Hand press

“ The hand press is a simple and quick agent for getting a result. The ink roller is run over the type and hand pressure is applied. One could not of course print a large newspaper on such a limited scale; but for job [156] bing work Franklin's variety of press is still acceptable and unrivaled."
"It seems funny to think of a Boston paper ever being so small," mused the boy.
Mr. Wright smiled. ”

“ The Hand-press.—Earl Stanhope’s Press.—Improvements.—Cylinder Presses.—Press-room.—Drying Room.—Sewing Room.—Elevator.—Books for the Blind.—Type, Press, and Paper invented.—Catalogue of Great Exhibition.—Estimate of Rapid Labor by Machinery.
We have already referred to the earliest modes of taking the impression from the types by friction, or the rubbing of some hard smooth substance over the paper when laid upon the face of the types.
The hand-press invented by Gutenberg is the only machine absolutely necessary for printers. ”

“ If the printing is to be done on a hand press, a lithographic leather roller is charged with printer's ink, and the plate, which has been fastened on a suitable bed-plate in the press, is rolled up while it is still moist. ”

“ The firm of R. Hoe & Co., which as early as 1822 was already engaged in the manufacture of hand-presses in New York, commenced about 1832 to manufacture flat-bed cylinder presses, beginning with the single large or drum cylinder press which was followed soon afterward by the single small cylinder and the double small cylinder press, the flat-bed perfecting press, the stop-cylinder press, the two-revolution press, and the rotary book press. They also made and are still making large newspaper and color presses which are used all over the civilized world, but of these we will not treat here. ”

“ You can make a printing press out of wood but to do a good job you must have a press built of iron and properly machined, that is finished up, for to do good printing a good outfit is needed to begin with.
Small hand inked and self-inking presses are sold in the toy departments of nearly all stores at prices ranging from $1.50 to $5.00 and this will include a font of type. Many of these little presses are made which use type about half the length of regular type and if you get a press of this kind you will never know the real joy of printing. ”

“ That the printing press was an invention of merit will be perceived at a glance when it is compared with the screw press which is supposed to have served as the basis of construction.394 That a proper method of doing presswork was devised in the infancy of the art may be inferred, not only from the permanency of the primitive form of press, all the important features of which are still preserved in the modern hand-press, but from the meritorious presswork of the first books. ”

“ It must be remembered, however, that most modern printing is done by machinery on soft paper, and not by the hand press, and these somewhat wiry letters are suitable for the machine process, which would not do justice to letters of more generous design. ”

“ The printing press has held its own in the rapid advance of that wonderful evolution which, within the last half century, in every phase of thought and in every movement of material forces placed under the dominion of men, has almost made one of our years the equivalent of one of the old centuries. Within average recollection the single cylinder printing machine, run by hand or steam, and able under best conditions to print one side of a thousand sheets in one hour, was the marvel of mankind. ”

“ These were the only improvements of any note which were made before the introduction of the Stanhope press about 1800. Of course, the presses were worked by hand power and it will be seen that the setting up of the screw or the throwing of a lever with sufficient force to insure a good impression was an extremely laborious task. It was sometimes dangerous, as the screw bar or lever was liable to break when the workman’s weight and strength were thrown upon it, resulting in serious injuries. ”

“ In other words, the output of a press was equal to one half the number of pulls a printer could give in an hour. It took so much muscular strength to pull the lever of the old-fashioned press that the services of a man were required. The only help a boy could be in the colonial print-shop was to ink the type : this he did, in many instances, with the help of a
deerskin ball filled with wool and nailed to a stick of hickory. Not until 1750 were printing-presses manufactured in America: in that year, Christopher Sower, Jr., began to turn out hand- presses at Germantown, Pennsylvania. ”

“ The average output of the modern hand-press, when all is made ready for running, is about two hundred and fifty impressions per hour. This number, it should be said, is the product of two men who work together as “partners.” One inks the type-forme and keeps a sharp look-out for any inequality of inking, and sees generally that the work is being turned out in a workmanlike manner. The other lays on the sheet to certain marks, runs the carriage in under the platen, and pulls the bar handle across to give the necessary impression. ”

“ As relief plates or types are more quickly coated with ink, and need less impression than lithographic stones or copper plates, the typographic process is, consequently, better fitted to receive the help of labor-saving machinery. The daily performance of the typographic hand press on plain work has been, almost from its earliest employment, about fifteen hundred impressions, which is about four times greater than that of the hand lithographic press. ”

“ The inking of the forme is done by another set of rollers called inkers, placed near the impression cylinder. The inking rollers receive their ink from what is distributed on the table and coat the type while it is passing underneath them. Thus the nine operations of the hand-press requisite to print one impression are greatly reduced. The bed carrying the type to and fro from the point of impression moves mechanically, superseding the running in and out of the carriage by the rounce and handle of the hand-press. ”

“ The Times Newspaper, which was [10] the first to adopt this astonishing invention, is still printed by it with a rapidity which is scarcely conceivable.10-* An inspection of it [11] cannot fail to gratify every intelligent observer. Its use has now become very general.
The Steam Press, however, is chiefly applicable where large numbers, or great speed are required; for ordinary works, and fine Printing, the hand Press is still preferred, and probably ever will be. ”

“ Sir Rowland Hill’s dream of a press which would print both sides of the paper at one operation in due time became a realized fact, while vast improvements in the matter of inking the forms, and even the addition of colored ink by which printing in color could be done, were among the new devices.
Washington Hand Press, 1827
What we have further to say is a question of progress in rapidity of action rather than of invention. ”

