On 17 Aug 2002, it is alleged that Christopher Jahn sauntered in to 
netscape.public.mozilla.mail-news and loudly proclaimed:

> And it came to pass that Brian Heinrich wrote:
> 
>> On 16 Aug 2002, it is alleged that Jay Garcia sauntered in
>> to netscape.public.mozilla.mail-news and loudly proclaimed:

>>> I consider Adobe to be an authority on the subject of
>>> fonts, etc. 
>>> 
>>> Here, read this, especially the "Why space-space is a
>>> no-no". 
>>> 
>>> http://www.adobe.com/print/tips/felici20001030/main.html
>> 
>> Interestingly, I just refuted that article by pulling a
>> book off a shelf, published in the U. K. in 1863, in which
>> 'double-spacing' follows a full stop.  (I didn't check
>> closely enough to see what the convention was in re. a
>> colon; that seems to have been somewhat variable.)  The
>> book -- an eight- volume history of England originally
>> published in serial form and then bound in four fairly
>> hefty tomes -- was, I believe, published prior to the 
>> invention of the typewriter. 
>> 
> 
> Nope.  The first typewriter was patented in 1714 in England by 
> Henry Mill - although no known models of it exist.  The first 
> american typewriter was patented in 1829, but was cumbersome and 
> unreliable, and was more novelty than office tool.
> 
> You're thinking of the first practical typewriter, the Remington 
> Model 1, patented in 1867.
> 
> The inventer, Christopher Latham Sholes, patented the QWERTY 
> keyboard the following year.
> 
> But the Remington Model 2, introduced in 1873, was the first 
> truly viabl typewriter.

Ah.  Thanks for the clarification.  I was thinking kind of post-Civil-War-
ish.  And, yes, I was thinking in terms of practicality or viability.

>> Mr Felici's argument is interesting and certainly reflects
>> current practice.  It's just that he, um, well, happens to
>> be /wrong/. 
> 
> Actually, if you read his article more carefully, you'll see 
> that he is not wrong so much as brief.  Every word he wrote is 
> true and accurate, it just doesn't go farther back than a 
> hundred years.

Fair 'nuff, I guess.  However, since he bases his argument on typewriters 
/v/ computer typography (apparently), and since the convention antedates the 
common use of the typewriter and fixed-pitch fonts, I would still say that, 
of necessity, he is wrong.  But it's not that big a deal. . . .

/b.

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