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

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Necessity, the Mother of Gutenburg's Invention By Silas J. Hirte INVENTIONS have always been preceded by a demand, and this is no less true of the invention of movable type for printing than of any other. Surrounded as we are today with printed matter of an excellent type, books, magazines, and newspapers, that give information on any and every subject known, it is quite impossible for us to conceive of the time when it was lacking. But way back in the days of the cave-men, records were kept by drawing and carving figures on stones in the caves. Now many museums in the world have these on exhibition. Even when Egypt was in full glory, ideas were expressed and preserved by pictures drawn with pens made of reeds on a kind of paper produced from bamboo. When Roman citizens, shortly before the time of Julius Caesar, were struggling to save democracy and were faced with great difficulties. aside from word of mouth and hand-written bulletins, there was no way of informing voters of the various problems that should be solved by them. Early in the fifteenth century in Germany, the combination of the industrial and economic conditions created a class of people who were hungering for education and could afford to purchase reading matter in greater quantities than the old-fashioned methods of book making could furnish. Then the artisan and the artist held practically the same rank. Tradesmen were wealthy and very influential in society. Quite generally they craved knowledge along with their daily occupation. Since it was almost impossible for them to get accurate and complete information concerning the world and the great deeds of the past or the plans of the future, it was no easy task to improve their lot in life. In all Europe there were but few books and manuscripts. The books were very large and unwieldy. They were made of many sheets of paper or parchment between fancy carved covers of wood or ivory. Much attention was paid to elaborate drawing and fancy penmanship, while the content was sadly neglected. Those who wanted to read them were obliged to go where the books were, for they were chained to tables. Priests and monks of the Roman Catholic Church spent hours and hours, weeks and weeks, copying religious and classical manuscripts. This was not only a slow process, but a very expensive one. Then from the Chinese, the Europeans learned to cut designs and letters on blocks of wood or other materials and to print them on cloth and parchment. This, while a great improvement over the 20

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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

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old copying method, was far from satisfactory, for after a design was used once, it had to be thrown away. As the demand for books had been steadily growing, the time was ripe for an invention to meet this demand. The alphabet had been changed to make it more readable. Those, who were reaching out for different kinds of reading material, had greatly increased in number. Then one day in Germany, a young man was engraving a page of manuscript on a block, when his knife slipped, cutting off a letter which fell to the floor. As he picked it up and looked at it. an idea struck him, why not carve one letter at a time, each on a single little block and put the letters together to make words? Thus was born an idea that was, when developed, to revolutionize the world. The young man was Johann Gutenburg, who was a refugee in Strassburg because he had engaged in a political discussion, opposing officers who were in control of the government in this native city. Mainz. Later, eager to recoup his fortune and, clinging to the possibilitiy of a better way of printing, he carried out and improved upon his original plan, and the invention of movable type was the result. Since printing by his method was made public five hundred years ago, it has carried the twin lights of Christianity and education over a dark and superstitious world. The Life Of Gutenberg By Carola E. Davis ALTHOUGH no one knows the exact year of Johann Gutenburg’s birth, it was probably about 1400. His parents, who resided in Mainz, Germany .were of noble birth, and very healthy. His father’s name was Gensfleisch. but young Johann took the name of Gutenburg in honor of his mother for she was the last of her house. When Johann was about ten years old, his parents had to flee from Mainz . There was a great quarrel between the poor and the rich in that city, and his parents were among the rich. So they were forced to find another home in Strassburg, and this is where the inventor of printing grew to manhood. Several years before he made any attempt to print books, he was engaged in experiments for polishing stones, and making mirrors. Later Gutenburg and a partner began a business of their own, making mirrors, but this venture was not a success. Gutenburg went into another business, that of printing with woodcuts, with three partners including Dritizehn. his former associate. Hut Dritizehn died in 1441 21