THEY THINK—ALMOST

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 1 May 1926, Page 9

THEY THINK —ALMOST

gTJPER-TYPISTS performed amazing figure feats on electric typewriters at tlie business efficiency exhibition in the Central Hall, Westminster, reports the Daily Chronicle. As their fingers lightly touched the bars and levers of the £250 typewriters factory wagesheets were turned out like lightning. There was no counting. The electric control and hair-spring triggers did all that. Instead of a fatigued young typist having to strike keys and space bar over 40,000 times a day and return the paper carriage SSO times in seven hours for 50 letters, the electric ma-chine-did all the striking. If this exhibition is any criterion of the future the next generation will see the clerical staffs of big businesses simply directors of machines.

There were calculating machines, which added, subtracted, divided, and almost used “thinking” powers in their infinite calculations. Silent type-

MECHANICAL OFFICE AIDS

writers, machines for sealing envelopes •and stamping them at the rate of 250 a minute, and machines for postal franking, obviating the use of adhesive stamps, were other features. One of the most fascinating machines was the coin counter and sorter, first made for the Bank of England. The operator who demonstrated to a Daily Chronicle representative shot the silver load out on to a revolving leather band, and in a few seconds they were not merely stacked into denominations —from sixpences to half-crowns —but they could be checked at any point of the operation. Sorting can be done at the rate of £4OOO an hour, or over ££l a second. About 50,000 coins an hour can be dealt with and put into packets automatically. Card indexes, which give immediate reference by the simple method of pushing a needle into them, .and machines which post and balance ledgers, are also to be seen.