When I was a kid in grade school Xerox machines weren’t yet commercially available. Instead, a mimeograph machine was used to create multiple copies of school handouts – tests, announcements, and letters to take home to parents. (Cheaper than the 3¢ stamps. )

The mimeograph machine was in the school principal’s anteroom. His secretary typed the stencils for handouts on an ordinary typewriter (with its ribbon removed). Each stencils was fastened to the cylindrical surface of a drum. A hand crank rotated the drum and fed sheets of paper through, each sheet getting a purple-blue image of the stencil.

I loved the utterly unique minty aroma of those mimeographed sheets! I don’t know if that aroma was an intrinsic characteristic of mimeograph ink, or if it was added to the ink for effect. A distant, but delightful, memory in any case.

I found this on the web: “Try explaining to some thirtysomething the exquisitely intoxicating smell of paper fresh from the ditto [mimeograph] machine. I tried to tonight. Without success…”

https://www.google.com/amp/s/a...ing.com/amp/96758932

OH fricken make me feel old. I was thinking of the smell of old pencils. Even the new Ticonderoga pencils do not smell the same.

Yes, that blue ink and smell of alcohol in the morning.
Before schools had Xerox copiers.
I guess we're getting old. Thanks for another reminder.
And then there were the pencil sharpeners. The teachers' pet's job was to sharpen them and to take the chalkboard erasers outside and bang them together to remove most of the chalk dust.
I'm even old enough to remember when a teacher of bus driver could give you a good smack for misbehavior. You'd never dare to tell your parents (2 usually unless one died) because you risked further punishment for causing them embarrassment for implied poor parenting. Back then you could bring your fathers gun for show and tell and it wasn't a felony or a threat.

We used to joke that the machines were made by A.B. Dick.

Aw man, I loved that smell. And dont get me started on rubber cement. (my mom, a teacher, also worked on the yearbook).

Youth is wasted on the young.

My grandad had one at home. He used to crank out a club newsletter on his. The smell was....intoxicating.


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I was active duty Navy 1956 - 1960. During that time, I was placed on light duty for three months while recovering from an injury.

Somebody found out that I could type fast and accurately, so my "light duty" assignment was Leading Chief's yeoman, sort of secretary / administrative assistant to the senior enlisted guy in the squadron.

I prepared the stencil and ran the mimeograph machine for everything in the squadron that would be photocopied in today's environment.

Yeah, I do remember that smell.

You may need a younger drug dealer.

Yeah, I remember the smell too.

Yeah I'm old. Remember those and the aroma well.
Also what preceded the mimeographs... clay tablets and stylus.

quote:

Originally posted by bald1:
Yeah I'm old. Remember those and the aroma well.
Also what preceded the mimeographs... clay tablets and stylus.

YOu had tablets AND a stylus? Man we just scratched our math in the mud with the same finger we picked our noses with.

Film Strips.

Purple fingers.

My elementary school had them and remember the smell too.
I even remember the smell of the projectors bulbs heating up also the overhead projector.

I also remember the smell of my third grade teachers perfume!

Yes, anyone 55 or older (maybe closer to 60) will remember the smell of mimeograph ink or solvent or whatever it was. The internet says the solvents were isopropanol and methanol, but I don't know that they explain the smell in full - the ink itself may have had a smell.

I can still see an entire class of 2nd graders lift still-damp mimeos to their faces and inhale like a pack of coke heads.

I'm part of this group.

I remember the smell, and I remember cranking the machine for my mother, who was a teacher. Later they had an electric drive machine that didn't need cranking. It seemed unfair, somehow.

I also remember the original Xerox paper that was multi-layer and you could remove information by scraping the layer off with a pocket knife. Hated the feel of that stuff.

I will admit a bit of nostalgia for the odd whiff of Mimeo.

Not so nostalgic for the crazy-strong ammonia we used in drafting class to make blueprints.

The smell of rubber based VanSon ink from an old printing press is addictive.

I not only remember the smell associated with mimeographs, I also remember the smell from its predecessor, Hectographs. Those were gelatin-based copiers on which masters marked with purple ink (typed or hand-written) were smoothed onto a flat gelatin surface, which transferred the ink to the surface. Blank papers could then be smoothed onto the surface one at a time and some of the ink would be transferred to them, making a copy. About 100 copies could be made that way before the ink ran out. When finished, the gelatin was melted and when hardened could be reused many times.

I believe Hectograph is still in use and has more colors available now.

I, too, was a good typist and found use of it in my military service.

flashguy