| Subject: 1889 |
Author:
Dean Nayes
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Date Posted: 18:41:50 09/15/01 Sat
In reply to:
Mary Cronk
's message, "I need information" on 20:27:35 09/10/01 Mon
Mary:
I am a retired compositor who began working in the printing trade in 1942. I worked in many small weeklies in the 40's and at that time probably used some of the same equipment that was used in the 1890s. Your story, set in the west, means that there was no electricity available, therefore the composing room of your newspaper would probably consist of banks of handset type in California job cases which was used to set straight matter, in those days most used 10 point type. Also many typecases of larger type sizes: 12-72 point for use in headlines, and ads. Most small weeklies at that time that were located in remote areas such as you describe were limited in their selection of type sizes and fonts due to the availability and financial reasons.
For small printing projects, they could have a platen press, equipped with a treadle, such as an old Singer sewing machine, for fliers, busines cards, wedding announcements, office stationary, etc. There would also be a larger press for printing the newspaper. If gasoline was available, there could be a larger press powered by a gasoline engine with a belt drive to the press, otherwise they would be using an old screw down press that produced one page at a time, such as you see in old western movies.
I hope I have been of assistance to you, and if you have more questions feel free to contact me at: wrongfont@excite.com, or if you have hotmail messenger; coleen1944@hotmail.com.
The Itinerant Typographical Engineer
Dean Nayes
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