Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Olympia typewriters

S.L. Mayer (Editor).  Signal.  Years of Retreat 1943-44.
Jet Tales.  The Lufthansa Magazine.  4/78.
Olympia was founded in Germany in 1903.  After the Second World War, their factory was taken over by the Soviets, but some employees managed to escape to the west to re-start the company.   By the early 60's, they were providing almost half of all the typewriters used in that country.  Considered the Mercedes-Benz of typewriters, they weren't cheap either:  in 1964, an Olympia SM7 cost $142.50, over $1,000 in today’s currency!  The company was innovative, producing a model with the Dvorak keyboard, but just couldn't compete against the computer revolution and shut its doors in 1992.

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