Recently, the shop has been getting some attention by our local media. The Seattle Times, Kiro Radio 97.3 and the Kitsap Sun have all stopped by to inquire about typewriters. Mostly the conversation goes like this; Interviewer: "So, you repair old stuff nobody makes or wants." In unison Montgomery and Lundy: "Yep." Interviewer: "You and Mr. Montgomery seem quite taken with all this obsolete stuff, are you nuts?" In unison Montgomery and … [Read more...]

This Saturday a film crew was here interviewing Mr. Montgomery. Fun times! Mr. Montgomery was a bit tired by the time we left at 3PM. … [Read more...]

One of the small rooms in the back of the shop is my machine shop area. It has the typical drill press, a couple small lathes and a table top milling machine. Working in the room kinda drives me nuts every time I go to resurface a platen, use the arbor press to press on new rubber on paper rollers or drill out a broken screw. Mostly the nuts part is that there were (note the past tense) parts typewriters, 4 boxes of Mr. Montgomery's videos of … [Read more...]

I had a customer come in and ask for me to keep an eye out for a nice Corona 3 portable typewriter. "Of course", I said. Well, all I really needed to do was walk into the back of the shop. I had been meaning to go through the Corona's for a while so I could cull the parts machines and get them labeled with the dreaded RED tag (parts only).  I pulled them out and started going through them. There is ALWAYS something that needs fixing which is why … [Read more...]

Mr. Montgomery was in the shop Friday, March 11, and was in fine spirits. Two years ago the Mayor of Bremerton honored Mr. Montgomery for his decades of community service. I have the plaque on the wall of the shop. Here is what the Mayor said of him: On November 12, 1942, Robert "Bob" Montgomery was invited to join the United States Army by none other than President Franklin Delano Roosevelt himself and so left the Puget Sound to fight in … [Read more...]

I love typewriter stuff. I mean all those things that are not specifically typewriters yet are part of our typosphere; typewriter ads, t-shirts, award pins, stationary, pencil sharpeners, even rubber stamps. I was surfing eBay this week and saw these two pins that I just HAD TO HAVE. Enjoy. … [Read more...]

I do a lot of rubber replacement on the older machines. Show me a machine from the 1930's and earlier, and I'll almost always need to replace rubber feet, washers, paper rollers and platens. Lately I've been thinking (as I'm scraping off the rubber from yet another roller core).  Most days in the shop is tinkering with the machines and lot of replacing rollers. I noticed that many of the manufacturers, over time, began to re-think paper … [Read more...]

Making copies! That's what I think every time I need to make a part for a typewriter. Today, I machined a piece that hangs from the right margin stop of a Royal HHE. This little thing hangs like a pendulum and activates the bell clapper. Yep, that's all it does. To make matters worse, it is an oblong shape that needs to balance freely. To compensate for the weight difference between the original steel part (being duplicated in brass) the … [Read more...]

With Mr. Montgomery only visiting the shop a couple times a week, it was time to make more of the shop my own. Mostly it is quite difficult to find parts and the right service manual without searching, searching, searching. Also, we are in a building shared with other tenants and the smell from oil and dirt soaked carpet wafts into the corridor. Even though our neighbors never complain, each time I get off the elevator onto our floor I can smell … [Read more...]

Occasionally, I publish some of Mr. Montgomery's musings edited only for grammatical errors. I really appreciate all that our Veterans have done for our Country, so this article is for today’s Veterans Day. Thank you, Mr. Montgomery. Battle of the Bulge - 1944 I wasn’t there - I was back at Headquarters in Versailles doing typewriters as usual. The following stories are second hand from acquaintances that seemed to know something about … [Read more...]