A loyal reader clued me in to the fact that one of these was up for auction and I got it! My good friend Mr. Dale packed the damn thing up and shipped from CA to here.
It weighs about as much as my Underwood #5 and Oliver #9 combined. Now to try and get it working. Even by the dead-end technology standards of typewriters, this is an impressively odd device. Reports say that people using it could type as fast 20 wpm.
Below is a print from a set of type as is in that big tray in the bottom of the picture.
To vaguely understand why I have longed for one of these see this post here. To read about the far superior electric Chinese language typewriter, see here.
Collateral Damage 