Hunt, Peck, Keep

Sean Trapp haunts Brevard’s thrift shops looking for the lost treasures of his trade. With his sister, Leigh, Trapp is the third-generation owner of the semi-weekly print and online newspaper The Transylvania Times. He searches for vintage typing tables, office chairs, and typewriters, and some weeks he makes daily trips to see what unknown valuables have landed on secondhand-store shelves. 

Trapp’s office, off the back hall of the downtown Brevard building that has housed The Transylvania Times for decades, shelters many of these items. And two vintage typewriters — a Corona Standard portable and a Royal KHM, both from the late 1930s — are on public display in the main lobby. One he found in a thrift shop; the other was a gift from a reader.

It’s in that front space that the Trapps are trying to diversify their business, making a brand of sorts out of old-school journalism symbols. Not only can folks walk in to place an ad or subscribe to the paper, they can also purchase artsy T-shirts with a white squirrel or old-fashioned typewriter printed on the front. The company printed several-hundred shirts to start and have sold more than 8,000, including a load of them during the area’s total solar eclipse in 2017. 

Most recently, The Transylvania Times has started selling necklaces made from Linotype matrices. The Linotype was once an indispensable part of the printing process, and each brass “mat” was a reusable mold for a letter or character. As the Linotype operator typed, the mats formed a line of type (hence the name), which was cast into lead. 

Visitors with a sharp eye will find other artifacts from the golden days of newspapers, such as the remnants of lead ingots, commonly referred to as “pigs,” now used at the paper as door stops. But old typewriters are more widely collected, and Trapp has owned dozens over the years, restoring them — he calls himself “an entry-level repairman” — and then selling them on eBay. 

Now, though, his collection is small and personal, including another artifact from the ’30s, a matte-black Remington Model 5. Many typewriters from this era, Trapp says, feature glass keys that are coveted today by jewelers. They’re also notable because they lack the number “1.” (Typists used the letter “I” instead.)

He also owns an alpine-blue-colored Smith-Corona Silent Super, a salmon-colored Royal Safari, an Underwood 21, and a R.C. Allen VisOmatic with an extended carriage. All of these, Trapp said, are 1960s-era machines.

How did you get into collecting typewriters?

Obviously, they connect me to my past, coming from a family of journalists. But, on a personal level, I love them because they’re a great example of form meeting function. A lot of collectors are drawn to things that are both aesthetically beautiful and functional: cars, motorcycles, guns, knives. There are certainly some bland, uninteresting-looking typewriters, like the ones I learned to type on in school. I can remember my mom and dad typing on a Smith-Corona electric. I remember what it sounded like and what it looked like — they aren’t the prettiest typewriters ever sold. But, by and large, typewriter manufacturers designed some incredibly beautiful machines that still managed to be durable. They were functional machines that performed a very important purpose.

Which one is your favorite?

I like the blue one, the Smith-Corona Silent Super. It’s super durable. You can type on it forever, and it’s easy to use. My wife likes the red one because it matches the furniture.

There’s something about them that’s universally appealing …

We have friends with kids, and when they come over, the kids cannot resist them. They just start going. I used to, when I started collecting typewriters in the early ’90s, give them to friends and friends with kids. I’m sure the parents curse me for that.

What do you do now at the newspaper?

My sister and I are co-publishers. We don’t do it all. We have an amazing staff. I do a lot of the business stuff. My background is in photography, so I help with that some. There’s not much writing in what I do now. It’s running a business, and that involves spreadsheets and human resources. … It’s a challenging environment, to run a newspaper. Everything is changing.

Do you use one for work?

I used to keep one on my desk just to do random notes, but, to be honest — and this is horrible for a collector to say — it’s easier to open up a Word document and keep it rolling on my desktop.

Any advice for someone looking to start a collection?

If you see a red one or pink one at a reasonable price, buy it, because they go for good money.

The Transylvania Times store is located in the lobby at 37 North Broad St., Brevard, open Monday through Friday, 8:30-5pm. To read the newspaper and learn more about its side venture, see transylvaniatimes.com.