Author: Jan van den Heuvel

Hello shorthand friends. Thanks for letting me join the club. First let me introduce myself. I am a happily married and retired Dutchman, living in The Hague, of 68 years of age (how these years have passed away is a miracle). I am interested in shorthand since I was about 16 years of age as far I remember, and have studied the advanced Dutch system: systeem Groote. This system is also adopted for German and English. But since I am also very interested in the English language, I considered only in in February 2021, it would be better to study an entirely English shorthand system. Then, thanks to internet, I found out that there are two “serious” systems viz. Pitman and Gregg. First I bought a Pitman handbook. I studied this book a few weeks but found it very complex. After doing some further research I considered Gregg being perhaps more fitted for me, and being also the more advanced and more beautiful system founded on the ellips, that would suffice my needs more than Pitman, viz. to write out my favourite English sermons (See: Catford lectures in London, UK). I plan to give myself a year to find out if I can cope this system, or that it proves too difficult too master it within a reasonable time. I started to study Gregg by printing some pdf files from internet and later by buying a book (Gregg shorthand DJS). Later I found out on the “Gregg site” that Gregg had more than one edition: from initially (Light- line phonography) and rather complex to the more “simple” (Centennial…), but every more simplified edition decreasing the transcription speed. From that time I am trying to study the Anniversary edition 1928, combined with additional material that can easily be downloaded freely: Light line, 5,000 most used shorthand forms, Gregg Shorthand dictionary, Shorthand theory Q&A, The basic principles of Gregg shorthand, Gregg speed studies, Word and sentence drills for Gregg Shorthand. Furthermore I bought via eBay mainly from Thriftbooks in California several books, lately Gregg speed building one year course and Gregg Shorthand reporting course (that cost me app 160 USD) all books to be accrued with postage costs of app. 25 usd. I already had bought: Gregg dictation and transcription, Gregg Shorthand for colleges vols one and two DJS, and transcription as well as Gregg Shorthand dictionary simplified, aug. 1955. One of the problems that I encounter is the missing keys of the exercises, mostly - as I found out later - available in a teachers handbook, but difficult or impossible to find on eBay. The spurious descriptions of books on eBay are a problem as well, so that you do not receive what you thought to have ordered, f.e. the transcription mentioned above. So in trying to find the keys to the assignments in the above mentioned one years course I thought to have found a link in this blog. But maybe I am wrong. In the meanwhile I try to follow the advise given in the reporters course: read shorthand, write shorthand and think shorthand. I realise that nowadays shorthand is out of business as young people in the Netherlands even never heard of the existing of shorthand (stenography), but time will come that shorthand will rise again. Also the cheap excuse that it is not necessary any more to study shorthand and that it is a waste of time, due to advanced web based applications by which addresses, speeches etc., can automatically be transcribed directly in the English or any other language is far from true, as I experienced. But time will learn. Hoping we will have a good time together! I wish everyone succes in studying this profound and challenging system.

42 native or common elementary sounds

Anything GoesJan van den Heuvel4 May 20229

Does this study about the 42 elementary English sound bring us further? F. e. in the (classification) rubrication of the vowel sounds. The document is larger than 2 mb so I can’t upload it. https://www.dropbox.com/s/mk5l1yuy9n4nhmj/42%20english%20sounds.png?dl=0 out: SEVEN THOUSAND WORDS OFTE N MISPRONOUNCED A COMPLETE HAN DBOOK OF DIFFICU LTI ES I N ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION INCLUDING…

Gregg speed studies 1917

GeneralJan van den Heuvel5 November 20213

Nicholas Salkilld 31 March 2023 at 11:17 am on Our 7-Mile Dive to Bottom – Part 1Just managing to get out of my sick-bed to post this before part 2 arrives. Not too many questions this
Draconius 29 March 2023 at 10:13 am on A Message for New MembersNow, they all just use DragonSpeak dictation for notes or (in my hospital) they just write in the chart with
Lee 29 March 2023 at 5:18 am on A Message for New MembersYou may be right about people over 50. A 50-year-old today was born in 1972-1973, so could easily have had
Lee 27 March 2023 at 6:35 pm on A Message for New MembersI suspect there are no medical shorthand people around any more, unless someone tracked down a very old retired secretary.
Draconius 26 March 2023 at 2:39 pm on A Message for New MembersIve made a few of my own, or just abbreviated some that I wrote often enough. Its partially just wanting
Lee 25 March 2023 at 7:59 pm on A Message for New MembersMcGraw-Hill published medical reference materials for Gregg shorthand for Diamond Jubilee. (And even that amazes me). I have three different
Elizabeth Skipper 25 March 2023 at 7:35 pm on A Message for New MembersDraconius, while it makes sense not to reinvent the wheel, for specific medical outlines you can't find, I don't think
Draconius 25 March 2023 at 5:55 am on A Message for New MembersThanks Lee and Carlos for your welcome! I actually bought the 1953 edition and just recieved it yesterday! Its a
Carlos 24 March 2023 at 11:51 pm on A Message for New MembersWelcome to the blog, Draconius! I second what Lee wrote, but be aware that the first edition of the Gregg
Lee 24 March 2023 at 8:33 pm on A Message for New MembersYou can keep an eye out for "The Gregg Medical Shorthand Manual" and "The Medical Stenographer", both by Effie B.
Draconius 24 March 2023 at 7:15 pm on A Message for New MembersI've always intended to say hi, but I keep forgetting! Y'all can call me Draconius or just shorten it as
Carlos 17 March 2023 at 11:20 am on A Message for New Members"During" is written d-r in Centennial. Also, both -gram and -graph are written in full in Centennial. But the other
lvw 16 March 2023 at 9:13 pm on A Message for New MembersLike Lee and Elizabeth, I first learned Diamond Jubilee. I agree that it, Series 90 and Centennial are very similar.
Carlos 3 March 2023 at 6:54 pm on Question about Notehand “R”Both "hurry" and "furry" are written with the oo-hook in Anniversary and earlier series. Louis Leslie changed that starting with
Carlos 3 March 2023 at 12:14 pm on Question about Notehand “R”Correct. A way of looking at it is that you only insert the e in the obscure vowel situation if
Sean Goldfarb 3 March 2023 at 12:06 pm on Question about Notehand “R”But wouldn't "hurry" be written as h-e-r-ee"? Unfortunately for me, an imaginary American accent doesn't always work for me haha,
Sean Goldfarb 3 March 2023 at 12:00 pm on Question about Notehand “R”Thanks, Carlos! I didn't get a chance to really look at your comment (or anyone of the other nice people
Lee 2 March 2023 at 6:43 am on A Message for New MembersThank you for clarifying that. I agree that Diamond Jubilee, Series 90, and Centennial really are essentially the same thing,
Carlos 1 March 2023 at 8:56 pm on A Message for New MembersI chose to write Centennial between those three because that was the last published series, and the differences between Centennial
Elizabeth Skipper 1 March 2023 at 8:11 pm on A Message for New MembersGood to know, as some of the others really have me shaking my head!Fortunately, my actual need for shorthand is