I found a little shop on Main Street in Plainfield that repairs typewriters. My youngest daughter Phoebe and I had so much fun typing a few notes and then watching my niece and nephews type on my 1946 black hunk of Smith Corona, that I decided it would be even more fun with a tuneup and a new ribbon.
After making an appointment with Nichols Business Equipment, my husband asked me to also take his late father’s typewriter, which carefully sat protected in its wooden leather case, to be tuned up.
On a piece of square note paper taped to the inside of the case read: “This typewriter was used by Jack Mangas during his high school years (1942-46) and was used — he thinks — at the Red 73 Creamery before that time.”
The vintage early-1930s Smith Corona machine is a rare burgundy color with shiny gloss paint finish and gold metallic keys and decal.
The same typewriter R. Jack Mangas used to type his papers at Purdue University, where he roomed with Virgil “Gus” Grissom — before Jack married Carmen and Gus married Betty. Oh, if these ol’ typewriters could talk.
We might be glad that they don’t. My hubby Steve, and third son of Jack and Carmen, toted the fresh-ribboned machine to surprise 89-year-old Carmen.
“You would have thought she saw an old friend,” Steve later remarked. “Although I do remember she felt like cussing it a few times when it was behaving poorly while she used it to prepare her manuscripts for mailing.”
After setting her old friend next to her computer, where she does her 2018 writing, Carmen quickly inserted a piece of paper under the roller, and turned the roller knob counterclockwise — like a pro.
She quickly typed:
All good things come to an end, said the pessimist.
Smiling, she looked at us over her shoulder and noted: “Do you remember that white-out we used to have to use?”
Then she continued typing.
I used to think I would be a famous writer.
We left the typewriter for Carmen to play with.
