Omaha daily bee., 1910-02-20

ward movement is first and which is sec
ond, either in point of Importance or in
point OF time. Necessity is. indeed, the
mother Of inventions-they are all of es-
sential Importance and usually in simult-
aneous termination. yet could not be forth
coming until the conditions were ripe for
them. l need only advert to a few OF
these steps that have helped us onward
and upward.
The materials by means of which our
language has been put into more or less
permanent form were originally so costly
as to preclude resort to them for any but
extraordinary occasions. The inscriptions
on the monuments, the craven tables OF
stone and of bronze, the baked bricks of
the Assyrians. all had reference for the
most part to the laws proclaimed by the
Gods and the lineage and doings of the
kings and potentates they had appointed to
rule for them over man. Philosophy, sci
ence and history managed to secure rep
resentation more frequently when the vol
umes of parchment and vellum were
opened up to receive their notations, yet
to perform the true mission the new art
Of printing must, perforce, put its impress
sion on some cheaper and more easily OBJ
tained substitute.
Strange as It may appear, paper derives
dts name from papyrus, which is not paper
at all. Stil more strange, PAPER was pro-
duced for many centuries by the Chinese
before It was carried TO Spain by the
Moors. The earliest known mill making
piper in Europe is sse1 to have teen set
In motion about 1850 at Fabriano, Italy,
Whence manufacture slowly spread. Not
until the edict Of Nantes in 1886 exiTed
the French paper makers was the first
paper mill established in England and five
years later the wheels of the first paper
mill in our own country began to revolve
at Roxboroush, near Philadelphia.
Up to the year 1900, the process of paper
making was sheet by sheet, almost all by
hand. The invention in 1898 Of a device
to produce web paper, drawing out the
foundation of rag pulp into a single con-
tinuous piece, proved to be the framework
of modern paper making. The cost of
production was reduced and the paper in
dustry placed on a firm footing. The still
comparative expensiveness Of rags melted
constant experiment with a measure of
success in the use Of Asparto grass, straw
and wood. The perfection of the process
of making paper pulp out Of ground wood
fiber dating in it's inception with 1854, while
disc TO our forests, has brought the
price of print paper down to a few cents a
pound, and has alone made possible the
colossal output of printed matter that al
most forces intelligence on even those who
prefer to remain immersed in ignorance.
In the interval. the making and compos-
ing of the types was by no means at a
standstill. Cutting each letter by hand
out Of a wooden block soon gave way to
cutting out Of more durable metal, and
this in turn to casting in dies that per-
mitted unlimited multiplication. The
stereotyping of whole columns and pages
of typeset matter was in%augurated in 1925
by William Ged, a goldsmith, by what is
known as the plaster process. taking a
mold of plaster of paris out of which he
cast a solid reproduction OF the assembled
types. This manner of stereotyping was
brought to Newark in this country in 1913.
By a French invention in 1929, the plaste-
mold was replaced by one made of papier
mache and the papier mache mold dis
closed such superior advantages that it is
today reigning supreme in all modern
stereotyping rooms. Electrotyping, which
likewise produces en- bloc the assembled
types, dates from about 1850. Electrotyping
differs from stereotyping in that, instead
OF being cast from molten metal, the shell
is formed by e~lectroplating in copper or
copper composition upon a mold of lead
coated wax, which is later backed up with
wood or metal. Electrotyping usually gives
a more clear cut impression, but is like
wise a slower and more costly process.
The acme of the stereotypIng art so far
reached is the auto-plate device by which,
after the papier mache mold has been in
serted in the casting box and the machin-
cry set in motion. a succession Of identical
completed page plates is elected SO rapidly
mat a dozen printing presses may be
sterted turning out the same Imprint in
less than that number of minutes.
The successful reproducing Of the assem-
bled types by stereotyping and electrotyp-
ing noticeably stimulated effort to intro
duce mechanical devices that would lessen
the labor and quicken the pace of the ex-
listing hand typesetting. \ Experiments
along this line began as early as 1921, but
for half a century met with doubtful re-
suits. The problem. It seems. presented a
three-fold venue of approach. First, the
types already separately made, could be
assembled by machinery. Second, the
types could be cast separately by machin.
cry in the order OF composition. Third
the types could be cast in a line at a TIM
in the order of the composition from dies
VI matilCtS separately assembled. II
transpires that the problem has yielded
to ell of these solutions. me first ma.
{ chimes operated through a keyboard &C.
) tually set up the types as supplied from
grooved feed boxes. which must be re.
plepished by a distinct distribution. The
; monotype casts the separate types in any
order desired and these types may after
wards b used for hand composition tn,
same as other type. Finally the linotype
perfected in 1894, casts a line Of typeSat
I time against a row of brass dies, released
by pressure on the keyboard and justified
I to any ordinary column width, with auto
5 matte redistribution of the matrices afte.
$ the casting, While all OF these s~o-calle,
\ typesetting machines are in use and espe
cially adapted to various Sorts of work
the linotype machine has justified IL
r claim to preference for the fast compost
$ tion demanded by the modern newspaper
e In the use Of this machine, one operate
I can now put into type in eight hours a
many words and senteLces as four or flv
compositors could do before by hand in tn
. same time; and the previous hand compost
ticn required the men TO devote addi
tiCral time to distribution, Mechanical I'm
~Vention, therefore, has not only enable