Remington Typewriter Agency

AMONG John Garlick's many claims to distinction is that he introduced two of mankind's most important inventions, certainly pre-electronic inventions, to South Africa. They were the typewriter, and the motor car. The Remington Typewriter Agency developed into Garlicks Office Equipment and finally became Garlicks Office Machines, a thriving company operating quite separately from the department stores.

In the mid 1970s there were twelve branches, ten in South Africa and two in Rhodesia, all situated in major cities. In the smaller centres there were agents, and together they made up a network of outlets. The head office was in Johannesburg. 

During the 1890's the typewriter agency spread throughout the country from Cape Town to Kimberley, Port Elizabeth, Durban, Pietermaritzburg, Bloemfontein, Johannesburg, Pretoria, Bulawayo and Salisbury. Travellers were dispatched to every town where the typewriter soon replaced the clerk's pen in offices, banks, government departments and elsewhere. 

The next revolution in office equipment was the introduction of the Rotary Neostyle Duplicating Machine in 1907. The name was shortened to Roneo. The company later introduced the National Cash Register to shops, and also supplied stationery, ribbons, carbon paper and so on to be used with the machines.

The next marvel of modern science to enhance the efficiency of South African business through the Agency was a "talking machine", bought from various factories, notably that of Edison of America.

In the early days the Remington Business College ran classes in shorthand, typing and bookkeping. In a 1906 address to the Remington Business College Prizegiving, Mr John Deane Cartwright said when he first came to the Cape in 1859 typewriters were unknown in the Colony. Nowadays one shuddered to think of the chaos which would result were they to be suddenly withdrawn from the many offices where the machine is now in daily use.

In the mid-1970s the company sold Facit typewriters and calculators, and also Simplex time recorders. They changed over to Sweda cash registers, trending towards more sophisticated equipment such as magnetic and punch tape machines – an ancillary to computers.

References: 

April 3, 1975 Cape Times  Garlick's Centenary Supplement

Dec 17, 1906 Cape Times article on Remington Business College

Photos:

Oct 1921, Online book: Office Appliances: The Magazine of Office Equipment, Volume 34, page 37