08/31/2026
Wellington Parker Kidder was born in 1853 in Norridgewock, Maine. At the age of fifteen he patented an improvement for steam engines and later studied mechanics in Boston. In 1889 Kidder applied for a patent for the Franklin, the first of several typewriting machines he would invent, which was awarded a patent in 1891. Kidder died in 1924. His obituary noted that Wellington Kidder was "considered the dean of the typewriter engineering world." The first practical mass-produced typewriter was made by the Re*****on company in 1874. Its inventor, printer and journalist Christopher Lathan Sholes, believed that the typewriter offered women entering the work force the opportunity to "more easily earn a living." Post-Civil War American offices saw a dramatic increase in paperwork and the necessity to produce correspondence and documents quickly and accurately, something the new typewriting machines could offer. Women simply seemed able to operate these machines more easily than their male counterparts. An 1888 typewriter manual noted that typewriters were "especially adapted to feminine fingers...they seem to be made for typewriting." Although women's wages in the office were considerably lower than their male counterparts, it was much higher than many other options available to women. At the end of the 19th century in northeastern America, a female domestic servant earned between two and five dollars a week; a factory worker between $1.50 and $8.00. In comparison, a woman working as a typist and stenographer routinely made between six and fifteen dollars a week. In addition, an office setting was less physically demanding than a house servant, much less dangerous than in many factories, and was considered to be highly respectable employment. Although a number of newspaper and magazine articles appeared decrying the fact that women were "stealing" job opportunities from men, for the most part the idea of female office workers was quickly embraced. As one article noted, "women, by virtue of some of their most womanly traits, are capable of making the office a more pleasant, peaceful, and homelike place."
