Smith Premier

Smith Premier Typewriter Company started producing typewriters in 1886 with the claim to fame that their machines could produce both uppercase and lowercase letters.

The company was formed by the four Smith brothers: Lyman Cornelius, Wilbert, Monroe C. and Hurlburt. The first typewriter to bear the Smith name was produced in 1887 at Lyman’s gun factory in Syracuse, New York. It had been invented by Alexander T. Brown, an employee of the gun factory, and the first prototype was financed by Wilbert Smith.

Smith Premier joined with the Union Typewriter Company in 1893, a trust that included competitor firms Remington, Caligraph, Densmore and Yost. Things didn’t go well as the Union blocked Smith from using a new front-strike design which enabled typists to see what they were typing. In response the Smith brothers left in 1903 and formed L. C. Smith & Bros Typewriter Company.

They produced two new models of typewriter, releasing ‘Model No. 2’ ahead of ‘Model No. 1’. They went on to buy out the ‘Rose Typewriter Company’ who had brought out the first portable machine in 1909 and Rose Typewriter was renamed the ‘Standard Typewriter Company’.

Standard Typewriter produced a new model called the Corona and due to its success, in 1914 Standard Typewriter again changed its’ name to become Corona Typewriter Company. Finally, in 1926 Smith Corona was formed when L. C. Smith and Bros merged with Corona, with Smith’s making office typewriters and Corona making portables.