FOOTNOTES:[145]As wooden types were the first with which the original printers made their earliest essays in the art of Typography in Europe, it is interesting to learn that in America such types are now being used to so great an extent, that it requires the aid of the most finished machinery to supply the demand that has arisen for them. The following account of their manufacture is condensed from a narrative in theBoston Weekly Spectator(Oct. 12, 1871).—About 1853 Mr. William H. Page, originally a printer, entered into the employ of Mr. J. G. Cooley, a wood type cutter at Greenville. Noticing the many defects of the process he busied his mind in devising and inventing methods for its improvement. Succeeding in his efforts, he started in business on his own account; and in 1869, having bought out Mr. Cooley, transferred the whole of the works to Norwich, Eastern Connecticut. Here, with extensive and perfect machinery, and from 35 to 40 workpeople, one-seventh of whom are females, he supplies the greater part of the wooden types used throughout the United States. The process of manufacture is as follows:—All ordinary wood type is made of rock-maple, which grows abundantly in Connecticut. The logs are first sawed across the grain into blocks an inch and an eighth thick, then steamed to force out the sap, and when dried, packed away in the seasoning house for two years. When wanted for type, they are taken to dressing machines, where horizontal revolving cutters rapidly smoothe and reduce their size with perfect uniformity; they are then skilfully planed by hand, next gum-shellaced, and dried for half a day, and sand papered, which process is again repeated. After this, they are taken to felt buffing wheels, covered with beeswax and tallow, which, revolving with exceeding swiftness, thoroughly polish the surfaces on which the letters are to be cut. The blocks are then sawed into the desired shapes, and transferred to the letter makers. These place the prepared blocks in a machine not much unlike in its appearance to an eccentric lathe, although it is not one. Set in one angle of a horizontal frame like a pentagraph, is a pencil or tracer, moved by the hand of the operator exactly in the lines of a stationary pattern or model letter. In an opposite angle, and directly over the block to be carved, is a corresponding pencil of fine steel, in reality a small bit, or gouge, which is belted to the driving power, and makes from 17,000 to 20,000 revolutions a minute, following minutely all the lines and flexions of the tracer on the pattern. A skilful operator can thus make a letter in half a minute. This part of the work is chiefly performed by girls. After leaving the cutter the letters are further dressed by a trimmer who gives them their finishing touches, when they are thoroughly oiled with linseed oil, and packed for transport to wherever ordered. The ordinary size of letters, used for Advertising placards, is 1 ft. 8 in., though occasionally some are ordered 14 ft. long, [made and printed in sections it is presumed]. These monster letters are made of a softer white wood, and gouged out on a great machine called a “router.” The smallest size manufactured is about one-third of an inch. [B. W. S.] This is just the size of the types used for the “Appeal to Christendom against the Turks,” printed at Mentz in 1454 or 1455. What steam-driven machinery is doing for wooden types it is also doing in another form for types of cast metal. The greatest number that an expert workman could cast by the hand-mould process was about 1800 in an hour. After many years of costly experimentalizing, and frequent but not wholly fruitless failures, a machine was at last perfected in 1862, by which as many as 7600 letters an hour are turned out. With type manufactured at this rate, with steam type-composers that put together 40,000 letters an hour, (the invention of Mr. A. Mackie of Warrington), and with steam printing machines capable of perfecting 12,000 sheets (equal to 24,000 impressions) in the same space of time, (theTimes“Walter” machine, invented by Mr. J. C. Macdonald); the latter half of the nineteenth century is truly an era of marvels in all that concerns Letter-press Printing.[146]Dr. Van Der Linde treats this writer with but scant ceremony. He says, (p. 76 of Hessels’ Translation) “The father of this arch-liar had written frankly and in accordance with truth—‘Joh. Faust (Fust) war Mitverleger der Buchdruckerei in der Stadt Mentze; etliche wollen wider seiner Dank ihn zu einem Inventorem haben und macken, so aber nur mit seinem Vermögen und guten Rath in der That geholfen.’—‘Joh. Faust was partner in the printing office at Mentz; some persons would make an inventor of him against his own wish; he really helped only with his money and good advice.’”
