Milestones of Slovena's technical heritage - TOPS S-3 Typewriter

Milestones of Slovenia‘s Technical Heritage

TOPS S-3 typewriter

The TOPS typewriter factory in Ljubljana was the only specialised typewriter manufacturer in Slovenia and an important part of the post-war Yugoslav precision engineering industry. It grew out of Rog, best known for making bicycles, and operated from 1952 to 1967. Its first domestically produced typewriter, the Emona, was introduced in 1953. In addition to standard office typewriters, TOPS also manufactured the portable Sava, M-1 and M-2 models, as well as duplicating and calculating machines.

The S-3 ranks among Slovenia’s best-known standard office typewriters. Designed for everyday office use, this robust mechanical machine was available with a Slovene (Yugoslav) keyboard layout in both Latin and Cyrillic versions. Its features included a decimal tabulator, a column-setting release mechanism, touch control, a mechanism for rapid platen adjustment for cleaner, sharper typing and a precision carriage mechanism for smooth carriage movement. It was produced with 30 cm, 45 cm or 62 cm platens to accommodate different paper sizes. Although most machines were finished in grey or green, the collection of the Technical Museum of Slovenia includes an unusual example with a body that was repainted red at a later date.

During the 1960s the S-3 was widely used throughout Yugoslavia and was also exported abroad. Today it stands as an important Slovene engineering achievement from the pre-computer era.

Martina Orehovec, principal curator

Technical Museum of Slovenia