For decades, the rhythmic click-clack and metallic slide of a carriage united offices, courtrooms and newsrooms everywhere. When computers took over, the typewriter was relegated to nostalgia – it was a relic of another age. Yet, the machine that once symbolised modernity, has returned as a quiet rebellion against speed, distraction and the digital blur.
Across continents, typewriters are being dusted off, repaired and used once more. Repair shops are reopening, “type-ins” are being organised, and younger artists and writers are rediscovering the thrill of pressing inked keys to paper. What the digital world tried to replace has become its most surprising antidote.
The story began in 1868, when Christopher Latham Sholes patented the first typewriter in Milwaukee and devised the QWERTY layout we still use today. Within decades, the machine transformed how people worked and communicated. By the early 1900s, typewriters were fixtures in homes and offices; by the 1980s, they had grown into a billion-dollar global industry.
In India, the typewriter became a symbol of aspiration. Typing institutes sprouted across cities, producing clerks and stenographers for government offices and courts.
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