More on the CBS documents

In the post below, I link to an illustration which compares the questioned documents with text created with Microsoft Word's Times New Roman font. The letter forms are different, and these differences cannot be attributed to image degradation. Moreover, the type "hops" up and down in the CBS documents; this is consistent with typewritten origin.

Were typewriters then capable of producing such documents? Yes. For proof, go here:

http://discuss.pcmag.com/n/main.asp?webtag=pcmag&nav=start&msg=42333

In this demonstration, we see that Microsoft Word automatically creates text very similar to the text seen in a typewritten document proven to have been created 40 years ago.

Now, I'm sure that differences would show up in an enlargement, but when reproduced at small size -- which is how the right-wing bloggers display such comparisons -- the resultant documents do look almost identical.

Were such IBM machines rare? Yes, but SOMEONE must have been purchasing them, or IBM wouldn't have made 'em.

Now -- and here is where we close the case -- go here for a close-up view of the controversial superscript:

http://discuss.pcmag.com/n/main.asp?webtag=pcmag&nav=start&msg=42333

(You'll have to scroll down -- sorry!) You'll see that MS Word produces superscripts completely different from those seen on the questioned documents. The difference cannot be attributed to image degradation. Check out the illustration and you'll see what I mean.

Let me repeat my standard caveats: I am not saying the docs are necessarily genuine; I am merely questioning the most common theory as to how they were produced. (Has anyone offered another theory?) And I would have strongly advised CBS against using any documents of unknown provenance.

Still, all evidence now points to the conclusion that these documents were produced on a rare IBM machine of the proper era. We must now ask the question: If the documents are fake, what sort of faker would use such a rare IBM machine? Very few working models still exist.

Oh, and for what it is worth: As I write, I am in the Cal State Northridge Library, where I happened upon a 1968 book titled "Beastly Folklore," by one Joseph Calrk. It was obviously produced on a typewriter (double spaced, underlining instead of italics, unjustified text) -- not an uncommon circumstance back then for books with a press run too small to justify the expense of hiring a typsetter.

BUT: The font is proportional! And it looks like a variant of Times Roman, albeit with less variety in line thickness.

So a typewriter was capable of proportional fonts in 1968.

-- Joseph Cannon CANNONFIRE http://www.cannonfire.blogspot.com