LOST ART
Meet one of the last masters of typewriter repair.
IT LOOKS LIKE a typical suburban house tucked away in the Laurentian Hills area of Kitchener. The only clue that you are in the right spot is a handwritten note taped around the doorbell that reads “Press this button for Manfred ‘the typewriter guy.” >>
They are sick of technology and want a basic machine that will work when their computer or printer goes down. A typewriter is like insurance.
>> People from all over travel to Manfred Aulich’s modest home with the hope that he will be able to fix their broken typewriters. That’s because he is one of the few people left in Canada, and one of the few people in southern Ontario, who is still repairing the machines.
It’s a trade that is dying out at a time when the demand is on the rise, making this 67-year-old a busy man.
“There’s definitely a trend in people restoring typewriters,” says Aulich. “There’s no one else doing it and people are desperate to get their typewriters fixed so I’m getting more and more business.”
So what’s spurring the sudden jump in people wanting to repair old typewriters? For years Aulich’s business came mostly from company offices, but in the last few years he has had a new type of customer ringing his door bell.
“It seems the younger generation is going into their grandparents’ basements, finding old relics and wanting to restore them,” he says. “It’s getting harder and harder to buy typewriters. You used to be able to go out and find typewriters on the curb, but now they are becoming more and more precious. They are antiques and people like to have them.”
Essentially the more rare these manual typewriters become, the more valued they are and the more eager people are to restore them.
Aulich began noticing younger people taking an interest in typewriters about four years ago when a young woman came to him with three antique typewriters in need of repair. The machines were made in the mid-to-late 1920s and she wanted to have them at her wedding for the guests to use to type out their names and well wishes in the guest book.
“The machines were so old and so complex,” says Aulich. “I had to teach her how to use them and how to set the margins manually.”
This younger generation not only wants to restore the machines because they are antiques, but they also enjoy the novelty of them. For many, computers are the only machines they have ever typed on. But a typewriter offers a more tactile experience with the effort it takes to push down each key, the tapping sound the keys make when they strike the ribbon and the bell that rings out once you reach the margin.
“It’s funny because some people come in and their biggest concern is that the bell is working,” he says laughing.
Aulich has a growing list of older clients as well.
Despite the onslaught of computers over the past couple of decades, some seniors are holding on to their typewriters to type out letters, he says.
“I hear the same story all the time. Grandchildren will give their grandparents a laptop to use in place of their typewriter. The grandparents look at the laptop and immediately realize how involved it is so they put it away and pull the typewriter out again.”
Others hang on to their typewriters as “back up,” he adds.
“They are sick of technology and want a basic machine that will work when their computer or printer goes down. A typewriter is like insurance.”
The rest of Aulich’s clients are made up of office staff. Lawyer’s offices and other busi- nesses that are required to fill out forms and applications will use typewriters because it’s sometimes easier to type on the form than it is to input it into a computer, he says. Typewriters are also used by companies to type up short notes and to fill in cheques.
“Many of these offices used to have six or eight typewriters and now they have just two or three. But if I have a hundred clients that’s still two to three hundred typewriters that can fail and need repair.”
Aulich learned the trade of repairing office
machines in Berlin where he was born and raised. When he turned 16 his father connected him with a man who owned an office machine business where they repaired adding machines, calculators and typewriters. Typewriters were particularly important at the time because they were not only used for typing but for making carbon copies, says Aulich.
“There were no photocopiers or printers at the time so the only way to make copies was with a carbon copy. Typewriters had the strong power to easily make duplicates.”
Aulich began his apprenticeship at his father’s friend’s business and finished it at Olympia, an international typewriter maker, in downtown Berlin. After three and a half years he earned his technician’s certificate.
“Having a technician’s certificate meant you were a somebody. You could show that you were qualified.”
In 1970, not long after earning his certificate, he applied for a job at Olympia in Don Mills, Ontario. Despite only being >>
>> able to speak a few words of English, Aulich had always dreamed of moving to Canada so he could experience more freedom. He flew over for the interview and was immediately hired by the company as a technician.
He then spent a few years travelling and lived in the Yukon and Alaska until he finally settled down in Kitchener in the mid-1970s. During that time he worked at various spots as a technician repairing typewriters and other office machines. He also got married and had three children.
Eventually Aulich opened his own business, Accurate Business Machines, in 1977. The company provided repair services for a variety of office machines including computers, printers, photocopiers and of course typewriters.
“We did everything, but I enjoyed repairing typewriters the most.”
He ran the business up until about two years ago when, at his request, his friend, who was in the same line of work, took over the company. Aulich kept the typewriter repair portion of the business. He was 65 and wanted to semi-retire and simplify his life.
“When a printer or photocopier goes down in an office, people freak out and the whole office stops,” he says. “Fixing printers and photocopiers is high stress. I just wanted to do typewriters. I wanted to get back to basics, do the restoration work and take my time. No one is in a hurry to get a typewriter fixed. They can handle being without it.”
Today he works out of a side room in his home where dozens of typewriters sit waiting on shelves to be fixed. His tiny workshop is like a typewriter museum filled with various models built over the last century. He has manual typewriters from as far back as the early 1900s to as recent as the 1980s and electric typewriters spanning from basic models to top-of-theline typewriters.
But no matter what the model, typewriters are complex machines with many moving parts and diagnosing why they aren’t working can take some digging. Aulich often has to take the machines apart bit by bit before finding the problem. He repairs about three or four typewriters a week and one machine can take anywhere from two to 10 hours to fix.
The newer electric typewriters often suffer from wear and tear and are in need of new parts. Since typewriter parts can be hard to come by, Aulich spends time searching garage sales and second-hand stores for broken typewriters that he can buy for spare parts.
However, with the recent boost in younger people taking an interest in restoring typewriters, Aulich has found more of his time is being devoted to repairing the antique machines. While it’s good for business, these older models are more difficult to fix, he says.
“Antiques are more time consuming because they have been sitting around not being used for longer so everything seizes up. It’s like if you let your car sit there and you don’t use the brakes for two years, you can’t expect them to work.”
Aulich had one woman contact him from Nova Scotia with a typewriter in need of repair. She couriered it to him and when it arrived he immediately realized he had a big challenge ahead of him. The machine was from 1914 and in rough shape.
“I had never seen a typewriter like that. It was so bad I didn’t want to look at it. I waited two weeks and then eventually I slowly and surely put my fingers on it and began to see what I could do. It was a lot of work, but I did get it done and by the end it was all fixed up and looking pretty nice. She was so happy when she got it back.”
Aulich himself has a couple of typewriters made in the early 1900s that he has restored for himself.
“You have to hold on to ones like these when you find them because it’s getting harder and harder to find people who want to sell their typewriters. I am keeping these machines to give to my grandchildren.”
As one of the last few people in the area repairing typewriters, Aulich was recently asked to be a part of a local museum exhibit. In October 2014, the photography exhibit Overtime: Portraits of Perseverance at Work at the City of Waterloo Museum began showcasing photographs and stories of people in Waterloo Region who continue to perform long-established trades and professions that are slowly disappearing due to new technologies. Aulich and his skills as a typewriter repair technician were featured in the exhibit by Karl Kessler and Sunshine Chen.
“It’s definitely a trade that is fading out. There’s not many of us left.”
At some point soon, Aulich will also be faced with winding down his business. It will be a difficult decision, he says, since some of his customers have been coming to him for more than 40 years.
“I have fantastic customers. I have never done a repair and not been paid. People who own typewriters are trustworthy people.”
But until that day comes, Aulich will continue repairing typewriters from across the province, and even the country, and his title “Manfred the typewriter guy” will remain.