Smith Corona Portable Model 250 (1960)
Smith Corona Model 250 No. 6
First year of production: 1960 approx.
Serial No. 216061
The claim of a 1957 Ad campaign was dramatic; "Just touch the keys and you get perfect letters - electrically!"
But does "perfect letters" mean perfect character impressions? Or does it mean that the new futuristic electric typewriter is so clever it can almost type your letters for you? The ambiguity seems to be have been left in deliberately for the benefit of the scientifically naive 1950s audience at which it was aimed. If the students, housewives, and self-employed business people, who were Smith Corona's target, believed they were buying some kind of intelligent computing machine, then so much the better!
The possibility of putting an electric motor into a portable typewriter was high on the development agenda of every manufacturer since the 1930s but the same factor had deterred them every time the subject came up for discussion in the boardroom - cost.
Electrifying the typewriter would confer little real benefit but would make the machine heavier and much more expensive. Would domestic and small business users want to pay for such luxury?
In 1957, Smith Corona decided to bite the bullet and find out. It produced the world's first electric portable in two versions: the 5TE with a 10-inch carriage and the more expensive 5LE with a 12-inch carriage. Both cost significantly more than manual machines, although they were cheaper than a manual desk machine - a fact that Smith Corona made use of in its ads.
In the event, the buying public welcomed the electric portable, just as they had welcomed the folding portable 40 years earlier and within a few years, every major manufacturer had followed Smith-Corona's lead by introducing their own electric portables. Although manual portables continued to be made in numbers for a decade or more, it was the beginning of the end.
One final irony is that while the first portables, the Blick Featherweight of 1909 and Standard Folding of 1908, weighed only 5 pounds and could be held in one hand, the Smith Corona Electric Portable weighed a whopping 24 pounds -- more than desk typewriters made from cast iron, like the Hammond and the Imperial A. The years of striving to reduce weight to a minimum had all been in vain.
History of Smith Corona:
Before the Smith brothers helped change the world with typewriters, they manufactured firearms. Noticing that some of the mechanical processes and manufacturing techniques employed at the firearms factory mirrored those present in the emerging production of typewriters, Alexander T. Brown, an inventor working for the brothers, approached them with his own mechanical typewriter design.
In 1886, Lyman Cornelius (LC) Smith, Wilbert Smith, Hurlbut W. (HW) Smith, and Monroe C. Smith founded the Smith Premier Typewriter Company, in order to produce Brown's forward-thinking dual-case typewriter design.
The Smith brothers' typewriter business went through some reconfigurations and changes to its name in the decades that followed, and, in 1926, L. C. Smith & Bros. merged with the Corona Typewriter Company. The combination of LC Smith's durable office typewriters and Corona's popular portable machines made the new firm an industry leader and helped them to remain profitable even during the Great Depression.
In the 1970s and 80s, Smith Corona developed innovations for typewriter cartridges, ribbons, electronic typewriters, and word processors.
It led the way in the word processing industry, creating spell-check and other technologies that were later used in personal computers. Unfortunately, the PC revolution virtually eliminated the need for the product that had made Smith Corona famous and several restructurings and buyouts resulted. As the typewriter market collapsed in the 1980s-2000s, Smith Corona's leadership looked for a new product line and found that it was a natural transition to bring our expertise at putting ink on paper to the thermal label industry.
Today, Smith Corona has poured its print know-how into the label market. The result is innovative, long-lasting thermal labels at surprisingly low prices. No one knows labels like Smith Corona. And since we manage our supply chain in-house, we avoid the middlemen and pass on incredible savings to our customers.
Fast-forward to 2019, and Smith Corona has now established itself as an industry leader in production of blank 4x6 labels. In fact, Smith Corona is now the largest thermal label manufacturer that makes their own adhesive and sells factory direct. With a facility over 600,000 sqft. in size, more than 15 printing presses, and 2 adhesive kettles, Smith Corona is poised to dominate the thermal label market for years to come.
1887
Smith Brothers form the Smith Premier Typewriter Company.
1907
"L.C. Smith & Bros. Model No. 2", was released. Which was an odd beginning because, a full year later, they released the "Model No. 1".
1910
November 5, 1910 L.C. Smith passes away at the age of 60. A true American innovator and industrialist.
1914
Construction of the Smith Tower begins, one of the world's first skyscrapers in Seattle, Washington.
1942
During World War II, the company did its part to support the war effort. Producing bomb fuses, M1903-A3 bolt-action rifles, M-209 Hagelin-style portable cipher machines, ammunition, and most importantly, they continued to produce typewriters.
1957
First electric portables hit the market and are a huge hit of hollywood starlets and consumers alike.