SHORTHAND WRITING MACHINE

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 317, 31 May 1913, Page 9

SHORTHAND WRITING MACHINE

WONDERFUL, IF CORRECT. A competition was held in New York recently that should be of.interest to thousands of stenographers and students of shorthand. When the competition was concluded it was confidently predicted that the day of the shorthand writer was doomed to give way to that of "shorthand typewriters," with stenographers supplanted, as they were most decisively in the test, by a simple little stenographic typewriting machine which weighs only 81b, can be carried about as easily as a lunch box, and can record speed in plain and unmistakable typewritten letters of the alphabet at the rate of 592 words a minute—and upward. Two eager young girl stenographers from 1 the Outlook offices, where Colonel Theodore Roosevelt is generally credited with ability to use language at some speed, were confidently on hand to show the assembled students how rapidly, under such training, they could take dictation stenographically. Opposed to them were two operators on the new machine, the -stenotype—a young man and a girl i from Kentucky, where people speak in slow drawls and don't write much faster, and where, incidentally, the new machine was invented and manufactured. , Charles JVI. Miller, head of the school, explained to his students that he had sanctioned the demonstration simply in order that they might know 'what conditions of competition they would have to face •in the near future, and lie added that from his fetudy of the machine the outlook was all in favor of it and against the shorthand writers, unless they learned to .adapt themselves to the machine. J. M. Bowen, treasurer of the company which holds patent rights on the machine, dictated to the four competitors simultaneously matter new to them and supplied to him by Mr. Miller, First he read a letter of 99 words in 43sec. The girl stenographers, bending busily over their notes, followed him with flying pencils, Both announced proudly that they had racorded every word. The two operators on the machines, who had kept tlieir eyes fastened on the speaker's lips, and merely played as in a slow piano prelude upon the keys of their machines, announced that they had, too. A second letter of 143 words in oOsec. followed, with never a pause for breath. Both stenographers, looking first puzzled i and then flushed and no little vexed, dropped out long before it was over. The, machines, however, reeled off thenrecords easily, with scarcely a sound, and both operators, • reading from a narrow slip like- that of an adding machine, that curled out of the stenotype, repeated almost as fast as Mr. Bowen had dictated each and every word. Then followed a letter of ISO words in o9sec. taken by the machines. Both stenographers, by this time, packing up their note books and pencils and shaking hands frankly with their successful rivals, had made their exit. Another dictation of 186 words in 67sec. followed, and thereafter, each operator taking the typewritten record of the other, read it off as easily as were it his own and typewritten after the ordinary fashion. Next they took down, still noiselessly and with apparent ease, difficult dictation from technical specifications in an architect's letter at a rattling rate of speed; and finally, as a climax, hut with niore exertion this time, they took down from dictation so rapid that even those nearest the speaker could not distinguish a word, a letter familiar to them, repeated over and over for one minute. In that minute, by actual count, it was found they had typewritten shorthand records of 592 words. The previous regular shorthand record has been 267 words a minute.

The stenotype is a simple little mahine with a keyboard like that of a typewriter, but containing only 22 keys. The basis of its operation and recording is phonetic spelling. Unlike the typewriter, however, whicn requires a separate stroke for each letter, the stenotype print's a chord of several letters at each stroke, on the average of a word at each stroke, instead of the six strokes required on the average by a typewriter. This is accomplished by the peculiar system of dividing the keys. Seven of them at the left of the keyboard are used as initial consonants, and as there are only 14 possible initial consonants the other saven are supplied by arbitrary combinations of these seven keys, it being easily feasible to strike two letters with one finger. » The right side of the keyboard contains 10 final consonants, and the remaining eight final consonants possible in English speech are supplied by arbitrary combinations of some of these 7ft. Tn the centre of the keyboard are four vowel keys—A, E. 0. U—the letter I being supplied by a combination of E and U. These 22 keys and their combinations cover any possible combination of sounds, and with the addition of some 150 standard abbreviations constitute the sole system or code necessary for the operator of the stenotype to master. Numbers are recorded simply by using an asterisk in combination with various letters. i The advantages of the new system over and above ordinary stenography j were declared to be: That it is easier to master (the operators were said to have studied it only seven or eight months respectively), that it was absolutely free from the puzzling uncertainties and inaccuracies of a shorthand system of straight and curved lines, recording as it does in plain, typewritten letters of the alphabet; that the record so writen by any operator can be read by any other operator with equal ease; that in addition to accuracy and legibility it permits of a speed utterly beyond the limitations of shorthand systems heretofore in use. The new machine is not on the market for sale to the general public. It will be sold only through business schools to students who have qualified in a course of study and examination as competent operators. The inventor of the machine is W. S. Ireland, formerly a court stenographer.