The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1912-12-11

About Six Months-A Most Interest
ing Demonstration.
A competition was held recently in
New York business school that should
be of interest to thousands of stenog-
rapherS and students OF shorthand. of
whom there have been graduated from
business schools throughout the coun-
try an average of 100000 year.
When the competition was concluded it
was confidently predicted that the day
Of the shorthand writer was doomed IN
give way to that OF shorthand type.
writers, with stenographers supplEnt-
ed. as they were most deCisively in the
test, by a simple little stenographic
typewrlting machine that weighs only
eight pounds, can be carried as easily
as a lunch box and record speech in
plain and unmistakable typewriter let
ters of the alphabet at the rate Of J92
words minute and upward.
Two eager young girl stenographers
from the outlook offices, where Colonel
Theodore Roosevelt is generally cred.
tied with ability to use language at
| some speed, were confidently on hand
to show the assembled students how
rapidly under such training they could
take dictation stenOgraphically. Op.
| posed to them We're two operators
who manipulated the new machine-a
young man and girl from Owens
boro, Ky, where people speak delib-
| erately and don't write much faster
and where incidentally the new ma
chine was invented and manufactured.
The two operators on the machines
who had kept their eyes fastened on
the speakers lips and merely played
as in Il slow piano prelude upon the
keys OF their machines, announced that
they had too. A second letter of l43
words in fifty seconds followed. with
never pause for breath. Both stenog-
raphers, looking first puzzled and then
flushed and no little vexed, dropped
out long before it was over.
Too Swift For the Stenos.
Then followed a letter of $50 words
in fifty-nine seconds taken by the ma
chimes. Both stenographers by this
time packing up their notebooks and
pencils and shaking hands frankly with
! their successful rivals, had made their
exit. Another dictation Of 1856 words
in sixty-seven seconds followed, and
thereafter each operator taking the
typewriter record of the other, read it
off as easily as were it his own and
typewriter after the ordinary fashion.
Next they took down, still noiseless-
ly and with apparent ease, difficult
dictatiOn from technical specifications
in an architects letter at rafting rate
Of speed. And finally, as a climax, but
with more exertion this time, they took
down from dlctation so rapid that even
those nearest the speaker could not
distinguish word a letter familiar to
them, repeated over and over for one
minute. In that minute, by actual
count, it was found they had typewrit-
ten shorthand records of 592 words
The previous regular shorthand record
has been 267 words a minute.
The new device is simple little ma
chine with keyboard like that of
Typewriter, but containing only twenty.
two keys. The basis of its operation
and recording is phonetic spelling. I'm
like the typewriter, however which re-
quires Il separate stroke for each let
ter, the machine prints a chord of
several letters at each stroke, on the
average a word at each stroke instead
of the six strokes required on the av-
erage by typewriter
How the Keys Are Divided.
This is accomplished by the peculiar
system OF dividing the keys. Seven of
them, at the left Of the keyboard, are
used as initial consonants, and as there
are only fourteen possible initial con
sonunts the other seven are supplied
by arbitrary combinations of these sey-
en- keys, it being easily feasible to
strike two letters with one finger
The right side of the keyboard con
tains ten final consonants, and the re,
naming eight final consonants possible
in English speech are supplied by ar
| bitrary combinations of some of these
ten. In the center of the keyboard are
four vowel keys-A, Il, o, 1.-THE letter
| being supplied by a combination of
Il and L.
These twenty-five keys and their
combinations cover any possible combi-
nation Of sounds and with the addition
of some 100 standard abbreviations
constitute the sole system or code nee
essary for the operator of the machine
TO master Numbers are recorded sim
ply by using an asterisk in combination
with various letters.
The advantages of the new system
over ordinary stenography We're de
clared to be: That II is easier to mas
ter 0he operators in the test were said
TO have studied it only seven and eight
months, respectively; that 1t was abso-
lutely free from the puzzling uncertain
ties aud inaccuracies OF a shorthand