[GreenKeys] [External] Re: Model 31

[Jones, Douglas W]

From: Duncan Brown [duncanancy at earthlink.net] -- Tuesday, March 15, 2022 3:40 PM

> Teletype Corp didn't sell many to the military, so they put a sync motor
> in it and a carrying case and sold the M31 to Western Union, who leased
> them out to sports casters to do remote game reporting. 

When I was in college, Carnegie-Mellon U in Pittsburgh, between 1969 and 1973, I used to work lights for a fellow student who'd put together a stage lighting company that did lights for many touring groups that performed on campus.  A good number of our gigs were in the main University gym, typically Saturday night, and it was quite common to be setting up for a rock concert while some member of the press was packing up their gear from an afternoon basketball game.

On several occasions, I saw teletypes being packed up.  Always Model 32 ASR.  As a frequent user of Model 32 machines, I was always fascinated by the fact that these machines were virtually identical to the ones I used so much, except for the narrow 5-level tape.  The machines were always mounted on the full pedistal, typically strapped to a hand truck that apparently stayed wedded to the Teletype from the time of delivery to retrieval.

         Doug Jones
         jones at cs.uiowa.edu