[GreenKeys] [External] Can anyone ID these markings on an old TTY Print?

[Jones, Douglas W]

From: B Degnan via GreenKeys [greenkeys at mailman.qth.net] -- Monday, August 28, 2023 8:45 PM

> I was contacted by someone who asked if I could help ID markings on alledgedly TTY printouts here:
> https://vintagecomputer.net/temp/TTY_prints/

The type font and the slight vertical and horizontal misplacements of the letters are all consistent with the quality of type I get on my model 33.  (The model 32 has the same print mechanism).  Those machines came to market in the mid 1960s and only became common after 1965 or so.

The model 28 mechanism (and the model 35) was also subject to vertical and horizontal jitter because of resonance in the tendons that shifted the type box, so this could have been printed on one of those machines.  Model 28 was a workhorse in fairly widespread use at the time these wire service messages were sent.  The font used on the 28 was basically the same as on the 32, with gentle widening curves on the W and Y, and both the M and N frequently look a bit bow-legged.

So, I think it was actually printed on a Teletype.  I have no way to determine if it was printed in the 1960s or yesterday.

I do note that standard teletype paper from the 1960s was crummy newsprint.  That oxidizes to a brittle brown if not stored very well.  To have survived in the condition these pages are, the paper must have been filed tightly packed in a closed file cabinet.  Even then, I would expect the pages to be a bit brown around the edges.

The condition of the paper fibers on the tear line across the top makes me really suspicious.  They seem less brown than the general paper surface, suggesting that the paper was torn recently.  If this page had been stored in a tightly-packed file folder, the torn edge would have been exposed to more air than the paper surface and would be browner, on average.

The condition of the crease is also suspicious.  The outside of a crease would be more oxidized than the rest of the paper.

About the only way to store 1960s teletype paper to the present without serious oxidation would be in a sealed envelope.  That could, in theory, protect even the torn edge and creases.  But how many people in the 1960s put wire service stories in sealed envelopes as keepsakes?

My guess is that this in not printed on TTY paper from the 1960s, but on much newer (still old stock) paper.

                Doug Jones
                jones at cs.uiowa.edu