[MineralMan]

"My IBM Selectric doesn't do "th" superscripts. And the typefact that looks like Times Roman has a straight apostrophe, not a curled one."

I don't understand why people keep talking about the Selectric. That's out of the picture, since it doesn't have proportional spacing. What your Selectric ball has on it is irrelevant.

The only common machine that produced proportional typing at that time was the IBM Executive typewriter. Did it have curly apostrophe's? I can't remember.

[TastyManatees]

I don't understand why people keep talking about the Selectric. That's out of the picture, since it doesn't have proportional spacing.

O.K., for the umpteenth freaking time. Here is a link to the IBM Selectric Composer (with pictures and instructions!), the top-o-da-line IBM that actually had proportional spacing. You may note that it was introduced in 1966, and that it took a crew of twelve to make proportional spacing work (and even then, the job took about a week).

You've been asserting over and over here that IBM's "Executive" model also provided that feature in 1972, and I recall another poster claiming it was easy to use. Bull excrement. IBM did not continue to produce and sell two top of the line typewriters with the same main selling feature in 1972, where one could barely do the job and the other was a breeze.

No one has yet provided evidence that the Executive could accomplish proportional spacing. Why don't you drop us some info and make us all look dumb? Until then, pardon my French, but STFU.

[CobaltBlue]

I have a call in to an old friend who teaches printing and collects old typewriters, and my mom, who used to be a typesetter.

Someone out in Blogland has an IBM Executive Typewriter and will set us straight about superscripted "th" and the curly apostrophes eventually.

[maryz]

Did it have curly apostrophe's?

It would have had to have two -- for single quotes. And two for full quotes, one beginning and one ending.