memory typewriter

An early typewriter that held a few pages of text in its memory and provided limited word processing functions. With a display screen of only one or two lines, editing was tedious.

One of the First Memory Typewriters

Its memory wasn't made of magnetic cores or semiconductors. Text was first punched into player piano-like rolls with a typewriter/perforator. As the rolls passed over slots in a bar in this machine, a valve opened and negative pressure in a hose collapsed a small bellows that pulled down the typewriter key. (Image courtesy of TMC/Compco, Inc.)

The AUTO-TYPIST Perforator

Typing on this machine recorded the text by punching holes in the rolls. (Image courtesy of TMC/Compco, Inc.)

An Ad for "Automatic Typing"

This explains the fabulous AUTO-TYPIST procedure for the prospective customer. Throughout the 1940s and up until the mid-1970s, AUTO-TYPIST machines like this one from the American Automatic Typewriter Company provided reliable document processing. (Image courtesy of TMC/Compco, Inc.)