Transfer printing

“ The success of this operation depends largely on the quality of the paper, which is soft, thin, pliable, and a quick absorbent of fluid ink.44 If American book papers were substituted for Chinese paper, the process of printing by the brush and with fluid ink would be found impracticable: the sheet would not adhere to the block; the ink would smear on the paper; the brush would not give enough pressure to transfer the ink.
Chinese presswork is done with rapidity. Du Halde said that a printer could perfect, without exertion, ten thousand sheets within one day. ”

“ The name of the printer, the author, and the publisher was to be placed in every book, and, with a view to encouraging English printing, it was decreed further that no merchant or bookseller should import any English book printed abroad. No person was to erect a printing-press, or to let any [Pg 179] premises for the purpose of carrying on printing, without first giving notice to the Company, and no joiner or carpenter was to make a press without similar notice. ”

“ At present we do not know much about the early business of type-cutting, but it seems clear that, soon after the commencement of the sixteenth century, different printers went to a common source for their type, and that type-cutting was not a part of the printer’s business, as it was when printing was first invented, but a special trade. ”

“ The Master and the Wardens of the Stationers’ Company might have three presses each and three apprentices. No other printer could have more than two presses. A master printer on the livery (a member of the Company) might have two apprentices, others only one. The master printers were to give work to journeymen when requested to do so. This enactment was not made out of any tenderness for unemployed journeymen but for the reason that the unemployed journeyman was always tempted to pick up an occasional shilling by printing unlicensed or objectionable books. ”

“ In these days of machinery, when paper can be made in any size of sheet desired, the process is reversed: the size of the letter-press page is determined and the size of the sheet of paper adapted thereto. Upon receipt of the paper the printer sends a full-sized dummy of it to the manufacturing man so that he may compare it with the order that was given to the paper dealer. The book is then put to press, and as soon as the printing has been completed, the printed sheets are delivered to the binder. ”

“ Once the printer or his apprentices had set the type, pulled a proof, “made up” the type into pages with the proper spacing and ornaments, and then locked it into forms by means of furniture and quoins, he placed his form on the press and adjusted it to get the most even impression. Then he was ready to begin the actual process of printing. Whereas printing is commonly done today by automatic presses, fed with paper either mechanically or by hand, it had to be done one sheet at a time in the eighteenth century. ”

“ Another difficulty regarded the supply and proper distribution of the ink, for which no interval could be left, as the process of printing off was to be absolutely continuous. As my invention was not practically adopted, and has been in a great measure superseded by later improvements, I forbear details, referring the curious either to my specification, which is dated August 12th, 1835, and numbered 6762; a printed copy of which may be procured at the Patent Office, or to the ‘Repertory of Patent Inventions,’ No. 35, where the machine is accurately and lucidly described. ”

“ This last book shows that unknown or not Faques was a skilful printer, for it is one of the most beautiful books issued from the early English press. The type is sharp and brilliant, the printing in red well done, and each page is surrounded with a chain-like border. On the first leaf is the printer’s device, a very uncommon one, [Pg 170] consisting of two triangles. ”

“ The early printers were their own publishers and booksellers. Previous to the invention of typography the maker and seller of the book were not ordinarily the same person. It was only natural that in a short time the stationers, that is to say, the sellers of manuscript books and of writing materials, should sell printed books also. Both the printer and bookseller were interested in an attempt to cut out one profit. If the printer sold to the bookseller and the bookseller sold to the public, both must profit by the transaction. ”

“ A printer liable to such visitations would prefer, if possible, to procure his type out of doors, rather than maintain the valuable plant requisite to make it himself; and it is probable that the outside demand thus created may have been among the causes which led to the establishment of one or two small foundries, unconnected with any one printing office in particular, whose business it would be to supply any purchaser with type from its matrices. ”

“ In this book, printed at the very end of the century in Paris, where the book trade had for centuries been highly organized, it is natural to find printer and publisher clearly separated, both being tradesmen working for gain. The lines for such a distinction already existed in the days of manuscripts, the scribes and the stationers belonging to quite separate classes, though they might assume each other’s functions. In the earliest days of printing the craftsmen were, as a rule, their own publishers ”

“ And when it comes to the larger, more expensive articles, like the press and the cutter, it must be considered that they are probably not soon, if ever, to be replaced, that imperfections are difficult to detect, and that not a very large reduction, can be had on machines in good repair. But if it is a question of getting a start in printing by the use of old equipment or doing without the printshop, by all means let’s have the old equipment. There are a good many items that can be safely and cheaply bought second hand. ”

“ That which might be of the utmost value to one printer would in all probability fail to meet the requirements of another. With these also, as with the transfer inks, the main point is to grasp the general principles involved. Adhering to these principles enables any intelligent workman to adapt the transfers to his own peculiar necessity. It is most important that lithographic transfer paper should be absolutely impervious to the transfer composition or ink, so that an impression of full strength can be conveyed to the stone, leaving its greasy properties unimpaired. ”

“ Up to our own times that demand has been limited to very narrow bounds; and the circumstances by which it has been extended are as remarkable as those which accompanied the progress of the original invention of printing. The same principle of demand going before supply, and the same reaction of supply upon demand, will be found to have marked the operations of the printing-press in this country, during the last twenty-five years, as distinctly as they marked them throughout Europe in the latter part of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth. ”

