17 Retro Office Equipment That’s No Longer Used
Here's a nostalgic look at the analog tools that once powered the modern office.
- Alyana Aguja
- 5 min read
These retro office tools shaped the daily rhythms of work before the digital age took over. Each item tells a story of a slower, more tactile era when productivity came with knobs, keys, and smudged ink. While they’ve all been retired, their mechanical charm still lingers in the memory of anyone who’s ever jammed a typewriter or cranked a mimeograph.
1. Typewriters
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Before keyboards ruled the desk, typewriters were the rhythmic heartbeats of the office. Each clack of the keys felt permanent because it was — there was no backspace to save you. Secretaries and writers alike learned to type fast and flawlessly or risk starting all over again.
2. Carbon Paper
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Carbon paper was essential for making duplicates before copiers and scanners came around. People sandwiched it between sheets to create instant copies while typing or writing. You could always tell who used carbon paper — they had inky fingers and smudged sleeves by the end of the day.
3. Rotary Dial Telephones
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These phones demanded patience, especially when dialing a long-distance number full of 9s and 0s. Office workers would use one finger to spin each digit into place and wait for the clickety return before moving to the next. Still, there was something satisfying about hearing the dial whirl back.
4. Fax Machines
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Once a symbol of corporate modernity, the fax machine spat out curling paper with grainy images and blurred signatures. You’d wait for that whiny screeching connection to go through, praying it didn’t jam. Now, it’s mostly a ghost in the corner of your dentist’s office.
5. Telex Machines
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Telex enabled global offices to send text-based messages before email was widely available. You’d punch a message into a keyboard, and a paper tape would encode it, complete with holes representing each letter. It looked more like something from a war bunker than a cubicle.
6. Microfiche Readers
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These clunky machines let workers scroll through tiny film slides to read archived documents. Offices and libraries stored cabinets full of them, organized like ancient treasures. The screens flickered, the knobs squeaked, and patience was a must.
7. Slide Projectors
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In darkened boardrooms, slide projectors clicked and hummed while managers pointed with yardsticks at graphs on a wall. You had to physically load every slide into a carousel, and one upside-down photo could derail the meeting. It was clumsy but dramatic, in a way PowerPoint never managed.
8. Dictation Machines
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Before voice memos on phones, there were dictation machines that recorded thoughts on tiny cassette tapes. Executives would murmur into hand-held mics, and someone down the hall would later transcribe every word with a foot pedal and headphones. It felt like a corporate game of telephone.
9. Manual Addressographs
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These metal beasts stamped addresses onto envelopes or forms using plates engraved with names. Secretaries would swap out plates like trading cards and crank the machine handle for each piece of mail. It was loud, messy, and surprisingly satisfying.
10. Mimeograph Machines
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If you ever smelled that sweet, chemical ink on school handouts, that was a mimeograph at work. Offices used them for quick, cheap mass printing — usually involving purple ink and crank handles. Every page felt like a ghost of the original, slightly blurred and uniquely fragrant.
11. Paper Rolodexes
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Before contacts were digital, your network was housed in a circular fortress of paper cards. Each card had a name, number, and maybe a coffee stain if they were important. Flipping through it felt like shuffling through your own analog social media feed.
12. Slide Rules
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Engineers and accountants once relied on these analog calculators that required a firm grasp of logarithms. Slide rules had no screens, no batteries, just sliding bars and tiny printed scales. Using one felt like doing math with a ruler from the future — or maybe the past.
13. Intercom Boxes
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Before email chains and Slack messages, there was the office intercom system. These little desk boxes buzzed you directly to your coworkers, often interrupting coffee breaks with abrupt static. It was like yelling across the office but with a sci-fi twist.
14. Punch Card Time Clocks
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Employees “clocked in” by sliding a cardboard card into a heavy machine that slammed the time in ink. The ka-chunk sound was a daily ritual, part ceremony, part surveillance. Forget to punch in, and you were explaining yourself to HR.
15. Letter Openers
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Not just decorative, these were once essential tools for slicing open heaps of daily mail. Executives often had fancy ones — silver, engraved, or shaped like swords. There was something oddly powerful about cracking into a sealed envelope with a single clean stroke.
16. Wite-Out Tape and Liquid Correction Fluid
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Mistakes didn’t vanish with a keystroke, so workers armed themselves with tiny brushes and tape rollers. You had to wait for it to dry or risk smearing your edits into oblivion. It smelled awful, but it was better than retyping a whole page.
17. Adding Machines
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With their long paper tapes and clattering keys, adding machines were the accountants’ best friends. They couldn’t store data or connect to the cloud, but they never crashed. Watching the number tape spool out like a paper tail was strangely hypnotic.