Wisconsin School for the Deaf - Tattler Yearbook (Delavan, WI)

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Small books became very stylish all over Europe and many printing offices made imitations of the Adline books. 1 he Elzevirs of Amsterdam in the seventeenth century published a set ot books w hi( h was so small that it could be packed in a traveling case. However, very few people could read the small type which they used. In those early years, England had no especial need of printing. There was a general interest in books among the better class, but these people got their books when they went to Europe on business, diplomacy. and pleasure. English church books were printed at Rouen. In 1470 an English merchant, William Caxton retired from business and went to visit Cologne where he spent a few months watching the workmen at a new printing shop. Returning to England he sent a friend to buy a printing outfit and learn how to use it. They produced the first English book at Bruges in Belgium in 1474. Two years later he returned to London where he and another printer. Wynkyn de Worde, published the first book printed in England. For the next three hundred years, the art of printing went steadily downward, because many people could not read and most of them were too poor to buy books or newspapers. They worked hard and all the money went to their kings and queens. After the revolution in France, the people won their freedom and later they were able to buy reading matter. Many hundreds of orders for books were made so the people could educate themselves and also their children. One of the greatest inventions in the field of printing was the Linotype, a machine invented in 1885 by Ottmar Mergenthaler. Before it was introduced, printers had to set all the type they used by hand, that is, they had to stand before large trays and pick out each letter as they needed it. Today, the Linotype machine can set type ten times more rapidly than it was formerly set by hand. Although printing went steadily downward for three hundred years, it is an important industry which has been active for five hundred years and has on the whole, showed improvement in that time. period of from four hundred fifty to five hundred years. Athough the facilities we have today are quicker and more accurate, the craftmanship of the earlier days was considerably better in the finished product. Modern Methods Of Printing By Robert L. Pagel 18

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Five Hundred Years Of Printing By Henry Schmidt w MILE Johann Gutenburg devoted himself to developing, improving and perfecting his ideas, he let others use his invention. From 1441 to 1450 some workmen, whom he had employed, got some of the type to produce a number of editions of a small school Latin grammar used throughout the Middle Ages. Examples of job printing done about ten years later have been found. These were blank forms printed to be used as receipts for money contributed for a missionary purpose. Gutenburg went back to his native city, Mainz, to undertake the publishing of the Bible in 1450, but he was so full of ideas for inventions that he neglected the work and Johann Fust, the man who loaned him the money to print the Bible, hired another man named Peter Schoeffer to take charge of the work in order to get it completed so that he could realize the profits on his investment. Gutenburg continued his experimenting and improved the type casting implements so much that he was able to produce a type that was only a third as large as that previously in use. This type was introduced in a large encyclopaedic dictionary, known as the Catholican. This was the first reference book ever printed and people think Gutenburg had charge of the printing of this himself. By the year 1460 printing was being practiced in Mainz. Cologne. Strassburg. and at least three other cities in the neighborhood. Cologne was a university town where there was a great demand for books. From these cities printing spread rapidly and by 1480 printing was a recognized, well organized, business throughout the country. Jobbing houses which sold paper to different printing shops sprang up. and printing became a flourishing business in a score of German cities. A German printer, John Speier, secured a monopoly of printing in Venice in 1465. Two years later, the trade was thrown open to all comers and a Frenchman, Nicolas Jenson was the first one to take advantage of the chance. He began work with a type, which he designed. This type has given him a fame that makes his name as well known among printers as that of Gutenburg. The Jenson type is the most nearly perfected type for reading that has yet been produced. Very many books were printed in Venice and sent all over the world but most of them were very poorly and cheaply made. In the 1480’s Aldus Manutius wanted to become the greatest editor and publisher of Greek books. Andres Torresanus, his father-in-law had the best printing shop in Venice. He introduced a new style letter that we now call Italics.” This type was more compact and so the same material could be printed in smaller books. These books were called Adline Octavoes. 17

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The original press was made so as to print on only one side of the paper at a time. It was a screw affair with a contrivance for pushing a plate down upon a sheet of paper resting on the top of the form. A great deal of time was required to pull an impression, ink the form by hand with a baren or ink ball, and then pull another impression; repeating this procedure time after time until the required number of impressions was secured. Today we have large rotary presses equipped to print both sides of the sheet at a time. There are also cylinder presses which make up to four thousand five hundred impressions an hour and at the same time ink the form evenly. These presses are fed automatically, which is more accurate and much faster than hand feeding. doing back to a smaller division of the printing industry, we tlnd modern platen presses being used on a large scale. Certain models of these presses are fed automatically, also. Forms for them usually come from the Linotype or Monotype machines, which have revolutionized the setting of type. Formerly, a person would have to spend something like an hour and a half making up a form which can now be set on a Linotype or Monotype in fifteen minutes, although a lot of composition is still done by hand. The Linotype, invented by Ottmar Mergenthaier, is a linecasting machine which composes lines of type, and casts them in one piece. This “line of type” is ready for use when it leaves the machine. This machine is used for all types of letterpress printing. It is one of the “musts” in the modern, well-equipped printing shop. The first use of the Linotype was made by the New York Tribune in 1886, fifty-five years ago. An idea of what one of these machines is worth may be obtained from the fact that ten of the popular automobiles in the lower price field may be bought for the price of one machine. Concerning other phases of the printing industry, there are so many branches connected with it that it is impossible to state them all here. Those mentioned above are some of the principal ones. What the printing industry is worth to the United States is shown by the following statistics: Printing ranks fourth in total value of products, which is more than two and one half billion dollars; and sixth in number of persons employed. There are thirteen thousand periodicals published annually in the United States. The American observance of the five hundredth anniversary of the invention of printing is being co-ordinated by a special comittee of the American Institute of Graphic Arts. Let's make 1941 a memorable year! 9