Saturday, December 7, 2013

Keys to Electri-conomy

Promotional film by Remington Rand.   (Came across it on the Archive, hadn't seen it before there.)

A short (~25 mins) movie with lots of period office scenes, I'm guessing it is from around 1950. Also lots of typewriters of course with the machines being used in ernest; there would be of course - the reason of the whole movie is typewriters.

Even though the full 25 minutes of it tried to convince me of the merit of electrics, I still quite like the manuals.

But then I'm not needing them to do 'production typing'.

:)

6 comments:

  1. Quite interesting. And it is great to see an infomercial that doesn't have a dance beat or a pretty blond smiling at me.
    But gaaaaaaaaaaawd. Talk about blandness! I couldn't watch more than 5 minutes.

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    1. Scott, you should have stuck around for the titillating moment of flirtation between the Remington salesman and the boss's "girl."

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  2. Well, that was a delightful infomercial -- I watched the whole thing! I love the skeptical boss who complains about how people can't just work nowadays, they need to be HAPPY.

    Remington electrics are not terribly common; I think they lagged behind IBM. I noticed a little criticism of IBM in the film, where the salesman says that Remingtons have a normally banked keyboard (the IBM keyboard is pretty flat).

    What I would really love to find is a Remington Statesman, the proportional version (like the IBM Executive). I have never seen one for sale.

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  3. Like Richard said. This was delightful! If rather trying at times. Took me a while to catch on, and I'm still not sure if some of what I found funny was intentional or not!

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  4. I was interested in the cast, wondering if they were established actors.Sure enough:

    Stewart Ballinger (the salesman) originally from Seattle, Stew married Rosemary "Wade" Ostrander in 1940.
    The newlyweds moved to Honolulu just in time for the bombing of Pearl Harbor.
    Stew volunteered for the Navy following the attack and served as the combat flight director on the USS Enterprise.
    After the war, the couple moved to Los Angeles, where Stew pursued a career as a performer in musical theatre.
    Passed away, July 19, 2010, aged 95.

    Paul McVey (the Boss)

    Paul McVey (the Boss) was born on March 17, 1898 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He is known for his work on Shane (1953),
    Force of Evil (1948) and Drums Along the Mohawk (1939). He died in 1973

    Curt Conway

    Curt Conway (Head of the typing pool) born May 4, 1915 – died April 10, 1974) was an American actor. He was sometimes billed as Curtis Conway or Kurt Conway.
    Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Conway began his career with small parts in films of the late 1940s, but appeared principally on TV from 1960 until his death.

    Helen Wagner (the secretary) was born on September 3, 1918 in Lubbock, Texas, USA. She was an actress, known for The Guiding Light (1952), As the World Turns (1956) and Valiant Lady (1953). She was married to Robert Willey. She died on May 1, 2010 in Mount Kisco, New York, USA.
    (Steve K)

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