TYPEWRITERS

When I was in elementary school, I was moved to the third floor of our house.  My two sisters shared the second bedroom in our house.  The house was a St. Louis style with two complete apartments with separate entrances.  On the third floor was two bedrooms and an attic.  My maternal grandparents lived in the second floor apartment. 

At one time, my father's sister, Rose, stayed in one of those upper rooms until she died there.  My mother's sister, Joyce, used one of the rooms for a while and, when I was very young, another relative lived up there.  When I moved to the third floor, I used one bedroom and the other was empty.

In that other bedroom, was a typewriter and a text book on how to type.  I think it had belonged to Joyce.  It was an old Underwood (see below).  Electric typewriters had not been invented yet.  In any case, while in the 7th or 8th grade, I began teaching myself how to type.  I actually got pretty good at it.  As a freshman in high school, I had a typing class for half a year and was ahead of the rest of the class.  Then, in the army, I again had a typing class - still no electric.  In Vietnam, I used a typewriter quite often - still not an electric. 

I'm comfortable typing on this computer, these days.  I'm afraid I still try to strike the keys too heavily because of my history with pounding the manual keys. 

.