The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1890-08-28
RAILROAD TICKETS.
Safeguards Adopted in Printing and Pre-
.,arfn2 the Pasteboards.


pairing the Pasteboards.
ssSee this!' said the foreman Of a big
sob printing establishment to reporter.
Yes" was the reply. ''What IS the
machine doing?
printing and numbering railroad
tickets said the gentleman.
Railroad tickets:''
yes, sir
'sTell me how it's DONE" said the
scribe.
Certainly. You must bear i'll mind,
however. that this class Of printing is
purely q speciality, and only about two
out Of the various printing establish
ments N this city are prepared to do the
work. IN fact the work cannot well be
done with the ordinary printing presses.
But let's see how it's done.
"Very often a special kind Of card
board is used in printing the tickets,
though the ordinary kind is usually
eerv;ceable. All colors are used, and
many times several impressions are nee
essary to turn out complete ticket
ready for stamping and selling. Let's
take an ordinary coupon ticket. 1t gem
orally consists of several parts that may
be detached Well, the reading matter,
such as the special directions to the con-
ductor, agent Or passenger, is usually
printed on an ordinary press, just as any
other class Of printing Is done. If there
are several co1ors on a ticket SO many
impressions are necessary. That's all
there is in it"
Glow about the nunbers?'
ooh, that's the difficult part of it..
Well explain later ON. Excursion tick
cts, usually in the form Of coupon tick
cts, are printed in the same way. But
see this? Here's the peculiar part Of the
work. The printing and numbering Of
local, or what are called car tickets, by
this machine is a unique process. The
cardboard is cut into pieces just the size
of the ticket desired, then they are
placed in one end of the machine and
pass to the press automatically. Sup
pose we are printing round trip tickets
The bits of pasteboard, when the little
machine begins to work, pass one by
one under the press, the form being
made up in sections. The first impress
sion prints the number, the form rises
instantly, descending again and printing
the ticket. Again the form rises and
descends, while the ticket is pushed
along just its length, when another i'm
preston of the form stamps the number
on the other end of the ticket.
"You see the tickets must be number
ed consecutively, sometimes both the go
ing and returning ends having the
same number, while quite as often the
two ends have different numbers, for rea-
sons best known to the railroad COM
pany. Again, the two ends of the car
ticket may be in different colors, or
possibly each in two colors, with diff
ferent color running across the face Of
the entire ticket. In such instances the
process Of printing becomes very in
tricate, but still the little machine does
it at the rate of 10000 an hour, or 49,
GOO if necessary. The numbering is done
at each end of the machine, the forms
being cylindrical in shape and pointing
consecutively from one upward until
large number is reached, when new
forms are put in. Bits of pasteboard
go in at one end Of the machine and
come out at the other end complete car
or local tickets, good both going and
coming Tho printing of single trip
tickets is a more simple matter This
machine prints but one size of tickets,
hence everything printed by it is Of the
same shape and SIZE
How about the printing of books
commuters and so On?'
ssWal1 cnac1o1 noobipa ,,co1 -,
printing books, the work being done in
sections-that is, the separate leaves of
the books are printed in one sheet,
which is afterward cut in smaller pieces,
and the numbers are put on by sep
arate machine. Take Thousand mile
advertising ticket, for instance The
consecutive miles must be numbered on
the little sections Of the leaves of the
book. The number of the book, the
name or initials of the road and some
other necessary details have to be print
ed. All but the number of the book is
generally printed at one impression, and
hundreds Of books may be printed from
tie same form But each book must
bear different number, SO different
form is required. The big sheet is cut
up into pieces, and the book numbers
printed on a machine especially adapted
to it, and these sheets are cut into small
er ones and the book bound as any other
book
what does it cost to make such q
book"
About ten cents when many Of the
same kind are made. To get out sin