A recent visit from the younger grandkids was very enjoyable. They were easily entertained while dinner was being prepared. One on their iPhone, the other a Nintendo DS. It amazed me how quickly they handled the games and the keyboard and the older one, Maddie, who is 9, asked me if we had handheld games and such when I was her age. I responded that we did not and shocked her a bit when I said there were no computers back then. Her eyes grew larger and she asked how we got our office work done. She often sees her mom working on her laptop computer and thought that was how it was always handled.
A trip to the basement resulted in finding some of the older desktop items for her review. The first thing I showed her was a white ceramic piece and asked if she knew what it was used for. She was stymied but saw the roller and thought maybe you’d flatten letters with it. Not too far off; it was used for moistening stamps to adhere to letters. Once again, a bit of confusion since the stamps of today already have adhesive.
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- Bates Date Stamper
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- Bates Date Stamper
The next thing I “wowed” her with was the Bates date stamper. She tried it and thought it was fun but she said there is date and time information on her computer. I told her it was used to mark incoming mail so the boss would know when mail was received and know when bills were due, usually net 30. A little too much information, I was sure.
Desktop calendar
The perpetual calendar made her laugh a bit. She asked “do you mean to say you had to flip this over every day so you’d know what the date was?” I responded that we used to do it regularly, just before we changed the date on the stamper.
I know that people collect older technology and desktop pieces. It probably brings a smile to a lot of faces when you enter an ultra-modern office set up and see a stamp moistener, date stamper, and manually run calendar. These items are generally inexpensive and quite a bit of fun too.
