Monday, September 07, 2009

Sholes had just received a patent for a third invention, an improved pager, when Carlos Glidden, a fellow tinkerer at Kleinsteuber's shop, showed him an article in an 1867 Scientific American describing "a machine by which it is assumed that a man may print his thoughts twice as fast as he can write them and with the advantage of legibility, compactness, and neatness of print [invented by a] Mr. Pratt of Alabama. -- Cynthia Monaco: "The Difficult Birth of the Typewriter", American Heritage of Invention & Technology, Vol.4, No.1 (Spring/Summer 1988), pp.10-21.

Scientific American issued Mr. John Pratt's article on July 6, 1867 (cf. "Type Writing Machine", Scientific American, Vol.17, No.1 (July 6, 1867), p.3, l.1). The third invention of Mr. Christopher Latham Sholes, titled "Improvement in Numbering-Machines", was patented on November 13, 1866 (cf. U. S. Patent No.59675). It's impossible for Mr. Carlos Glidden to show the 1867 article to Mr. Sholes in 1866.

In fact Mr. Sholes started the development of Type-Writer when he received his second patent, titled "Improved Shoe-Blush", on August 14, 1866 (cf. U. S. Patent No.57168). In the same patent issue Mr. Sholes should have found a patent of Mr. Abner Peeler, titled "Machine for Writing and Printing" (cf. U. S. Patent No.57182).