Today in Science History - Quickie Quiz

Christopher Latham Sholes

(14 Feb 1819 - 17 Feb 1890)

American inventor who developed the first practical typewriter, but being unable to create a market for it, sold the rights to the Remington Arms Company for $12,000.

Short biography of Christopher Latham Sholes >>

Christopher Latham Sholes

First Typewriter Patent Model - Top View

(source)

This is a top view, showing the brass disk, slotted and connected with the type bars, also the platen, consisting of a metal bar rigidly fastened to the frame of the machine, and extending to the center of the aperture in the disk with sufficient common surface for each letter to strike at a common center; also showing the flat paper frame moving beneath the ribbon and platen, the paper being clamped at each corner of the frame. The ribbon movement apparatus having been lost or mislaid is not shown on the model. It consisted of spools fastened on each side of the frame, attached to the carriage movement in such manner as to move and present a fresh surface with each stroke of the key, and automatically reversing when the end of the ribbon was reached.

Text and image from Charles Edward Weller, The Early History of the Typewriter (1918), 81-82 (source)

See also:

Science Quotes by Christopher Latham Sholes.
14 Feb - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Sholes's birth.
Christopher Latham Sholes - First Typewriter Patent Model - Side View
Grave of Christopher Latham Sholes - Early Photo Showing Only Cemetery Lot
Christopher Latham Sholes - Home of the First Typewriter
Christopher Latham Sholes - Letters to the First User of his Typewriter
Christopher Latham Sholes - Colorized photograph.
Christopher Latham Sholes - Photograph in sepia tone
The Early History of the Typewriter - The first user of the first Sholes typewriter describes the inventor, and his own experience of Sholes’ new invention and its development.
Sholes Grave Memorial - The copper plaque reads: Christopher Latham Sholes 1819 – 1890 “The Father of the Typewriter” Dedicated by The Young Men and Women of America In Grateful Memory of One Who Materially Aided in the World’s Progress.
The Typewriter: An Illustrated History, by Typewriter Topics. - book suggestion.
Booklist for Typewriter History.

Nature bears long with those who wrong her. She is patient under abuse. But when abuse has gone too far, when the time of reckoning finally comes, she is equally slow to be appeased and to turn away her wrath. (1882) -- Nathaniel Egleston, who was writing then about deforestation, but speaks equally well about the danger of climate change today.

Carl Sagan: In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion. (1987) ...(more by Sagan)

Albert Einstein: I used to wonder how it comes about that the electron is negative. Negative-positive—these are perfectly symmetric in physics. There is no reason whatever to prefer one to the other. Then why is the electron negative? I thought about this for a long time and at last all I could think was “It won the fight!” ...(more by Einstein)

Richard Feynman: It is the facts that matter, not the proofs. Physics can progress without the proofs, but we can't go on without the facts ... if the facts are right, then the proofs are a matter of playing around with the algebra correctly. ...(more by Feynman)