[145]As wooden types were the first with which the original printers made their earliest essays in the art of Typography in Europe, it is interesting to learn that in America such types are now being used to so great an extent, that it requires the aid of the most finished machinery to supply the demand that has arisen for them. The following account of their manufacture is condensed from a narrative in theBoston Weekly Spectator(Oct. 12, 1871).—About 1853 Mr. William H. Page, originally a printer, entered into the employ of Mr. J. G. Cooley, a wood type cutter at Greenville. Noticing the many defects of the process he busied his mind in devising and inventing methods for its improvement. Succeeding in his efforts, he started in business on his own account; and in 1869, having bought out Mr. Cooley, transferred the whole of the works to Norwich, Eastern Connecticut. Here, with extensive and perfect machinery, and from 35 to 40 workpeople, one-seventh of whom are females, he supplies the greater part of the wooden types used throughout the United States. The process of manufacture is as follows:—All ordinary wood type is made of rock-maple, which grows abundantly in Connecticut. The logs are first sawed across the grain into blocks an inch and an eighth thick, then steamed to force out the sap, and when dried, packed away in the seasoning house for two years. When wanted for type, they are taken to dressing machines, where horizontal revolving cutters rapidly smoothe and reduce their size with perfect uniformity; they are then skilfully planed by hand, next gum-shellaced, and dried for half a day, and sand papered, which process is again repeated. After this, they are taken to felt buffing wheels, covered with beeswax and tallow, which, revolving with exceeding swiftness, thoroughly polish the surfaces on which the letters are to be cut. The blocks are then sawed into the desired shapes, and transferred to the letter makers. These place the prepared blocks in a machine not much unlike in its appearance to an eccentric lathe, although it is not one. Set in one angle of a horizontal frame like a pentagraph, is a pencil or tracer, moved by the hand of the operator exactly in the lines of a stationary pattern or model letter. In an opposite angle, and directly over the block to be carved, is a corresponding pencil of fine steel, in reality a small bit, or gouge, which is belted to the driving power, and makes from 17,000 to 20,000 revolutions a minute, following minutely all the lines and flexions of the tracer on the pattern. A skilful operator can thus make a letter in half a minute. This part of the work is chiefly performed by girls. After leaving the cutter the letters are further dressed by a trimmer who gives them their finishing touches, when they are thoroughly oiled with linseed oil, and packed for transport to wherever ordered. The ordinary size of letters, used for Advertising placards, is 1 ft. 8 in., though occasionally some are ordered 14 ft. long, [made and printed in sections it is presumed]. These monster letters are made of a softer white wood, and gouged out on a great machine called a “router.” The smallest size manufactured is about one-third of an inch. [B. W. S.] This is just the size of the types used for the “Appeal to Christendom against the Turks,” printed at Mentz in 1454 or 1455. What steam-driven machinery is doing for wooden types it is also doing in another form for types of cast metal. The greatest number that an expert workman could cast by the hand-mould process was about 1800 in an hour. After many years of costly experimentalizing, and frequent but not wholly fruitless failures, a machine was at last perfected in 1862, by which as many as 7600 letters an hour are turned out. With type manufactured at this rate, with steam type-composers that put together 40,000 letters an hour, (the invention of Mr. A. Mackie of Warrington), and with steam printing machines capable of perfecting 12,000 sheets (equal to 24,000 impressions) in the same space of time, (theTimes“Walter” machine, invented by Mr. J. C. Macdonald); the latter half of the nineteenth century is truly an era of marvels in all that concerns Letter-press Printing.
