Here I am back when I thought it worth recording myself typing. The only camera I had was a Flip Video—compact, unpretentious, and in 2009 just modern enough to shoot HD. It no longer works. I find I miss it.
Typing One to a Million on a Typewriter
posted Dec 29, 2025 by Tom Fasano
Setting goals is a great way to get things done, but sometimes the point isn’t efficiency or even explanation — it’s endurance. Case in point: Les Stewart, an Australian man who decided to manually type out every number from one to one million on a typewriter. In words. One finger. Over sixteen years.
He started in 1982 and finished in 1998, working in disciplined bursts (20 minutes on the hour, every hour), producing nearly 20,000 pages and burning through a thousand ink ribbons across seven manual typewriters. Partially paralyzed after serving in Vietnam, Stewart chose a challenge that fit both his limitations and his love of typing — something he’d once taught professionally.
It’s tempting to ask why, but that’s usually the wrong question. The better one is why not? Some projects exist purely to be finished, and the quiet stubbornness required to see them through is its own kind of achievement.
Home Movies 1958
posted Dec 28, 2025 by Tom Fasano
An 8mm home movie from Virginia 1958, featuring my extended family, especially my twin brother and me.
From Hermes Rockets to Rotary Phones: A Treasure Trove in Amherst
posted Dec 26, 2025 by Tom Fasano
Jeremy Skillings, a local entrepreneur and CEO of Hemptation USA, is leading the effort to rescue the inventory. Skillings is cataloging the items and moving them into storage to ensure they find “good homes” rather than ending up in a dumpster.
Venice Beach Psalms – A Peter Blair Mystery
posted Dec 12, 2025 by Tom Fasano
Chapter One
This is an audio rendition of the first chapter of Venice Beach Psalms—the first book in my planned Peter Blair Mystery series. The video mimics a typewriter effect synchronized with the voice-over.
You can purchase a copy and support my creative efforts at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.
Typewriter City Streets Art Project
posted Dec 11, 2025 by Tom Fasano
Here’s a wonderful public art project from Everett, Washington, that brings vintage manual typewriters out of collectors’ homes and onto the streets. This was from eleven years ago, but the ideas are fresh.
“Word on the Street” placed ten manual typewriters at locations around downtown Everett during the summer. Each typewriter table was custom painted by local artists celebrating literary themes—Maya Angelou, favorite books, childhood fairy tales. Passersby were invited to sit down and type responses to daily questions posed by the city’s librarians.
It’s a brilliant way to introduce a new generation to the tactile pleasure of hitting keys and hearing that bell ring when you reach the end of a line. Some responses were displayed in storefront windows; others shared on social media.
This is what happens when a community values both the literary arts and hands-on creative expression.
My New Baby – Olympia SM3 with Professional Elite Font
posted Dec 7, 2025 by Tom Fasano
A little experiment with Elevator Music. Enjoy.
Graphic Novel Series
posted Dec 5, 2025 by Tom Fasano
I’m working on the seventh volume of my New Testament Verse-by-Verse Graphic Novel series. The video above is a quick flip-through of Philippians, the second book in the series. I started with the shorter epistles and will eventually make my way to the much longer gospels—assuming my hands cooperate. I’ve already had carpal tunnel surgery on my right wrist and still need it on my left.
My working method is a bit of a hybrid. I start by inking the bold black lines on Bristol board, then I scan the pages and add color and backgrounds in Photoshop. I spent many years as a graphic artist, so I still rely on those old skills—like using a light table to speed up background work. It’s tough on the hands, and I just hope mine hold up.
Dear Jackson | Episode 8 – Hope
posted Dec 1, 2025 by Tom Fasano
“Dear Jackson” is a public-access, micro-fiction series created by Highland Park TV in Los Angeles. Each brief episode features a standalone monologue addressed to an unseen “Jackson,” blending noir atmospherics, poetic narration, a manual tyypewriter, and reflections on life at its rough edges. The series sits somewhere between community-media art project and spoken-word diary, offering a uniquely local, low-fi take on modern noir storytelling.
Episode 8 of the “Dear Jackson” series is a short, noir-tinged monologue reflecting on the harsher side of hope. Delivered in a gritty, poetic voice, the narrator paints hope not as comfort but as a tough, clawed creature—something we cling to because we must, not because it’s gentle. It’s a compact piece of spoken-word storytelling, part confession and part street-corner philosophy.
If you can identify the typewriter he’s using, leave the name of it in the comments.
A Foreign Correspondent’s Olivetti Now in NY TIMES Museum
posted Nov 23, 2025 by Tom Fasano
James P. Sterba working on his Olivetti Lettera 32 in Jakarta, Indonesia, in 1971. Note the lorikeet perched atop the typewriter. Credit… Courtesy of James P. Sterba
Note: I read about this in today’s NY Times.
James P. Sterba, a former New York Times foreign correspondent, with the Olivetti Lettera 32 typewriter he donated to the Museum at The Times in 2024.Credit…David W. Dunlap/The New York Times
My Lettera 32 used to type this post. There’s something wrong with the ribbon advance, which is probably why some letters appear washed out.
