Christopher Latham Sholes
Christopher Latham Sholes was an American inventor who invented the QWERTY keyboard, and, along with Samuel W. Soule, Carlos Glidden and John Pratt, has been contended to be one of the inventors of the first typewriter in the United States. He was also a newspaper publisher and Wisconsin politician. In his time, Sholes went by the names C. Latham Sholes, Latham Sholes, or C. L. Sholes, but never "Christopher Sholes" or "Christopher L. Sholes".
Christopher Latham Sholes
John Pratt's Pterotype, the inspiration for Sholes in July 1867, a version close to the stock model advocated by fellow inventor Frank Haven Hall
Wisconsin Historical Marker
Sholes typewriter, 1873. Buffalo History Museum.
QWERTY is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: QWERTY. The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sholes and Glidden typewriter sold via E. Remington and Sons from 1874. QWERTY became popular with the success of the Remington No. 2 of 1878 and remains in ubiquitous use.
Remington 2 typewriter keyboard, 1878
A laptop computer keyboard using the QWERTY layout
Keys are arranged on diagonal columns to give space for the levers.
Remington 2 typewriter, 1878 - First typewriter with a shift key for upper and lower case characters