You probably think the typewriter was a single "aha!" moment. It wasn't. Honestly, the history of the Sholes and Glidden typewriter is a messy, sprawling saga of failed prototypes, ink-stained fingers, and a whole lot of skeptical investors who thought the device was a total joke. People had been trying to build "writing machines" since the early 1700s—Henry Mill got a British patent in 1714—but those early attempts were basically glorified, oversized stamps that moved slower than a tired scribe with a quill.
The Sholes and Glidden typewriter was different. It actually worked. Sorta.
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It was 1867 in a small machine shop in Milwaukee. Christopher Latham Sholes, a local politician and editor, wasn't even trying to change the world at first. He just wanted a way to number the pages of blank books and tickets. But along with his buddies Samuel Soulé and Carlos Glidden, he realized that if you could stamp a number, you could probably stamp a letter. This realization didn't lead to instant fame. It led to a decade of frustration.
Why the Sholes and Glidden typewriter changed everything
Before this machine hit the market, if you wanted to send a professional letter, you wrote it by hand. If your handwriting was bad? Too bad. The Sholes and Glidden typewriter, also known as the Remington No. 1, introduced the world to the idea that mechanical writing could be faster than the human hand. It didn't happen overnight, though.
Most people don't realize how clunky the first version was. It looked like a sewing machine. Literally. E. Remington & Sons, the company that ended up manufacturing it, was a firearms and sewing machine company. They used a foot pedal to return the carriage. Imagine sitting at your desk, typing away, and having to pump your foot like you're working a Victorian loom just to start a new line. It’s wild to think about now, but that was the cutting edge of 1874 technology.
Then there’s the keyboard.
The QWERTY Myth vs. Reality
We have to talk about QWERTY. You’ve heard the legend that it was designed to slow typists down because the keys kept jamming. That is mostly true, but it's a bit more nuanced. Sholes didn't want to annoy people; he wanted to solve a mechanical physics problem.
In the original Sholes and Glidden typewriter, the typebars (the metal arms with the letters on them) hung in a circular "basket" underneath the roller. When you hit a key, the bar swung up and hit the paper. If you hit two keys that were right next to each other too fast, the arms would get tangled like a pair of deer with locked antlers.
Sholes spent years rearranging the letters. He didn't just guess. He looked at letter frequency and "bigrams"—pairs of letters that often appear together in English, like "TH" or "ST." By separating these common pairs, he gave the mechanical arms enough time to fall back down before the next one swung up.
It wasn't about making humans slower. It was about making the machine capable of keeping up with humans at all.
The Blind Typing Problem
Here is the weirdest part: you couldn't see what you were typing.
The Sholes and Glidden typewriter was a "blind writer." Because the typebars hit the bottom of the cylinder (the platen), the characters were hidden from view. If you made a typo, you wouldn't know until you finished the page and cranked the paper up to look at it. Can you imagine writing a 2,000-word report today without seeing the screen? It sounds like a nightmare. But back then, it was a miracle.
Mark Twain and the $125 Gamble
Mark Twain was the first major author to buy one of these things. He paid $125 for it in 1874—which was an insane amount of money back then, roughly $3,500 in today's cash. He actually wrote a letter to the Remington company complaining about it later. He said it was "corrupting his morals" because it made him want to swear so much when it broke down.
Despite the swearing, he used a typewriter to submit the manuscript for Life on the Mississippi. He was an early adopter in the truest sense. He saw the potential for the Sholes and Glidden typewriter to revolutionize the business of being an author.
Why it took so long to catch on
Businesses hated it at first.
- It was way too expensive for the average clerk.
- The "all caps" look of the early machines was considered rude.
- Recipients of typewritten letters often felt insulted, as if the sender was implying they couldn't read handwriting.
- The mechanical noise was deafening in a quiet office.
The machine didn't really take off until the Remington No. 2 came out in 1878. That version added a "shift" key, allowing for both upper and lowercase letters. That was the game-changer. Once you could write "Dear Mr. Smith" instead of "DEAR MR. SMITH," the business world finally paid attention.
The Design Aesthetic: Floral Patterns and Iron
If you ever see a Sholes and Glidden typewriter in a museum (like the Smithsonian or the Milwaukee Public Museum), you’ll notice something strange. It’s covered in painted flowers.
Why?
Because the manufacturers were terrified that it looked too much like a weapon or a heavy industrial tool. They wanted it to feel like a piece of high-end furniture. They were marketing it to women, specifically hoping to create a new class of female office workers called "type-writers." (In the 1870s, the word "typewriter" referred to both the machine and the person operating it.)
This worked. The invention of this machine is arguably one of the biggest catalysts for women entering the professional workforce. It created a demand for a skill that didn't require heavy lifting or years of apprenticeship. You just needed nimble fingers and patience.
Nuance and Complexity: Was Sholes really "The" Inventor?
History loves a lone genius, but Sholes had plenty of help. Aside from Glidden and Soulé, there was James Densmore. Densmore was the aggressive, loud-mouthed financier who kept pushing Sholes to improve the design. Sholes was a modest guy; he often got discouraged and wanted to quit. Densmore was the one who kept saying, "Make it better."
There was also the influence of the "Pterotype," an earlier invention by John Pratt. Sholes saw a description of it in Scientific American and used it as inspiration. Then you have Rasmus Malling-Hansen’s "Writing Ball" from Denmark, which actually beat Sholes to market but looked like a pincushion and was way too complex to mass-produce.
The Sholes and Glidden typewriter won the race not because it was the first idea, but because it was the first manufacturable idea. It was the Ford Model T of writing.
Actionable Insights for History Buffs and Collectors
If you're interested in the origins of modern tech, the Sholes and Glidden typewriter is the ultimate case study in "V1" products. It shows that being first doesn't mean being perfect. It means being persistent enough to stay in the game until the market catches up.
- Check the Serial Numbers: If you ever stumble upon an old black metal machine with floral decals at an estate sale, look for the Remington branding. Real Sholes and Glidden units (1874-1878) are incredibly rare and worth thousands to collectors.
- Understand the Legacy: Look at your smartphone. The QWERTY layout you’re using to text right now is a direct 150-year-old hand-me-down from a guy in Milwaukee who was tired of his metal arms getting stuck.
- Visit the Source: The Milwaukee Public Museum holds the "Carl P. Dietz Collection," which is one of the best places to see the evolution from the Sholes prototype to the machines that eventually conquered the world.
The Sholes and Glidden typewriter didn't just change how we wrote; it changed how we thought. It moved us from the flowing, artistic era of calligraphy into the structured, standardized era of information. Every time you hit "Enter" or "Shift," you're interacting with a ghost from 1867.
To truly understand where we're going with AI and voice-to-text, you have to look back at that clunky, floral-painted iron box. It proved that any tool, no matter how loud or difficult to use, can change the world if it solves a fundamental human problem: the need to communicate clearly and quickly.