1872.05.15 English
May 15 1872 (in handwriting)[1]
MY DEAR BROTHER! THANK YOU SO MUCH TO YOU AND DEAR SWEET MOTHER FOR YOUR LETTERS. MOTHER’S COMMENTS AS REGARDS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE BALL AND THE TACHYGRAPH[2] ARE THE SAME AS MY OWN. THE ARTICLE IN ILLUSTRIERTE ZEITUNG GOT ME TWO ORDERS AND LOTS OF LETTERS WITH ENQUIERIES, GIVING ME ALMOST TOO MUCH TO DO. APART FROM THAT, WE ARE ALL VERY WELL, EXCEPT THAT WE ARE LONGING SO MUCH TO SEE ALL OF YOU DEAR PEOPLE.
PLEASE MAKE DO WITH THIS SHORT LETTER FOR NOW –‘IT’LL GET BETTER T‘MORROW’[3] . YOUR VERY BEST BROTHER _ JOHN IS ALSO THE BEST!. R.MALLING HANSEN.
[4]
.....................................................
(there are also a couple of pages with short sentences):
VERY BEST REGARDS TO DEAR SWEET MOTHER AND DEAR BROTHER JOHN. R. MALLING HANSEN.
(and then with a very different and smaller font – typed on a different writing ball):
katerine hansen juliane marie katherine hansen
[1] CB: This is a letter typed on an unusual square paper format. It features two different fonts, hence it must have been typed with two different writing balls. There is an entire page with samples of letters and signs. SA: I think the oldest of Malling-Hansen’s daughters, Juliane, has been allowed to type her name on her father’s letter. Maybe it is she who has “written” a whole page of letters too? In 1872 she was 6 years old.
[2] JMC: Tachygraphy = shorthand, especially the ancient Greek and Roman handwriting used for rapid stenography and writing.
[3] CB: Here RMH is using a dialectical expression – possibly from <place w:st="on">Lolland</place> ? Note that the writing ball features quotation marks; I don’t remember having seen that before.
[4] CB: The next page contains only letters and digits, probably in order to show what signs and characters are on the writing ball. Apart from the alphabet – minus Æ and Ø (written instead as
Ä and Ö) – but including the letter Å - it also features W, J, Ü, Ö and Ä - and all digits 1 to 9 as well as the following special characters:
Omega! (Greek letter used for instance for chemical formulas; shaped like an ‘O’ with an open base) It is not featured on my pc!
& - and
The specific Danish type of quotation marks – two horizontal ‘v’s (not featured on my pc)
? – question mark
! – exclamation mark
: - colon
; - semicolon
, - komma
. – full stop
___________ underlining
////////////// slash
In other words, this model features 52 keys! Perhaps also a space bar?? How was the spacing done on the writing ball?
SA: I have never written a letter on a writing ball, but I have noticed that on many of the pictures we have of writing ball keyboards, there is one key that is blank, without any letter or sign engraved. Maybe this is the space bar? The models below, are of different types and from different times - but they have a blank key on the keyboard in common! (Photos: Dieter Eberwein)
