Vintage Royal Portable Typewriter in Original Carrying Case: 7,035 ppm Lead + 2,058 ppm Cadmium + 516 ppm Arsenic
For those new to this website:
Tamara Rubin is a multiple-federal-award-winning independent advocate for childhood Lead poisoning prevention and consumer goods safety, and a documentary filmmaker. She is also a mother of Lead-poisoned children (two of her sons were acutely Lead-poisoned in 2005). Since 2009, Tamara has been using XRF technology (a scientific method used by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) to test consumer goods for toxicants (specifically heavy metals — including Lead, Cadmium, Mercury, Antimony, and Arsenic). Tamara’s work was featured in Consumer Reports Magazine in February 2023 (March 2023 print edition).
I know this piece is probably going to be upsetting for at least a few people! (Especially folks like Tom Hanks!)
Vintage typewriters are simply not safe for children to play with.
I often see these old manual typewriters in daycares and elementary schools in an area specifically set up to encourage young children to experiment with learning to type. Whenever I notice this, I recommend removing them from those play centers immediately because the Lead levels are extremely high — often a couple orders of magnitude above what is considered unsafe for use as a child’s toy (by modern standards), not to mention with the potential for the presence of other toxic heavy metals like Cadmium, Arsenic and Mercury!
In 2019, newly manufactured items created specifically with the intention that they be used by children are required to have no more than 90 ppm Lead in the paint, glaze, or coating of the item and no more than 100 ppm Lead in the substrate. Cadmium is considered toxic and illegal at 40 ppm (and above) in the State of Washington and at 75 ppm (and above) in Denmark. As a result, the typewriter pictured here would be considered illegal if it were sold as an item intended for use by children today.
When tested with an XRF instrument, this vintage Royal brand portable typewriter had the following readings:
Brown Outside of Carrying Case:
- Lead (Pb): 1,557 +/- 47 ppm
- Cadmium (Cd): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Barium (Ba): 426+/-140 ppm
- Chromium (Cr): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
Gray Painted Metal Elements:
- Lead (Pb): 502 +/- 89 ppm
- Cadmium (Cd): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Barium (Ba): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Chromium (Cr): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
Green Plastic Keys With White Writing:
- Lead (Pb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Cadmium (Cd): 2,058 +/- 44 ppm
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Barium (Ba): 560 +/- 131 ppm
- Chromium (Cr): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): 14 +/- 5 ppm
Typeface (ink side):
- Lead (Pb): 7,035 +/- 413 ppm
- Cadmium (Cd): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Barium (Ba): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Chromium (Cr): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Tin (Sn): 783 +/- 113 ppm
Quiet De Luxe Green Painted Logo:
- Lead (Pb): 2,214 +/- 110 ppm
- Cadmium (Cd): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): 335 +/- 77 ppm
- Barium (Ba): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Chromium (Cr): 1,399 +/- 191 ppm
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
Green Interior of Carrying Case:
- Lead (Pb): 5,935 +/- 133 ppm
- Cadmium (Cd): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Mercury (Hg):Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Arsenic (As): 516 +/- 71 ppm
- Barium (Ba): 234 ppm
- Chromium (Cr): 1,847 ppm
- Antimony (Sb): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
- Selenium (Se): Non-Detect (Nd)/Negative
Takeaway
I prefer to let my children learn to type on a modern electric typewriter or computer keyboard (we have used computer teaching aides over the years, including Spongebob Typing and Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing).
Given the fact that Lead (Pb) can be found in pretty much every component of a vintage typewriter, I would not want my children playing with them ever (especially very young children). Even Benjamin Franklin spoke about the hazards of Lead in typeface! (Here’s a link with that letter!)
As always, thank you for reading and for sharing our articles.
Please let me know if you have any questions!
Tamara Rubin
#LeadSafeMama
*Amazon links are affiliate links. If you purchase something after clicking on one of our Amazon affiliate links, Lead Safe Mama, LLC may receive a small percentage of what you spend at no extra cost to you.
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I will be happy to take all tjose terribly dangerous typewriters off your hands!
Hi Liz,
Just don’t let little kids play with them, and consider lots of hand washing after use. For kids – get a newer electric typewriter that is less likely to have lead painted components.
Tamara
Since you’re so keen to point it out, perhaps you should look into what kind of toxins are in the computer, or the smart phone or tablet. I think you’ll find they are equally dangerous – or harmless, if you just don’t eat them.
Hanks is not a representative of the tipósfera. It is, rather, the user of more media typewriters, because of the nature of their work. Hanks does not encourage anything within the tipósfera.
Your article has made me think deeply.
Success!
I’m going to burn in hell. I gave my local playground an Olympia SG-1 typewriter for the kids to play with. To be sure, I told them not to lick the machine, but kids rarely do what you tell them too.
I do find it interesting that you link to Benjamin Franklin’s letter regarding lead poisoning from typesetting. You do know, I hope, that typesetting involves chunks of lead type set barehanded into printing frames, which is totally different from the amount of lead poisoning one might get from manually dislodging jammed typebars on typewriters – which, by the way, can often be done by pressing the ‘margin release key’ or, in the case of Swissa Junior and Erika 10 machines, by using a special key/lever to make them spring back into their original position.
Meanwhile, I wonder why you are so concerned about children touching vintage typewriters and not about them playing with their mother’s iPhones or licking iPads. Or is that type of radiation not a concern for you?
Best regards,
Martyn V. Halm
Suspense Fiction Novelist and Street Poet with vintage typewriters
Instagram: amsterdamassassin
I should think that the dangerous contaminants from car fumes, and the climate crisis we are witnessing, are more harmful to and have more potential to damage the futures of little children than an old typewriter. I personally am not bothered about my kids playing with and using my typewriters, since they know and have always known not to lick them and to wash their hands before they eat. And I’m far happier for them to get creative with typewriters than for them to be getting sucked into digital devices, and the damage that does to their ability to concentrate and absorb useful information… Have you condsidered the dangerous chemicals also present in computers, tablets, and phones, and the toxic waste they produce, the mountains of toxic waste that the West ships out to the developing world in the form of discarded digital devices, where little children encounter huge levels of contaminants in their environment, thanks to us and our throw away culture? I understand that avoiding lead is your thing, but there is a bigger picture to consider when we are thinking about the health of not just our own children, but the children of the world. Just some thoughts, and I wish you well.
This makes me wonder how many old things we have squirreled away in our attics, basements & garages that are all toxic. I’m sure we all have toys & then I wonder about old camping equipment, sports equipment and … hmm. Guess this gives me a better idea of why you offer parents the service of coming & checking all this stuff.
What about electric typewriters from the late 80s in plastic casings? Have you tested any of those types of typewriters? I ask because I have my grandma’s Brother typewriter, which was bought in 1986. She wants to borrow it from me because she can’t write very well anymore. But if it has harmful materials in it I don’t want her to use it.
Hi Kelly Lynn! I used to have one of those in 1986 too. I haven’t tested those yet.
Tamara
Do electric Smith Corona super 12 1970s typewriters
have lead in them?