The Newtown bee., 1880-08-04
Heu Postal Cards are Made.

In long article on the history and
 manufacture of postal cards. the New
 York Sunday Nescs says that the Ameri. can Phototype company-to whom the
 contract tor making the postal cards of tho United States was awarded in 1877 carried oh the business in that city tor two years, but to save the expense and
 risk attending the transportation of paper from the mill at Holyoke, Mass, ] the. business was removed thither in the spring of 1879, a new building being erected for it's accommodation. The | main portion of tLs building is divided by partition through the middle. One side is used by the con- l tractors for manufacturing cards, and the other side by the special agent of the postoffice and his subordinates, in the | transaction of the government business pertaining to making up of orders and l forwarding cards to the various post | offices ordering them. No business of | whatever nature is transacted with
 more systematic precision than is main-
 tained in both departments of the postal
 card agency.
 On entering the contractors side, the | irst thing noticed are the large piles of | paper, which arc delivered to the con- l tractors by the Parsons Paper company | loads of 5000 sheets each. The works
 consume on the average about three
 tons daily at present. The process of
 manufacturing cards is neither lengthy
 nor complicated, but is at once so novel
 and interesting that brief description | is worth recital. The sheets are about thirty by twetty-two inches in size. and
 are just fitted by the plates from which
 the cards are printed, each plate cover | ing forty cards, four in width and ten
 in length. The printing is done on two
 Hoe superroyal presses, by skillful pres5men, and as each sheet passes into the press the number of cards is une--
 ringly recorded by registers attached to
 the presses and which are carefully
 locked every night to'prevent tampering.
 The sheets aie then piled up and allowed
 to dry in order that they may not be
 damaged by future handling. Incident
 to the rapiGity with which the work Is
 performed, now and then a sheetis is mis- printed, but this occurs only rarely, the
 number of cards being spoiled in this
 way being not over one-tenth of one
 per cent. or one in a thousand on the
 average.
 After drying thoroughly the sheets
 are then passed through the rotary
 sitter, machine fitted with circular
 knives, which cuts them into strips oi
 ten cards each. and trims the edge oi
 the outside strip. These strips are then passed transversely through the rotary cross cutters, the mechanism of which
 is similar to the '' slitiers." The cross
 cuts divide the strips into the single cards. which drop into a rotary hopper containing ten compartments. As soon , as each compartment has received twenty-five cards the hopper revolves and throws the cards out upon a table. A number of girls then take them, and
 after throwing aside all damaged cards , bind the perfect ones into packs c
 twenty-five each. Other girls then takt tue packs, and, recountiIg them, pu , them in pasteboard boxes containing , twenty packs or 500 cards each. Thi boxes are made entirely of one piece c l pasteboard, without seam or paste. anf
 after being filled are all weighed. Eact
 box is supposed to weigh three pounds
 and two ounces. In the rear of tn
 building is large fireproof vault, witt a capacity for storing 5000, ,0G0 cards : By the stipulation of the contract tn . American Prototype company IS re quired to keep at least 10, ,0OO. .O0O in stor' All the time.
 So rapidly has the popular demand . for postal cards increased that the work , have lately been run night and day, em ploying in all nearly fifty hands, an'  , day on the average. The governmen , portion of the works is no less interest ing than the other. Here the bushes , is carried on in manner similar to tha , in the general postoffices in large cities ; Every postoffice in the country requlr , ing postal cards sends its order, to f gether with acquisition for other sup D plies, to the office of the third assistan , postmaster-general at Washington :. There the orders are separated, and al the orders for postal cards are made U 1, in one general order to the agency a = Holyoh ;, the names of ordering post I An order is sent every day, and often ln cludes the orders of several bundre 2 postoffices, and requiring all the wa from few thousand to two. three an . even four million cards to fill it. Dun I ing the first month in each quarter tn orders average much larger than other timos for, as a rule, large nun f Der of offices order supplies ln thos Q months to last for the quar.er. As a f example of this there were ordered dul T. ing the months of January last 36 46S f 500 domestic cards, while 16,5S2 ,Ot d filled the orders for February.
 A large portion of all the cards mac { are used in the Eastern and Midd n States. New York city.alone uses abol Y tep per cent. of the entire production n Chicago stands next to New York, usir a more cards thsn Boston. The Southel h States take but few cards
 i The total number of cards issned du ,e ing the fiscal year ending June 30, l07 if was 22I ,SO7, ,0OO. The department esi ae mate for the year ending June 5 n 1880, was 250, ,5l4. loo. an increase Je eventeen per cent. over the previou h years issue; but if the number issu' le tor the first eight months of the ye ,e should be continued proportionally t 1s the close, the years consumption wou Q amount to 275, ,S39, 750. If q like increa 10 were to be presumed from year to yes ne before 1890 the yearly issue of post h. cards would exceed q thousand million es Congress passed an act March 5, lSi he providing for the issue of information CT cards at postal charge of two cer ti- each. It was not, however, un e. December l that the first were issue ps The demand for them has not been h. large as was anticipated. Up to Mar a. I, this year, three months from = first issue, only 2.5OO, ,000 have be
 ordered, and of this number l,000,t
 went to New York city.-Scieat
 o Americdn.