There was no office machinery at all–the typewriter was known but scarcely used. Even telephones were rarities. The card index, the filing cabinet, the loose-leaf ledger were all but unknown. Of course there were no calculating machines.
System, the Magazine of Business, volume XLII, Number 5, November 1922, p536, "What 55 Years in Business Taught Me About Managing: The first installment of the biography of John H. Patterson, founder of the National Cash Register Company and Lately Chairman of the Board" by Samuel Crowther.