10. Germany

Now turn towards the 3 separate cabinets by the stairs where the history of German typewriters has been detailed. Thanks to the high standard of industrial precision engineering, Germany rapidly became a leader in European typewriter production. Strengthened at the turn of the century, it developed under the influence of the technically mature American typewriter industry. The first impulse towards mass production of typewriters came from the Hamburg sewing machine factory “Guhl & Harbeck”, which launched the first German typewriter, the Hammonia, in 1882. This pointer or print bar typewriter, which could easily be confused with a breadcutter, hardly got a foot in the market and is very rare today. The same company manufactured the “Kosmopolit” some years later which was popular primarily due to the beautiful letters similar to those printed in a book.