1921 Remington Portable #NX11633
Status: My Collection
Hunter: James Grooms (jgrooms)
Created: 04-11-2025 at 05:14AM
Last Edit: 02-04-2026 at 09:53AM
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Description:
See Prof. Polt's excellent site for the background on what follows (link):
What is in question is the single shift machines made in 1921. RP references a Remington doc from 1926 stating that dealers didn't place orders until September 1921. The conclusion being "For almost a year, then, production was limited and experimental." * RP updated to the conclusion below.
My theory is (and I have not seen the above document) there is a typo or Remington in 1926 got it wrong and it should say Sept 1920 and the limited run prototypes are those made in 1920. Here is why:
Dealers start placing ads in late Dec 1920, as well does Remington. *See the image for 11/1920 Remington in OS.
An Apr 1921 shareholder report specifically cites the excellent sales of the Portable that went on sale in Oct.
A Feb 1922 dealer meeting cites the excellent sales of the Portable that had been "on sale a little over a year" with the factory not able to meet demand.
There are roughly 2500 returns for ads being placed by dealers for the Portable in 1921. Dealers simply are not spending money on something they don't have for sale. I believe they were placing Sept 1920 orders for first quarter sales.
* 1920 to 1/1921 production was at Hartford with a shift to Syracuse after that. 6/1921 limited supply and can't keep them in stock.
The TWDB gallery numbers, yes an anecdotal sampling, currently suggest that as many as 5,000 1921 models were made.
The three month run in 1920 are the true prototypes and are certainly rare. By contrast, 1921 single shifters are unusual, but not rare. *RP updated his info sometime before 2/2/26 to reflect this.
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Another update. The letter-to-month coding (link) doesn't work for the serial number sequences in the DB. +
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A nice survivor that needed lot's of roller experimenting to get it to feed fairly well. I think the platen is swollen to a slightly larger diameter. Who knows what it may have been cleaned with at some point. The A key legend is off and the key ring was barely hanging on, so I repaired this and decided it was best to leave the legend as it was because easy rotation wasn't happening and it risked losing the whole thing. Types pretty well and leaves a good impression on a soft, but trashed platen.
* 2/2/26 updates.
Typeface Specimen:
Links:
- Manual
- All things Remington Portables
- Serial number codes
- Gallery
- 1922 two shifter
- for the author
- Popular Mechanics
- for the engineer
- half a million words and still kicking
- for the traveller
- for any age
- for xmas
- guilt trip
- Everest
- Portable 2 announcement Sept 1925
- 1928 P2 in green.
Photos:
Hunter: James Grooms (jgrooms)
James Grooms's Typewriter Galleries [ My Collection ] [ My Sightings ]
Status: Typewriter Hunter
Points: 21010
Typewriters are the perfect blend of using one's technical skills, history and functional purpose. My goal is type tested machines. My interests are not isolated to anyone area. For example, I am a big fan of Smith Corona electrics, mid century electrics and all things Royal.
RESEARCH NOTE: When researching the Remington Portable on a computer with lots of screen real estate, you may find that launching the Remington Serial Number page and the Remington Portable By Model/Year/Serial page in new browser windows can give you interesting perspectives on changes throughout the model series.