[145]As wooden types were the first with which the original printers made their earliest essays in the art of Typography in Europe, it is interesting to learn that in America such types are now being used to so great an extent, that it requires the aid of the most finished machinery to supply the demand that has arisen for them. The following account of their manufacture is condensed from a narrative in theBoston Weekly Spectator(Oct. 12, 1871).—About 1853 Mr. William H. Page, originally a printer, entered into the employ of Mr. J. G. Cooley, a wood type cutter at Greenville. Noticing the many defects of the process he busied his mind in devising and inventing methods for its improvement. Succeeding in his efforts, he started in business on his own account; and in 1869, having bought out Mr. Cooley, transferred the whole of the works to Norwich, Eastern Connecticut. Here, with extensive and perfect machinery, and from 35 to 40 workpeople, one-seventh of whom are females, he supplies the greater part of the wooden types used throughout the United States. The process of manufacture is as follows:—All ordinary wood type is made of rock-maple, which grows abundantly in Connecticut. The logs are first sawed across the grain into blocks an inch and an eighth thick, then steamed to force out the sap, and when dried, packed away in the seasoning house for two years. When wanted for type, they are taken to dressing machines, where horizontal revolving cutters rapidly smoothe and reduce their size with perfect uniformity; they are then skilfully planed by hand, next gum-shellaced, and dried for half a day, and sand papered, which process is again repeated. After this, they are taken to felt buffing wheels, covered with beeswax and tallow, which, revolving with exceeding swiftness, thoroughly polish the surfaces on which the letters are to be cut. The blocks are then sawed into the desired shapes, and transferred to the letter makers. These place the prepared blocks in a machine not much unlike in its appearance to an eccentric lathe, although it is not one. Set in one angle of a horizontal frame like a pentagraph, is a pencil or tracer, moved by the hand of the operator exactly in the lines of a stationary pattern or model letter. In an opposite angle, and directly over the block to be carved, is a corresponding pencil of fine steel, in reality a small bit, or gouge, which is belted to the driving power, and makes from 17,000 to 20,000 revolutions a minute, following minutely all the lines and flexions of the tracer on the pattern. A skilful operator can thus make a letter in half a minute. This part of the work is chiefly performed by girls. After leaving the cutter the letters are further dressed by a trimmer who gives them their finishing touches, when they are thoroughly oiled with linseed oil, and packed for transport to wherever ordered. The ordinary size of letters, used for Advertising placards, is 1 ft. 8 in., though occasionally some are ordered 14 ft. long, [made and printed in sections it is presumed]. These monster letters are made of a softer white wood, and gouged out on a great machine called a “router.” The smallest size manufactured is about one-third of an inch. [B. W. S.] This is just the size of the types used for the “Appeal to Christendom against the Turks,” printed at Mentz in 1454 or 1455. What steam-driven machinery is doing for wooden types it is also doing in another form for types of cast metal. The greatest number that an expert workman could cast by the hand-mould process was about 1800 in an hour. After many years of costly experimentalizing, and frequent but not wholly fruitless failures, a machine was at last perfected in 1862, by which as many as 7600 letters an hour are turned out. With type manufactured at this rate, with steam type-composers that put together 40,000 letters an hour, (the invention of Mr. A. Mackie of Warrington), and with steam printing machines capable of perfecting 12,000 sheets (equal to 24,000 impressions) in the same space of time, (theTimes“Walter” machine, invented by Mr. J. C. Macdonald); the latter half of the nineteenth century is truly an era of marvels in all that concerns Letter-press Printing.
[146]Dr. Van Der Linde treats this writer with but scant ceremony. He says, (p. 76 of Hessels’ Translation) “The father of this arch-liar had written frankly and in accordance with truth—‘Joh. Faust (Fust) war Mitverleger der Buchdruckerei in der Stadt Mentze; etliche wollen wider seiner Dank ihn zu einem Inventorem haben und macken, so aber nur mit seinem Vermögen und guten Rath in der That geholfen.’—‘Joh. Faust was partner in the printing office at Mentz; some persons would make an inventor of him against his own wish; he really helped only with his money and good advice.’”
[146]Dr. Van Der Linde treats this writer with but scant ceremony. He says, (p. 76 of Hessels’ Translation) “The father of this arch-liar had written frankly and in accordance with truth—‘Joh. Faust (Fust) war Mitverleger der Buchdruckerei in der Stadt Mentze; etliche wollen wider seiner Dank ihn zu einem Inventorem haben und macken, so aber nur mit seinem Vermögen und guten Rath in der That geholfen.’—‘Joh. Faust was partner in the printing office at Mentz; some persons would make an inventor of him against his own wish; he really helped only with his money and good advice.’”