L.C. Smith & Brothers Typewriter Company, New York, USA

The  company was founded in 1903. It was founded by the four Smith brothers, founders of Smith Premier Typewriter Co.  The Smith Premier typewriter was a “blind” typewriter, because the typist could not see the written text. In 1896 the first “visible” typewriter was introduced on the market allowing the typist to see what was typed without lifting the carriage. This caused a rift within the company  when the other partners  did not see the advantages of the new typewriter. The Smith brothers  started a new company;  L.C.Smith Brothers Co. Carl Gabrielson, who followed the Smith brothers to the new company, took over the designing of the new typewriter. In 1904 he developed a visible single keyboard typewriter. A number of the new models were introduced with reasonable sales success.  . In 1926 a merger between L.C. Smith Co and another successful company producing portable typewriters, Corona Typwriter Company, took place. The company  was named  Smith & Corona (see Corona typewriters).  When the electric typewriter began to dominate the market Smith-Corona introduced  the electric De Luxe 400 in 1961. In 1958 Smith-Corona merged with Marchant Calculators founded in 1911. The company entered the personal word processor market and introduced in 1991 a PC called Simple Smart.  However, the competition from overseas took their toll on the company’s finances.  In 1995, the Smith-Corona Co filed for bankruptcy protection.