The Collection: Remington Portable 2

The Classic Typewriter Page: Remington Portables

The Collection: Remington Portable 2 In the series "The Collection", published every Friday‚ we present the typewriters collected by maschinengeschrieben.blogspot.com. This time‚ it's a mysterious Remington Portable 2. In 1920, Remington released the Remington Portable, not the first portable typewriter, but the first with a standard keyboard and same functioanlities like the office machines. In 5 years, about 600'000 of them were made, it was a great sucress. In October l925‚ Remington released an improved model, of which about 300'000 were made within 3 years. It was this the Remington Portable 2, although Remington never officially called it so. But you'd better read this whole story over at Richard Polt's comprehensive page, linked below. Being the first design of its kind, the Remington Portable is a brilliant model. For example‚ to keep the machine flat (only a little more than 8 cm high)‚ the typebars must be raised before writing. Ingeniousl Or, since a carriage return lever has to be over everything else, it isn't a big one‚ but a small one at the left end of the carriage. I thought it would be diflficult to get used to that design‚ but it's actually pretty intuitive. The ribbon re- Verse is semi-automatic‚ I think it works automatis- ally‚ but can be apyyygy operated manually. There's even a lever to make the platen rotate freely. The typing feel is good, maybe a bit short', but I like it very much. The maohine is a bit noisy‚though The shift mechanism is a light carriage shift‚ mo- ving the carriage a bit up- and baokwards. This machine was initially sold by the Remington House of Anton Waltisbühl in?urich. Sadly, the warranty sticker has yellowed over the years and I can't read the date of purchase completely, but I'm tempted U> say it was the 17th of ?? I927, with the year not sure. And this would fit the machine: According to Richard's page, early Portable 2 may have the same decal "RemingtonPortable" as the l. Mine does. But then oomes the problem of the serial number: Vll52l2. That would mean it was manufactured in October 1928.