The Obituary
The daisy-wheel printer gave early word processors the look of a fine typewriter. Introduced by Diablo Data Systems around 1970, it used a flat wheel whose spokes each ended in a single molded letter, arranged like a daisy’s petals. The wheel spun to the right character, and a hammer struck it through a ribbon onto the page, producing sharp “letter-quality” text that the era’s crude dot-matrix printers could not match. The trade-offs were noise, slowness, and a fixed typeface you changed by swapping the wheel. Laser and inkjet printers, which were quiet, fast, and could print any font or graphic, swept it away by the mid-1990s.
Worth remembering
- The print element was a flat wheel of spokes, each tipped with one molded character, like a daisy's petals.
- Changing fonts meant physically swapping the wheel — and the machine was loud enough to need a sound hood.
Sources
- Daisy wheel printing introduced by Diablo Data Systems around 1970 Wikipedia
- Daisy-wheel printers gave 'letter-quality' output before laser printers Britannica
A graveyard tradition: leave a stone to show you came, and remembered.