[GreenKeys] Telegrapher's "Mill"

[Derek Cohn/WB0TUA]

Hi Everyone,

As the resident "telegrapher" on this mailing list with precious little to contribute for teletype matters, I think I can help here.

Though I can't speak to the origin of the word "Mill", I can help with the definition.  A telegraph "mill" is an All Caps typewriter (which I collect in addition to telegraph instruments).  Telegrams were required to be typed in upper case and the railroads and Western Union furnished all caps typewriters for the purpose.  They came in a variety of flavors......some had shift keys and would type the same character when shifted no matter what key was pressed.  I have several that print a tilde whenever you hit a key when shifting.  Others, have no shift key at all.  Here is a photo of one in my collection and you can see there is no shift on either side of the keyboard.

http://www.mindspring.com/~vibroplex/mill.jpg

If the telegraph office also had to do billing, a standard typewriter was furnished and the morse op had to make sure to copy messages only in upper case.

Hope this helps!

Derek Cohn
Amateur Radio Station - WBØTUA
Morse Telegraph Club - Office UD, Sine DJ