Q-W-E-R-T-Y.

They’re the first six letters atop all our keyboards, from our phones to our computers, and they revolutionized communication. But their history is far from digital and, in fact, is rooted here in the Cream City.

In 1868, Milwaukee native Charles Latham Sholes was just trying to solve a problem: He needed to design a machine that could produce the letters of the alphabet without the arms jamming. With help from his son-in-law, Sholes separated the right letters, creating the QWERTY system and the modern typewriter.More than 150 years later, his ingenuity is still celebrated in the city where it happened.

In October, QWERTYFEST takes writers, artists and lovers of typewriters (and nostalgia) on a three-day jaunt all across the keyboard. As an owner of a vintage typewriter herself, host Kim Shine wanted to get more of the story behind QWERTYFEST, so she met the organizers at Niche Book Bar in Bronzeville as they shared the latest edition of the event’s official publication, the QWERTY Quarterly.

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Episode host: Kim Shine

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