Daily Kennebec journal., 1904-09-01
Some Plain Facts and a Little History

The Journal contends that the State
printer only charges the State AZ cents
for composition while 1t charges in
dividuals, in competition with this
office, SO and IS cents. This statement
| may go with those who 90 not kno"
differently. but we know that the
Journal office does any amount of
composition for private firms for %
cents a thOusand.-Watervill Sentinel.
The editor of the Waterville Sentinel
is n practical printer, and therefore,
cannot but know the difference be-
tween newspaper composition, Set up
on the galley and delivered without
makeup, and book composition, proof
read and made up into book pages and
locked up ready for the press. In the
first place, the editor well knows, that
composition for newspaper work can be
set up at about one-half the cost OF
book composition. Again, the cost of
makeup, taking the type from the gal
press, is anywhere from fifteen to
eighteen cents per thousand according
to the careful records Of a leading
Portland printer who has kept the ac-
curate cost of every book he has
printed for many years. We repeat
our statement recently made that We
have not figured less than fifty, and
frequently figured fifty-five cents on
book composition for private work
printed at the Journal office.
We are willing to leave it to the
printers OF Maine to say whether under
existing conditions, it is possible to do
such composition for less than forty
two cents and have any fair margin of
profit left. AS the Sentinel well knows.
the commercial rate in many places in
the State is even higher than fifty cents
per thousand ems. We have before us
a letter from q large Portland pin ins
firm, wherein they state that all Port
land offices are figuring sixty cents per
thousand ems Oh book composition.
Newspaper composition can be done
for abou- half the cost of book COM
position as every printer knows. and
the fact that the Journal has done
some newspaper composition for others
at twenty-five cents n thousand, for
type delivered on the galleys and not
made up has no bearing upon the ques-
ton of book and job composition which
is the kind Of composition which enters
into the State work. although the
Sentinel endeavors to convey that i'm
preston by failing to make the distinc-
ton which all printers know exists be-
tween the two classes Of work.
THE Journal likewise says the
Sentinel "claims credit for the payment
Of larger wages to it's employees than
was paid in 1882. This claim cannot be
proven by facts" We will simply say
that our books will show an increase
of twenty-five. per cent. in wages since
1882 in addition to a ten per cent. re-
duction in working time. The editor of
the Sentinel declares that he knows
employees Of the Journal Office way
back in 1876 who received much higher
wages for the amount of work done
than the same class of employees in that
Office receive today. Just what
wages in 1876 has to do with wages in
1882 and 1904 we cannot comprehend. |
Neither of the present proprietors was
connected with the Journal establish
ment in 1876. but one of them was in |
1882. the year on which our comparison
in wages was based. One of our fore
men. however, who worked in the |
Journal establishment in 1876, says that |
wages were considerably lower then