The loud typing, the charming ringing when the line comes to an end, the sound when you press the line switch lever on a mechanical typewriter, or even the pressing of the keys on mechanical calculators. For some of Generation Z (and later), these mechanical devices seem almost prehistoric. However, until recently, they accompanied and determined people's daily lives in schools, universities, offices and even at home.

On the 6 August 2024 Dorotheum will be auctioning off for the first time a large collection of historical calculating machines and typewriters put together over a period of 55 years. Helmut Waldbauer, from Vienna, was a typewriter and calculator trader for decades. More than 200 items from his collection are now going up for auction.

Calculating machine rarities
The most valuable auction item is the Hahn’s calculator, a detailed replica from the end of the 19th/beginning of the 20th century by Johann Christoph Schuster (1795-1823). This rarity will go into the auction for €30,000. The Frenchman Thomas de Colmar started the world's first series production of calculating machines in 1850. His ARITHMOMETRE THOMAS DE COLMAR stepped cylinder machine, circa 1872, is available for as little as €1,800. The MILLIONÄR by the Swiss company Egli, ca. 1903, is valued at €1,400. A calculating machine from the first series of the Bunzel company in Vienna, ca. 1902, is expected to bring €1,200.

Prominent collector
Typewriters were also produced in different technical variants. The first patent dates back to the 18th century, with the first functioning devices appearing in the 19th century. In times of electronic e-mails and text messages, texts or letters written on typewriters have a special importance for many people.

The typewriter collector community can boast a Hollywood celebrity. Tom Hanks not only writes stories about typewriters, but also owns a not too insignificant collection.

Typing on a mechanical typewriter feels "like a gentler version of stone carving".  In his essay for the New York Times (3 August 2013), the film star writes: "Close your eyes as you touch-type on a vintage manual typewriter and you are a blacksmith, shaping sentences hot out of the forge of your mind.”

The Dorotheum auction offers, for example, the Kanzler Schnellschreibmaschine No. 4 (Germany 1910, € 600), the Stoewer 1 B Paul Grützmann (Germany 1905, € 900), the Mignon 2 pointer typewriter in decorative red with gold from 1904 (€ 500), or a Bar Lock 6 copper Columbia Typewriter, (USA 1887, € 700).

A design classic among typewriters - conceived in 1969 by none other than Ettore Sottsass - is most certainly the Olivetti Valentine. Early examples can be bought at auction for as little as €150. David Bowie also owned such a model, on which he is said to have written many of his song lyrics