Typewriter mystery game
A typewriter mystery game was a specific type of typewriter art popular in the mid-20th century.
A typewriter owner would be presented with a set of instructions: press a key this many times, press another key, move on to the next line. Upon finishing the typing, a picture would emerge on the page. First lines of a simple typewriter mystery could look like this:
[1] 36 spaces, 4 X [2] 31 spaces, 20 X [3] 27 spaces, 32 X [4] 23 spaces, 43 X, 2 spaces, 5 X
Typewriter mystery games were published in magazines (such as Woman's Realm[1] and The Journal of Business Education[2]), and collected in separate books.[3][4][5] The “mystery” in the name refers to the fact that a visual result of the instructions would sometimes be presented on a different page, in the following issue of the magazine, or withheld altogether, making typing the only immediate way to discover the picture.
The end result of a typewriter mystery game would be a picture similar to the later ASCII art,[6] except it would often use overtyping – making several passes over the same line,[1] unavailable or difficult on computer screens. The photo would often be a portrait of a person[1] or an animal.
Photos
Books of typewriter mystery games
- 50 Typing Picture Projects by Winnifred Nichols (1980)
- Bob Neill’s Book of Typewriter Art (1982)
- Bob Neill’s Second Book of Typewriter Art (1984)
- Typewriter Mystery Games by Julius Nelson (1951)
- The 1956 book Fun with typewriter is similar in that it contains many typewritten graphic elements with proper instructions on how to type them (they are not, however, mysteries).
References
- 1 2 3 Nick Higham (August 29, 2014). "Typewriter Art". Retrieved April 14, 2018.
- ↑ "Typewriter Mystery Game". 1963. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
- ↑ Barbara Neill (January 31, 2013). "Bob Neill's Typewriter Art". Retrieved April 14, 2018.
- ↑ Lori Emerson (January 18, 2013). "D.I.Y. Typewriter Art". Retrieved April 14, 2018.
- ↑ "Typewriter Mystery Games by Julius Nelson". September 20, 2013. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
- ↑ Alexis Madrigal (January 30, 2014). "The Lost Ancestors of ASCII Art". Retrieved April 14, 2018.