Standard Metal Typer Tokens

I headed out to the Winchester Mystery House on a Tuesday afternoon in order to acquire a logo for this very site. I wanted the domain name / URL stamped onto a metal typer token for the logo and the nearest machine to me is located in the gift shop of the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose.

The machine is centrally located in the Gift Shop directly in front of the cafe and on the primary path to the tour area. I arrived around 12:30 and it took me four tries and over an hour to finally get the token you can see in the header of this site. The four tries was a result of errors on my part (see my Metal Typer Tips page to avoid these problems), but the time was a result of of the fact that the machine had a line the entire time I was there.

It amazes me that these machines are getting rarer considering the revenue they can so easily generate. This machine costs only $0.50 and has custom tokens but the volume certainly makes up for this relatively low profit margin. Remember, these machines are purely mechanical, so require no electricity to operate either. Once you buy the machine ($300-$600) it only takes a few square feet of floor space and generic tokens can easily be had for $0.10 or less. Seems like a no-brainer to me.

Here’s a few photos of the metal typer machine at the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose-

And here are the four tokens I made in an attempt to get the our logo right-

What’s really nice about these custom tokens is that they not only have the name of the location imprinted on one side (Winchester Mystery House San Jose California”), but they also have a picture of the Winchester mansion on the other side.

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I received a total of six metal typer tokens in a lot of miscellaneous exonumia and I believe these four are all from a machine that was in Weirs Beach, NH in the 1950s. This is a long time recreational area and would have many different shops and locations where a metal typer machine would “fit”.

What led me to believe these are all from Weirs Beach is that they all look very similar (Good Luck Clover / American Flag) and one of them contains the legend “TWEIRS BEACH” which is probably a typo. The “1056″ is most likely a typo as well (for 1956).

Imprint: B.T.N.Tweirs Beach Aug. 12 1056

Obverse: Good Luck [Four Leaf Clover]

Reverse: American Flag

Color: Silver

Location: Weirs Beach, NH

Machine: Unknown

Date: August 12, 1956

The three other tokens not only have the same blanks, but all mention areas that are home to frequent Weirs Beach visitors: Adamsville, RI, Boston, and North End (a region of Boston).

Here are the other three tokens-

Imprint: Chet Deplitch Adamsville RI 1953

Obverse: Good Luck [Four Leaf Clover]

Reverse: American Flag

Color: Silver

Location: Weirs Beach, NH

Machine: Unknown

Date: 1953

Imprint: Jonny Bergonzi Boston

Obverse: American Flag

Reverse: Good Luck [Four Leaf Clover]

Color: Silver

Location: Weirs Beach, NH

Machine: Unknown

Date: 1950s

Imprint: Frank Iarrobino North End

Obverse: American Flag

Reverse: Good Luck [Four Leaf Clover]

Color: Silver

Location: Weirs Beach, NH

Machine: Unknown

Date: 1950s

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• Standard Typer Co – “The Science Club” (0)

I paid a whopping $0.30 for this Standard Typer token on eBay. There’s not much special about it and it’s not very remarkable, but how could I call myself a collector and not spend thirty cents on buying one.

It has very little wear, leading me to believe it’s fairly modern, but it has the “STANDARD TYPER CO” on the back and I’m not sure that such blank medallions are still being made.

Imprint: David Brown The Science Club

Obverse: Good Luck [Four Leaf Clover]

Reverse: STANDARD TYPER CO

Color: Silver

Location: Unknown

Machine: Unknown

Date: Unknown

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