“ PAPER-MAKING—Continued Technique.—The importance of the formation of the sheet on the machine wire is the same as on the hand mold, as subsequent pressing and calendering can only modify faulty formation. The stuff should be uniform and even in texture. The press rolls must be ground with absolute accuracy, and slightly crowned to allow for their sagging. Otherwise water would be unevenly expelled from the web, possibly causing a damp streak throughout the entire run of paper, which would show in the finished product. ”

“ The presses are of various sizes, but all require much strength to work them; the press has a horizontal lever, crossing the top of a vertical screw, and there is generally an iron weight at the end of each arm or half of the lever to increase the power; one of the lever arms is grasped in the right hand of the presser, and whirled round with a jerk; while the fingers of the left hand place the metal in its proper position, and remove it when it has been stamped or pressed. ”

“ His Mark, which he first used in 1507, is the earliest picture of a printing-press. Thirteen years after, he adopted another device with the same subject, but differing in many important particulars. In the second, the composing-stick used by the figure in the act of setting type is changed from the right 117 to the left hand; the press shows improved mechanical construction, indicating greater solidity and strength. In the latter example also the figure sitting at the case on the right side of the engraving is intended to represent a woman, instead of a man as in the earlier illustration. ”

“ In finishing the back of a book it must always be held tightly in the "finishing press." When in the press, mark the head and tail as a guide for the pallets by running a folding-stick along the edge of a piece of parchment or vellum held by the finger and thumb of the left hand against the sides of the volume across the back at the proper place. ”

“ To-day we have in the [Pg 307] place of Caxton’s rude hand-made press great cylinder machines capable of absorbing paper by the mile, and grinding out 20,000 impressions an hour as easily as a child can unwind a reel of cotton.
Side by side with the problem how to produce the greatest possible number of copies in a given time from one machine, has arisen another:—how to set up type with a proportionate rapidity. A press without type is as useless as a chaff-cutter without hay or straw. The type once assembled, as many casts or stereotypes can be made from it as there are machines to be worked. ”

“ All-along.—When a volume is sewed, and the thread passes from kettle-stitch to kettle-stitch, or from end to end in each sheet, it is said to be sewed "all-along."
Arming press.—A species of blocking press used by hand ”

“ When the plates have been made perfect in other points, the guards are no longer needed, and are cut away. When books were printed on hand presses during the first half of this century, pressmen sometimes pasted on or tacked on thin strips of wood around the forms of types to shield the ends of lines from injury. It is a strange surprise to encounter this modern method of protecting types from injury in one of the earliest books. ”

“ So Uncle Ben continued his talk about magazine making. He explained the workings of different kinds of printing presses, how some print directly from the type “made ready” on a flat bed, the paper being fed into the press in flat sheets, and how some of the big presses print from curved plates that fit around a big roller, the paper running into the press continuously from an immense big roll as wide as the press. He told about the wonderful folding and stitching machines, and many other interesting things. ”

“ That will probably be when they have found out all about how to put a harness on electricity. No one can predict when inventive genius will reach its limits in the printing press. Before this press was built, the fastest presses in the world were Hoe’s quadruple presses, which will turn out 48,000 four-, six-, or eight-page papers an hour, 24,000 ten-, twelve-, fourteen-, or sixteen-page papers an hour, and 12,000 twenty- or twenty-four page papers an hour, all cut, pasted, and folded.
The sextuple press has a well-nigh insatiable appetite for white paper. ”

“ In this case the legend of the picture should face it so that the reader will have no occasion to look beyond the two pages when he has them before him. The printers of the sixteenth century, especially the Dutch, did not hesitate to send their pages through two presses, one the typographic press, and the other the roller press for copper-plate engravings. The results give us perhaps the best example that we have of things beautiful in themselves but unlovely in combination. As in the use of other ornamental features, there are no bounds to the use of illustration except that of fitness. ”

“ The familiar napkin press with a large wooden screw and cross handle is the type of the earliest printing presses of which we possess any record, the screw presently giving way before the more effective lever handles, and it should not be forgotten that excellent results can be obtained from these old presses acting with a direct downward pressure. ”

“ Correspondents of the press were ever on hand to hear every word dropped, and were not always disposed to report correctly what did not confirm their preconceived notions, either about the conduct of the war or the individuals concerned in it. ”

“ The Printing Press.—It is on the cylinders of these presses that the circular stereotyped plates are fitted, two plates filling nicely the round of the cylinder. All the plates for the inside pages of the paper are stereotyped and screwed on their cylinders a half-hour or more before press time, the pages with the latest news being held until the last possible moment. Usually the last page to come is the title page, and as soon as the last locking lever has been clamped, the wheels of the big press begin to turn. ”

“ Rolling the Prints.—After the prints have been under the hands of the retoucher, they should be rolled in a rolling-press in order to give a brightness to the printed image. It would be invidious to point out any particular press that should be used. Suffice it to say, there are many excellent ones in the market. The directions for cleaning and using the press are supplied with each machine ”

“ The printing is effected by steam-worked presses. The ink is blue, and its composition known only to a few of the authorities. An inspector goes his rounds during the continuance of the operations, watching every press, every workman, every process. A beautiful machine, distinct from the press, is employed to print the variable numbers on the note; fed with sheets of paper, it will number a thousand of them in succession, changing the digits each time, and scarcely requiring to be touched meanwhile; even the removal of one note and the placing of another are effected by automatic agency. ”