# Who uses a typewriter anymore?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [June 16, 2006, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940 "2006-06-16T16:22:37Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@powerjacob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/powerjacob)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/1 "2006-06-16T16:22:37Z")
Even though I am considered young, in some circles, I learned to type using a typewriter. Though I use email, a friend of mine and I send corespondence via “snail mail” using old manual typewriters that we have had over the years. I use either an Underwood, or portable Roayal depending on which one I feel like typing on. Do the kids today still learn to type on typewriters or has that too gone to the way of computer? I know some offices keep one handy for certain forms and documents (especially if they use carbon copy paper), but who still uses typewriters for letters and general writing purposes?
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### Author:  [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/2 "2006-06-16T16:41:06Z")
I’ve got a typewriter from the 50’s in my room that I like to bang away on from time to time (it makes me type slow enough so I can actually think about what I’m writing), but I rarely use it for correspondance purposes. Handy for filling out forms though. My mom has a newer electric typewriter that I can’t stand, always humming loudly and being noisy as all get-out.
But yeah, mostly I type on the computer. I also learned to type on a computer, but since the keyboard layout is the same, that still worked for me with typewriters (I just have to remind myself that I can’t do 100WPM on my trusty mechanical typewriter)
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### Author:  [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/3 "2006-06-16T16:42:27Z")
I, too, learned to type on a typewriter: a manual. So I still pound away at the keyboard like Ros Russell in _His Girl Friday_, and I wear the letters off the keys rather quickly. I have a 1920s Underwood at home I’d love to use for envelopes and labels, but it needs some repair. I could find someone in NYC who still repairs typewriters, I imagine: but you know how much those things _weigh_, how the hell would I get it into the city and back home?!
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### Author:  [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/4 "2006-06-16T16:53:06Z")
I learned on typewriters (my first was a Royal I used in college, though I had learned in high school). In my day, when you went to college, your parents bought you a typewriter; now, they buy a computer.
I still have a very heavy touch on the keys, though I haven’t used a manual typewriter in at least 30 years. But I don’t use one at all these days.
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### Author:  [@ENugent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ENugent)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/5 "2006-06-16T17:46:47Z")
I used one to take my bar exam a few months ago. It’s a pain in the butt to locate a typewriter with a Dvorak keyboard and no memory capabilities, let me tell you! (It’s a Silver Reed that was surplus at Ohio State.)
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### Author:  [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/6 "2006-06-16T17:49:18Z")
They’ll get my IBM Selectric II when they take it from my cold dead hands.
I’ve had young adults ask me “Is that a typewriter?” and child ask “What is that?” Little child can’t get over how they can SEE what they typing as they type it.
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/7 "2006-06-16T17:51:10Z")
Since the OP is looking for shared opinions, etc. let’s move this from General Questions.
**samclem** GQ moderator
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### Author:  [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/8 "2006-06-16T17:51:14Z")
My dentist’s office has no computers at all and all typing is done on a typewriter. We still use them in our office for the occasional form that has yet to be put into Adobe or Word. I still own two myself but my old Underwood needs some work. Where does one buy ribbons these days?
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### Author:  [@xicano69](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xicano69)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/9 "2006-06-16T17:55:12Z")
Since the OP did not specify country, I’ll say based on my experience in Mexico, they are still used in governmental offices by secretaries, though a good number are the electric type. There is a push to phase 'em with new computers, but typewriters are still cheaper to maintain than a computer.
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### Author:  [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/10 "2006-06-16T18:15:09Z")
My office uses a typewriter for forms and individual envelopes. I had to use it the other day, and it was the first time I had to use a typewriter in about 15 years.
Robin
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### Author:  [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/11 "2006-06-16T18:19:18Z")
While I learned to type on one (electric though), and am fairly good, I hate them and will never use them again if I can avoid it. I’m glad I learned the skill, though.
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/12 "2006-06-16T19:27:01Z")
Lots of people still use them - at the library we still have three coin op ones and they get a decent amount of use. Administration is talking about doing away with them because they’re always broken and nobody really knows how to fix them and it’s a huge pain all around, but I think the service is still necessary. I’d like them to just take the coin boxes off and make them free.
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### Author:  [@PoorYorick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PoorYorick)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/13 "2006-06-16T19:55:49Z")
Somebody at work put an old rusty Underwood typewriter on a filing cabinet in my office, and placed a sign on it that said “PoorYorick’s Word Processor.”
Damn whippersnappers.
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### Author:  [@boytyperanma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boytyperanma)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/14 "2006-06-16T22:25:56Z")
I still use one in my office. My company is a good 50-60 years old. All are customer data cards are 3x5s. It is just much easier to add lines with a typewriter. Some day we will put the database on a computer but no ones volenteering to enter it in.
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### Author:  [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/15 "2006-06-16T23:26:11Z")
> [@boytyperanma](#):
>
> Some day we will put the database on a computer but no ones volenteering to enter it in.
I would do this – I love to type, whether it’s on a typewriter or a computer keyboard. When I’d get bored at work, I’d find something to retype, just for the fun of it.
Last time I used a typewriter was last fall at work, typing a multi-carbon order form – only it wasn’t carbon paper, it was that newfangled stuff. 🙂
That typewriter died. It was the last one in the building (community college). They tossed it.
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### Author:  [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)
#### Post date: [June 17, 2006, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/16 "2006-06-17T00:57:05Z")
I have an old Olivetti that I use occasionally to type plotting stuff onto index cards. Benefits (to doing this instead of writing): I will be able to read it days from now, and if I spill coffee on it it won’t run.
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### Author:  [@gabriela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gabriela)
#### Post date: [June 17, 2006, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/17 "2006-06-17T10:41:31Z")
We have two at my job, fancy electric models. We have them because death certificates are still a triplicate form with carbons. And Vital Records will not accept any typos or corrections.
Screw up one tiny letter of a non-intuitive 50-answer form, and it’s in the trash while you start a new one over.
I pine for the future time when death certificates will be on the computer where you can delete and backtrack and fix it all you like until it’s RIGHT, without using a typewriter.
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### Author:  [@Caractacus\_Pott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caractacus_Pott)
#### Post date: [June 18, 2006, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/18 "2006-06-18T01:40:45Z")
I, too, learned on manual typewriters and moved to word processing as soon as it was practical and haven’t looked back. I remember my first network admin job: I took it upon myself to make the typewriters obsolete. Surprised everyone in the office when, within a year of my arrival, the last typewriter was placed in the supply room as a backup.
My officemate has a Selectric with a wheel and types an envelope almost every week. I’m debating whether to show him how to do envelopes on his laser printer.
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### Author:  [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)
#### Post date: [June 18, 2006, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/19 "2006-06-18T01:47:13Z")
> [@powerjacob](#):
>
> Do the kids today still learn to type on typewriters or has that too gone to the way of computer?
Don’t think anyone’s really answered this yet:
In the US, I don’t imagine there are many, if any. In my not-affluent-but-not-poor not-tiny-but-not-huge high school, in the mid-to-late 90s, there were no typing classes which still used typerwriters. They were called “keyboarding” and used computers.
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### Author:  [@powerjacob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/powerjacob)
#### Post date: [June 18, 2006, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-uses-a-typewriter-anymore/360940/20 "2006-06-18T02:09:39Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#):
>
> Where does one buy ribbons these days?
The best place would be to go online or a office supply store other than Office depot or any other chain. A friend of mine found where he could buy a lot of it and so when I can’t type on a ribbon any more I respool it.
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