The Typewriter

I already mentioned some basic history about the typewriter in the previous post, but here are some photographs to check out.

This is the Hansen Writing Ball -- 1870, the first typewriter manufactured commercially.

This is the Prototype of the Sholes and Glidden typewriter, 1873, the first commercially successful typewriter, and the first with a QWERTY keyboard. This was not a small, easily transferable object.

However, by 1910, mechanical (or manual) typewriters were fairly common, fully equipped with a type bar -- what you see below.  It was significant because it introduced the shift key, and soon in 1917, a noiseless design enabling the typist to type quietly. Commercially, and ironically, it didn't sell very well. Customers seemed to prefer it's "clickity-clack."

What "The Crime of the Century" Would've Looked Like In Court

This first photograph is, I think, the most telling publication for our purposes. 

First a couple of givens: the people in the first photograph are all men, they are all sitting, which leads me to believe that this photo was not staged. However, there's no crowd, so it was either a private, unpopular trial or they are on break. There are several pitchers of what I'm assuming is water, and most of the men are relaxed and non aggressive.  

Now, looking at the picture from the left to right: there is a man sitting all my his lonesome. Why is he so far away? I don't know. He is sitting behind a desk which appears to have nothing on it (or it could be very thin, like paper) and his hand is raised, my guess holding a pen or a cigar; neither would be uncommon. The men at the left table are sitting around a row of books. The judge is clearly at the top center of the photograph with a gavel and something else that I can't make out.  

The only other men of interest are the two partially hidden. One is obviously behind the same barrier as the judge. He's interesting because one would assume that he's on the stand for questioning. However, unless someone took a picture while they were in the middle of trail (which I suppose is possible), why is he on the stand now? If you look to the other side of the judge, there is an empty chair, raised so that the whole court room can view it. This is where I assume the real questioning went on. So what does that make the man behind the banister? Perhaps he is the scribe (or we know this person now as the stenographer), but if so, his instrument is hidden. The man slightly downstage of him is the only one slightly hidden, and although he is facing the correct direction and at the correct position in the room to be the scribe, I'm assuming that since we cannot see an instrument in front of him (which we would if there were one), he is not. The question still remains... how did they record happenings in the court room? 

Facts

• My guess is the stenograph machine. Created by Ward Stone Ireland, this method of recording speech was commercially feasible circa 1906.
• The typewriter was invented in 1870; it was used by writers and businesses, however I haven't yet found any substantial evidence that proves that they were used in court rooms.
  *(Fun fact: According to the U.S. Census in 1910, 81% of typists were females, so it wasn't uncommon for them to be decorated in a floral pattern. OooOOoo)*
• At the turn of the century in the UK, trial proceedings were not consistently recorded. Often times, newspaper reporters would cover the trial in more detail than any scribe in the court and even then, the lower priority cases were not covered at all. Of the few that were in fact indexed, records were handwritten (often difficult to read and difficult to understand due to the use of unfamiliar legal terms).

 This photograph was taken in Richmond, Indiana in 1895. It was the longest jury trial in the U.S. to date, lasting from Jan 2 - May 10.

This next photograph is of the espionage trial of Captain Alfred Dreyfus at Rennes, France in 1899.

This in an engraving by D.H. Friston for Gilbert & Sullivan's "Trial by Jury," 1875.

 

What is The Little Girl playing with on the ship?

A box that she has keepsakes in, maybe it was an old cigar box...

 

...a handmade wooden wagon, miniature rocking horse, carved dog...

...or a wooden dreidle if it was the only thing they could manage to bring.

Dolls were very common, and with Teddy Rosevelt in office, Teddy Bears became a fast favorite.

 

 

These are examples of toys popular in the early 1900s that The Little Girls would have never had the money to have, it is possible however that The Little Boy might have owned them.

The Emergence of the Camera

The first photograph was taken c.1817, however the photographs were not permanent and eventually faded away.  In 1827, photographs were taken by coating a pewter plate with bitumen and exposing the plate to light. Where the light struck, the bitumen hardened, thus making the unhardened area dissolve away.

In the 1840s and 50s, camera makers experienced with different types of plates, and in the 1870s wet plates soon rivaled dry plates in speed and quality.  Shortened exposure time which made candid photography possible (ie. paparazzi), necessitated another innovation: the mechanical shutter. By the turn of the century, built-in shutters were common for each camera. 

This is the "Victo" -- short for the Victorian plate camera.

The Century Camera, founded in 1900.


This is the Brownie and the Yale camera, circa 1900. George Eastman's first camera, the Kodak .2 Brownie Box camera, offered a fixed-focus lens and single shutter speed. First offered for sale in 1888, it was a huge hit with consumers because it was a new and exciting invention for a relatively low cost. It came pre-loaded with film for 100 exposures and introduced the concept of the snapshot, soon leading to the movie camera. 

Here's an advertisement for children to own cameras of their own.

Props for Act 1, Scene 2

If the Brother needs a prop, I thought it was very interesting to find out that ships in bottles were common toys at the turn of the century.  What an appropriate prop!

This is an advertisement for binoculars in the early 1900s and an example of such binoculars. Definitely a prop that Father would take much pride in.

He would also have a pocket watch and a high end piece of luggage.


 

If for any need we need to further establish the ship, we can roll on one of these...