The elbow, our helper to enjoy a glass of wine.

I am still reading in the Ben Franklin book. He was a man of great wisdom and insight. He was the right person to be negotiating for America. But that isn’t what I want to say here today. I found another little gem from the Master Printer. This time it was about the elbow.

As for the human elbow, Franklin explained, it was important that it be located at the right place, otherwise it would be hard to drink wine. If Providence had placed the elbow too low on the arm, it would be hard for the forearm to reach the mouth. Likewise, if the elbow had been placed too high, the forearm would overshoot the mouth. “But by the actual situation, we are enabled to drink at our ease, the glass going exactly to the mouth. Let us, with glass in hand, adore this benevolent wisdom; let us adore and drink!”

Not only did he and I have a love for art of printing, but love of wine also!

The Art in Letterpress

Art... what you don't think it's art!

Letterpress printing started to fail in the 1950s and was all but gone by the 80s. Offset printing was coming of age, and with desktop publishing in the late 80s it closed the door on the letterpress.

It’s still a specialty craft. Some graphic artists have revived the art.  Not getting the results they were looking for in desktops flat design. They found a medium and expression in the letterpress. Though specialty shops and internet stores some have found a following for the look and feel of letterpress printing. “Letterpress is like the new engraving” said Kitty Maryatt “it looks different, it feels old and people love that. It’s the romance of the impression of the letters pressed into the paper that people feel good about” I couldn’t agree with her any more. I love the feel of the impression, the sound of the press  and that is where the art comes from. The master or the pressman knows just how much to push. Not too much or it will cut, not to soft or it won’t have the feel and look of letterpress. It’s what we see and feel on the paper that opens the old world printing in our Imagination. The remembered old wedding invitation or business card found long ago that’s the “feel good” part Kitty was talking about.

Art, yes I think its art. Just like an old painting on the wall it’s an expression of the artist.

Food

Found this awhile back and it made me smile.


“The only time to eat diet food 
is while you’re waiting 
for the steak to cook.”

—	Julia Child

Offset Printing!

Well a little recap since we last talked. I said this blog was going be about offset printing in the last couple of entries haven’t really followed that. Cooking and woodworking are some of my favorites things to do, and I want to share those also. But today’s topic is going to be offset printing that’s what we do here at McComb Printing. To be exact we’re a sheetfed printer.

A little history of offset printing.

Ira Washington Rebel an American was probably the first to discover the process in 1903. The discovery was quite by accident while printing with the old stone plates, on a lithograph press he failed to insert a sheet of paper and noticed it printed on the rubber blanket or impression cylinder. To his amazement when he did insert a sheet of paper it printed on both sides of the sheet. The rubber impression cylinder print side was much clearer, this soft rubber was able to give a better print than the hard Litho Stone. With this discovery he created a machine that would replicate his error. This process was also noticed by two brothers Charles and Albert Harris. They later formed a company producing offset printing machines and the name of that company was Harris Automated Press. When I first started in the printing trade Harris presses were very big part of the printing market, but not the old Litho presses the new modern sheetfed presses it printed up to 10,000 pieces per hour. The printing trade has evolved considerably over the past 25 years. No longer do we use the Harris presses but digital is the new way of the future.

I Wonder How Gutenberg Felt?

I was reading the PrintSouth Magazine today and this was the headline “I wonder how Gutenberg felt?” by Jim Lobaito. This is what the first three paragraphs say.

When Gutenberg ran his Bible off the press, I wonder if he was thinking about all the people he was about to put out of work? The Gutenberg Bible was the first major book printed with a movable type print press, thus ushering in the age of mass produced printed book. Suddenly ideas could be shared with the masses and humanity dramatically changed.

The printing press was an important step towards the democratization of knowledge and moveable type made it available to common man. Surely this was an exciting time to be in business or was it?

The people who transcribed books by hand for a living felt threatened by moveable type.

The story goes to tell the reader how web sites aren’t threatening to today’s printers. But this got me to thinking about how threatening we feel when something new comes along. We just installed a new digital press. It’s night and day different from Gutenberg’s printing press. It could be seen as a threat to the other printers in our town, or the pressman that runs our offset press. It’s faster, has better quality, and unbelievably easy to run. As good as it is, it will not replace the old ink on paper printing press any time soon.

The process of printing has changed over the years, and each change has put someone or a trade out in the street looking for a new jobs. I know there’s been times I’ve felt threaten by someone or a new printing company coming to town. The one thing I do know, is when I’ve been threatened, it has always has got my butt too moving. We can get in a rut and not want any changes in our day to day world. This is what the writer was saying about the people who transcribed books. Change comes with a price sometimes, and there are times when it doesn’t, but there’s one thing you can count on, there will be changes like them or not.

The progression of offset printing, where do I start.

I guess there isn’t any form of printing in modern history as much fun, and brings out the art of printing as Letterpress. Letterpress changed the way we copy the written word more than any other process. It has given us the way to quickly change content and mass produce the written word.

But this was a long time in the making. First China invented wooden blocks that were carved with letters or whole words around 2000 years ago. Then in the mid 1400s a guy with the name of Gutenberg in Mainz, Germany which was in the heart of German wine growing region. He built a printing press on the same idea as the wine presses of his day. Using movable type in his printing press he opened a whole new process of printing.

As the printing process spread so did the number of people who could read and the number who could afford to reproduce their ideas, there religious thoughts, and the news of the day’s events.

 But that’s history. I want to talk about the Art of Printing with the letterpress. It was just as creative as photography or oil painting, in Gutenbergs time an apprentice would work for 6 to 10 years before he could be called a printer, and even more before being called a Master Printer.  The process required understanding  of paper,  ink, and the nimbleness of placing very and I mean very little letters in reverse order so when the letters were inked and were pressed in to the paper it would read correct. Even the measurements were different in printing. Pica and points were used. 6pt to a 12pt pica. When lead type was first invented they made a cast 1 inch in height. When it cooled it shrank to .918 which is what we call type high, one more new measurement for the printer to use. The measurements for amount of space side to side where called M’s and N’s for a cap letter M was the largest width of a letter and an N was ½  of that.

The arrival of the letter press changed the way we communicate maybe more than any other form of communication in history. With people like Gutenberg and Ben Franklin pushing the process in to everyday lives.