“ Although a busy import trade in type appears to have been maintained by the earliest printers, and although as early as the days of De Worde, as we have seen, there were English printers who not only cast types for themselves, but are supposed to have supplied them to others, we search in vain for any definite reference to letter-founding in the decrees and proclamations which, prior to 1637, had for their object the regulation or repression of printing. ”

“ When an ancient printer died, and his copies were exposed to sale, few or none of the young ones were of ability to deal for them, nor indeed for any other, so that the Booksellers have engross'd almost all.' The petitioners show also that the Company of Stationers was grown so large that none could be Master or Warden until he was well advanced in life, and therefore unable to keep a vigilant eye on the trade, while a printer did not become Master once in ten or twenty years. ”

“ Paper for linotype operators as well as that for hand-compositors should be about the size of commercial note, and the writing should run the long way of the page, the reason being that sheets of the commercial note size fit into the machine ‘copy-holder’ very neatly. Good margins should be left at the top and sides, this for side-notes and catch-lines for headings. Names of persons, etc., should be ‘printed out’ carefully in manuscripts, and interlineations should be avoided. Blind hands have always caused infinite trouble in printing-houses. ”

“ There is a general belief that the correction of these oversights is the duty of the printer, and the writer too often throws this duty largely on the compositor and the proof-reader. During the last fifty years there has been no marked improvement in the average writer's preparation of copy for the printer, but there have been steadily increasing exactions from book-buyers. The printing that passed a tolerant inspection in 1850 does not pass now. The reader insists on more attention to uniformity in mechanical details. ”

“ One great difficulty of most printing machines is that of securing perfect register (the exact coincidence of the printing on opposite sides of the paper) . This was anticipated and met by the patent. The one thing the inventor failed to do was to overcome the resistance the collectors of the stamp duty presented to this printing on a continuous roll, and to the affixing of the stamps to the newspapers at the proper intervals during their passage through the machine. ”

“ Type is type, speaking somewhat loosely, and, whatever the crotchet a consumer of printing may get into his head it is not likely to cost more than about so much a pound. It is otherwise with paper, and generally it is more the color, texture, and appearance the patron wishes than the intrinsic value, and the printer must make a choice that shall satisfy the artistic exigencies of the case, as well as consider its financial aspects. One paper may be unsuited for a particular piece of work, and another of the same tint, weight, and price may be exactly suitable ”

“ Valuable as all these books are, they disappoint the printer. Some of them, though presenting fac-similes in profusion, are not accompanied with proper explanations in the text: others are devoted to one branch only of early printing, such as block-books, or the printed work of one nation only. Two of them are untrustworthy as authorities. Neither from one book, nor from all the books, can a printer get a clear description of the mechanical development of typography. ”

“ And assuming that it was printed there, its printer may have been Johan Gutenberg, who was at Mainz in 1454.
A peculiarity of the above-mentioned “system” is that it ascribes two types, so different in size, shape and form, as those of B36 and B42, to one and the same printer, merely because they “resemble” each other. This shows that the “system” takes no account of the fact that the inventor of printing, and all the early printers who came after him, in manufacturing their types necessarily imitated the forms of the written characters of their time. ”

“ A large Gordon press, propelled by steam power, is kept constantly in use to134 supply the vast amount of printing required in the details of this business. Tips, labels, size-marks, tickets for use in the various departments of "making," "sewing," "sizing," "finishing," and "blocking." Order tickets, coupons, boxes and box labels and mercantile printing are but a portion of the work done here. In addition, a patent gas-heating press is used for printing in gold and silver leaf. There also emanates from this department a monthly trade journal, conducted under the auspices of the firm. ”

“ If the print is large (say 15 by 12) it is not advisable to look at much of it at once, or for a longer time than can be avoided. It constantly happens that on a warm day the paper contracts during the short time necessary for a proper examination of the print; the consequence is, that the paper does not fall on the same place on the negative when reflected, and the result is a double print on the paper.
The printing being judged to be complete, the paper is withdrawn by taking off pressure-board and pads, and put away for the further operations of toning and fixing. ”

“ No form was to be kept standing to the injury of workmen. The meaning of this is clearer when we remember that all composition at this time was hand composition and that stereotyping and other methods of preserving forms were not known and consequently a reprint or re-issue was, excepting for absence of editorial work, a new job. If there was expectation that a new reprint might soon be required and the printer had the type to spare he might leave a form standing and so avoid the labor of recomposition. ”

“ From the casting of the type to the mixing of the ink they did nearly everything for themselves. Gradually the different departments of the art were constituted separate and re cognized trades. The type-founder was probably the first to secede from the concern ; then printers delegated to others the making of presses ; afterwards the ink and the rollers found separate and distinct manufacturers ; and there arose a class of persons who, though belonging to other trades, made printing appliances a specialty, such as printers smiths, printers joiners, and printers engineers. ”

“ Some of them came to the conclusion that such a process would be quite practicable; others found by experiment that it would, in the case of small types, be wholly impossible. Nearly all the experiments, however, were made with the idea that the inventor of printing, or the earliest printers, started, or had to start, with as large a supply of type as a modern printer. ”