I recently read A Farewell to Arms. My wife’s book club was reading it so I decided to get myself a copy and see if I would enjoy the book. I read The Sun Also Rises once and didn’t like it all that much, so I was hoping this one would be better. It was better, much better. In comparison, The Sun Also Rises is hardly worthy of attention, and yet it got Hemingway lots of that. So who knows how this works. While doing the inevitable internet searches to see what the world had to say about A Farewell to Arms I stumbled across a number of supposed facts about Hemingway’s various typewriters, of which he had many. There were some facts that seemed reliable and a great number of what were obvious errors about Hemingway and the typewriters. I had to laugh at one comment stating he typed so hard he wore out his typewriters! If he wore them out, how come his first typewriter, a Corona folder, is still around and works?
There are lists and lists of typewriters he is alleged to have owned. Several are well documented, for example the Corona his first wife gave him for his birthday when he was 21 or so. Steve Soboroff owns Hemingway’s 3 bank Underwood, unless he sold it without informing me. I also saw photos of Ernest using a Noiseless Underwood, which I think qualifies as solid evidence for that one. Then there is the last one, the Halda, which seems to have solid provenance and which was allegedly sold at auction a few years ago. There are photos of Hem with a Royal with chrome trim around the hood too.
To fill out this list of Hemingway’s alleged typewriters we have a Royal P, as well as a Corona 4, plus various other Royals. While reading through all this a funny thought began to occur to me. I had a feeling that I own every one of Hemingway’s typewriters, or at least a close relative of same. I began to dig through the piles in the basement and discovered that indeed I do have a reasonable facsimile of every typewriter Hemingway is reported to have owned (that I know of).
I could not find any photos of Hemingway’s Royal P Portable, but here is mine.
nathanguitars 
Thanks for bringing this all together. I find it so amusing when somebody “explains” that such ‘n’ such is a good typewriter because Hemingway used that model. He didn’t go out of his way to get a particular model because it was any better than others; he used whatever came his way and got the job done. Really, did he ever buy a second example of one he had used before (taking into account that Royal was the most common brand in America and thus more likely to come his way)?
Good points!
Heh, looks like the Old Man had fairly pedestrian (but good) taste in his typewriters, enough so that I apparently have brothers of many of his machines, too 😀
I sense he liked them for their compact size, mainly.
Neat! According to my informants, he also had an Erika folding—but I don’t have a photo of that, and I feel skeptical about it now, since it’s a typewriter that wasn’t sold in the US and wasn’t very common in the European countries where Hemingway hung out.
Thank heavens I don’t have to find an Erika folding now.
There is a story floating around in which an American writer claims he owns the used Erika portable typewriter EH supposedly purchased in France after a taxi driver smashed his Corona 3 in an argument at a French train station. According to this writer, Carlos Baker is the one who told him the story (and, after several owners, gifted this American writer the elusive Erika). Carlos Baker, respectfully, flattered Hemingway so much with his homage to “the artist” in the early 50’s that he got the job to write Hemingway’s bio, post mortem. In fact, Mary said Hemingway’s only request was that the chosen biographer be someone Hemingway had never met and the biography be written only after Hemingway was dead 10 years (clearly that didn’t happen). I always thought it odd that Baker wrote two books about Hemingway – one of which was while EH was very much alive – yet they never met. Two of Hemingway’s wives also claimed Baker often got stories about EH wrong. So, there is no record out there of a Hemingway-owned a used early 1920’s Erika. Hemingway’s 1921 Corona 3 is alive and well in Havana, Cuba, and there are authentication receipts in the form of serial numbers, etc. So the Corona 3 was not destroyed. It is in Cuba. And the phantom Erika remains just that. 🙂
The provenance of Hemingway’s Erika, (which I own) is perfectly clear. His Corona 3 was destroyed by a taxi driver in Paris. When Hemingway returned from that trip, he bought the used Erika to write The (Sun) Also Rises. When he left Paris, he gave the Erika to Sylvia Beach at the Shakespeare and Son bookstore. She gave it to an antique dealer friend whose daughter, Janine de Goldschmidt married the art critic Pierre Restany. Pierre and Janine then gave it to their friend, the “New Realist” artist Arman for possible use in one of his sculpture. My friend Arman gave it to me. (Sarah claims that it was Carlos Baker who gave me the Erika). I know the story because I knew Pierre and Janine and Arman. (In fact, I’m Godfather to Arman’s and Corice’s daughter Yasmine.) These are what’s known in serious reporting as primary sources (first hand sources) to the Erika’s story. Sarah insists the Cuba Corona is the one Hadley gave Hemingway in 1922. A forensic study of it in Cuba proves it is absolutely not the Hadley Corona. To begin with, it was not made for the US market model. The keys are different. For example, on the Cuba Corona, there is no key for (US) cents. i.e. ¢. And yet, letters known to have been written on the Hadley Corona use the key ¢. Hemingway’s 1921 Corona 3 is dead and irrefutably not alive and well in Cuba. There are no authentication receipts in the form of serial numbers. The Hadley Corona 3 was indeed destroyed. It is not in Cuba. The Erika story is well documented. /Jeffrey Robinson
This is most interesting. I never imagined this post would become the centre of a controversy! What model is the Erika in question?
Don, Thank you for yours. The story of my Erika was first told publicly
11 years ago in this blog:
https://oztypewriter.blogspot.com/2014/11/ernest-hemingway-and-erika-folding.html
A photo of it and the serial number are included.
I don’t know who Sarah is, but I was disturbed by both her arrogance and
her ignorance.I hope this sets the record straight. As I said, I
personally knew the people (Pierre Restany, his wife Janine and Arman)
who all verified the story, first hand. So did Carlos Baker. That Sarah
should so categorically insist that the Erika story is wrong and the
Cuba Corona is the correct typewriter when it has forensically be proven
not to be… reported here, among other places…
https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA338778555&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=abs&issn=02763362&p=AONE&sw=w&userGroupName=anon%7Eb936c3ef&aty=open-web-entry
… is just wrong and cannot be left to stand.
I appreciate what you’re doing and hope that my setting the record
straight contributes to the importance of your blog.
I wish you well/ Jeffrey Robinson
Hi Jeffrey, thanks for this. I was not aware of Robert Messenger’s post about the Erika until now! This old post certainly gets a lot of traffic, so I expect Hemingway’s life is still of great interest to many. Unfortunately this means I am missing a folding Erika, which I doubt will ever come my way. I will keep looking however!
Check eBay. There are plenty of Erikas listed for sale.
Very interesting, thanks for sharing. (I really like the looks of that Halda.)
I agree they have a very timeless appeal!
These pictures are captivating, I’m going to scroll through again.
I imagine the ghosts of Virginia Woolf, Thomas Mann, James Joyce, and who knows who else are scrounging around your basement looking for their old typewriters.