#Exhibit of the Month

Manufactured in 1902 by AG vorm Siedel & Nauman in Dresden, Germany.

Dimensions: Length - 38 cm, Width - 35 cm, Height - 20 cm. Weight - 16 kg. It entered the museum collection in 1984, transferred from the National Museum of Ethnography and Natural History.

The typewriter features a standard carriage mounted on ball bearings and rollers, along with a keyboard equipped with 42 keys. These contain two complete sets of Latin and Cyrillic alphabets, punctuation marks, numbers, and mathematical symbols, enabling the typing of 126 characters. Beneath the metal casing, the type bars are arranged in a fan-like pattern, holding embossed characters and ink ribbon rollers. When the keys are pressed, the type bars strike the inked ribbon, imprinting characters onto the paper tensioned in the machine's roller system.

The side panels are elegantly decorated with refined cast-iron elements in the Art Nouveau style, displaying the brand name - "Ideal." The Polyglott model, featuring a bilingual keyboard patented in the United Kingdom by Max Klaczko from Riga, Latvia, was produced between 1902 and 1913, marking the first typewriter capable of writing in two languages. The "Ideal Polyglott" typewriter was actively sold in the Russian Empire and gained significant popularity in Poland, Bulgaria, and Serbia.
The typewriter - a mechanical device used for printing text directly onto paper - ranks among the most important inventions of the modern era, as it revolutionized communication. From the late 19th century to the early 21st century, it became an indispensable tool, widely used by writers, in offices, for business correspondence, and in private homes. The peak of typewriter sales occurred in the 1950s when the average annual sales in the United States reached 12 million units. In November 2012, the British Brother factory produced what it claimed to be the last typewriter, which was donated to the Science Museum in London.
The advent of computers, word processing software, printers, and the decreasing cost of these technologies led to the typewriter's disappearance from the mainstream market, turning it into a museum exhibit.
June 23 marks Typewriter Day, commemorating the date when American journalist and inventor Christopher Latham Sholes patented his typewriter. This day celebrates the simple yet revolutionary device that has become history, as well as the remarkable literary achievements it has enabled since 1868.

Virtual Tour

International Collaboration

2016

From March 2 to April 10, 2016 the National Museum of History of Moldova organized an event celebrating an emblematic personality of the Czech Republic - Václav Havel. The temporary exhibition „Portrait of Václav Havel" was brought to Chișinău by the Czech Center from Bucharest.

Through the German Cultural Center AKZENTE from Chișinău, the German composer Adrian Oswalt gave a public conference on „History of hurdy-gurdy" and a performance of mechanic music at the „Museum Night", May 16, 2016.

Based on the collaboration agreement with Herend Porcelánmanufaktúra Zrt. From Hungary, the MNIM hosted from May 13 to July 12, 2016 an exceptional exhibition of Hungarian porcelain entitled "Herend Glow". On the occasion of the exhibition opening, the museum was visited by dr. Attila Simon, General Director of Herend Porcelain Manufacture.

Five curators from the MNIM participated in the "Days of museographers - memory, consciousness, history", which was held in Bucharest, Romania, on June 6-10, 2016. The project was developed by the Institute "Eudoxiu Hurmuzachi" for Romanians de Pretutindeni, in partnership with the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Moldova. The study visit included workshops and lectures by experts from various museums in the Bucharest, meetings with academics and visits to museums.

MNIM has participated at the organization of the exhibition "Romania in the Great War" which was opened at the National Museum of History of Romania on September 15, 2016. In this order, 25 documents and photos about the situation of Bessarabia during World War I were included in the exhibition and catalog.

From September 21 to 24, 2016 was held the 26th Numismatic Symposium, organized in collaboration with the Institute of Archaeology "Vasile Pârvan" from Bucharest. The event brought together researchers numismatists and collectors from Moldova, Romania, France, Japan, Ukraine, Belarus, Slovakia and Poland.

Based on the cooperation agreement between the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Moldova and the Ministry of National Heritage of Poland, the restorer of the National History Museum of Moldova, Daniela Ferroni, conducted a study visit in Poland in the period of October 10 to 15, 2016. The theme of the documentation visit was "Conservation-restoration of movable heritage, historical monuments and cultural heritage digitization."

Between October 3 to 12, 2016 was implemented the second stage of the Moldovan-German project (National Museum of History of Moldova, Chișinău - Frei Universität, Berlin) which started with verification and research of Sabatinovka culture settlements identified in the valleys of Ialpug river and tributaries.

Based on the cooperation agreement, the Polish Centre in Bucharest organized at the MNIM a temporary exhibition with the theme "War in Polish poster. Krzysztof Dydo Collection". The exhibition is on display from November 3 to 30, 2016.

#Exhibit of the Month

"Ideal" Mechanical Typewriter, Model A Polyglott

2016

#Exhibit of the Month