The Republican journal., 1906-11-22
SIXTY YEARS A PRINTER.
Set Tyne BY Light Of rallow Dip.


Martin G. Dilworth. for many years
+, a resident of Belfast, Me-, ou' now ~
! Ing in well-earned retirement WIN ~ MS
daughter, Mrs. Mary Parsons VI Nortn-
ampton, Mass, worked at 10 I, e. case III
He was born in Cork, Ire, and at
tended school there until he was 10
years old, when his father olea ana al ne
came with his mother to America. The
voyage was made in the full rugged brig
Earl Whitbee, and the time occupied
from Queenstown to st. Andrews, N.
B., was IL weeks and days. That was
in 1S43, and in June OF the same year
young Dilworth entered the office Of
the Charlotte. n. B., Gazette as print
er's devil.
Finding the work hard and the pay
slow in coming after it was earned, he
left the Gazette and secured employ
ment on the St. Andrews Standard,
where he remained three years.
After leaving the Standard he work
ed in various places until 1852, when
Yates & Kurdish started the Union in
Machias, Me, He made up the forms
of the first issue of that paper. He al
SO assisted in getting out the first issue
of the Machias Republican in 1855.
Mr.. Dilworth has seen the printing
business grow from the prlmltlve ap-
pliances used in Franklin's time, as
there was little advance in methods I'M
til the middle of the last century. His
light for typesetting was once a talloW
dip set in the lower case sc" box, and
the ink was applied to the type on the
hand presses by means OF a leather
covered pad.
The first cylinder press on which he
ever worked was turned by hand power
and had no fly frame for delivering the
sheets after printing. 1t, therefore,
took two men and boy to operate the
press-one man to turn the wheel, one
to feed in the sheets and the boy to
take away the pril ted papers: FIVE
hundred to 600 an hour was good speed
for such a press, but this was great
improvement on the hand press, on
which the stint, for pressman and
roller boy, was a ''token,' or 24O sheets
per hour.
Mr.. Dilworth enlisted in 1852 as a
private in the 9th Maine battery, and
served in that organization to the close
of the war. After the war closed he
belonged to the State militia and was
clerk of Co. H., eight years. He was a
Clldi Vel lucluDCl VI II. sA"A-
shall post, G. A. r., and was its adju-
tant 20 years. He also served two years
as commander.
On leaving the army Mr. Dilworth
returned to the printing business, work
ing at different times on the Machias
papers, The Republican journal of Bel
fast, the Bangor Wing and others. In
1873 he moved to Belfast, and was for
several years foreman of The Journal
office. When the Belfast City Press
was started in 1883 he was its foreman.
He was later employed in the job office
of the Belfast printing company, but
when that establishment was moved to
Waterville he decided that the intirm,
tiles of age called for rest, and he re-
tired to spend the remainder of his days
with his children.
He was married in February, 1862, to
Miss Margaret L. Higgins of Addison,
who bore him nine children, five OF
whom are now living. Mrs. Dilworth
died Sept. 10, 1902. The living children
are Mrs. Mary Parsons Of Northamp-
ton, Mass; Charles H. Dilworth, a
prominent merchant and city official of
Norwalk, Conn.,; Oscar H. Dilworth,
jeweler of Madison, Me-; William =:
Dilworth, the locally famous baseball
pitcher of Belfast, and Miss Helen Eva
Dilworth, whose home is with her SIS
ter and father.-Boston Sunday GLOBE.