File:Roneo copying machine (26286969718).jpg

On this day 13 February 1913 a retailer declared that a copying device good enough for the Hague Tribunal should be more than adequate for a Wellington government department.

Mr Chas Walker of Wellington’s Remington and Roneo Agency was responding to a complaint from the Department of Internal Affairs that the Roneo Litho Machine wasn’t up to the task of producing the volume of official documents required. The duplicating machine worked by forcing ink through stencils and was used worldwide until the emergence of photocopiers in the 1960s. Walker was very keen to keep the department’s business and offered Under Secretary J Hislop special tuition in the use of the machine. “The Hague Tribunal always use the Roneo Dup for the very purpose that you have in view, namely evidence for Counsel and they go through about 250,000 copies on the Roneo in a few days,” he wrote. Hislop replied that “satisfactory arrangements have now been made” and the file was closed.

Shown here is Chas Walker’s letter to the Department of Internal Affairs. ACGO 8333 1248/[26] 1913/1097 <a href="https://www.archway.archives.govt.nz/ViewFullItem.do?code=24765860" rel="nofollow">www.archway.archives.govt.nz/ViewFullItem.do?code=24765860</a>

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