I am the author of that second citation and am happy to share a pdf with interested folks. Judith Yaross Lee, Ph.D. Distinguished Professor of Communication Studies Charles E. Zumkehr Professor of Rhetoric & Culture Director, Central Region Humanities Center School of Communication Studies Ohio University Schoonover Center 439 Athens, Ohio 45701 T: 740-593-4888 F: 740-593-4810 My newest book: Twain's Brand: Humor in Contemporary American Culture <http://www.ohio.edu/people/leej/Twains_Brand.html> On Mar 11, 2018, at 8:21 PM, Dave Davis <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: A 1985 conference paper about the Paige machine , available through ERIC. I also vaguely remember some discussion of it , perhaps in a publication at Cornell. I will look. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED265544 Another citation (I haven't tracked this one down) Lee, J. Y., Anatomy of a Fascinating Failure. American Heritage of Invention and Technology, Summer 1987, pp. 55-60. More about that -- https://circuitousroot.com/artifice/letters/press/noncastcomp/paige/index.html On Sun, Mar 11, 2018 at 7:50 PM, Carl J. Chimi <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: I'm just reading the section of the recent edition of the Autobiography in which Clemens discusses to some extent his perception of how the typesetter worked. His description is valuable, not only because he had considerable experience as a compositor, but also to show how he could have been so taken by the machine as to invest so heavily in it. I've read descriptions of the machine that range from roughly "hopelessly incapable of the task" to "hopelessly complex given the task". I've seen it depicted in the 1940s biopic as a truly silly and ridiculous device. I believe I even saw some version of the actual machine in the basement of the Hartford house the first time I visited back in late 1972. Nothing like the Rube Goldberg thing in the movie. Not being an expert, but being mechanically inclined, I remember the machine I saw as "plausible". All this has me wondering if anyone has ever written a study of the technical aspects of the machine. How it worked. How it perhaps drew on and related to other technology of that period. That Clemens said such a machine would have to "think" is fascinating, and makes me wonder how Paige created something that did apparently work and did, apparently, give the illusion of "thinking". I figure if anyone has written on this topic, this is the forum that would know about it. Thanks, Carl Grandfather of Olivia