The machine that changed the world--the Linotype

I'm a member of the International Printing Museum in Southern California which has an incredible collection of all things relating to the printed word. Closed during the pandemic, the museum has made some fascinating videos as a "visual tour" of the museum. One of these features the machine that created the type for many of our letterpress books, the Mergenthaler Linotype. It was the winner of the race in the late 19th century to mechanize the tedious process of setting type.

This video is well worth a watch if you ever wondered how most books in our libraries were not printed from hand-set type:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5n5JQrN8qx4

Fantastic!

Thanks for sharing!

>1 Django6924: Thank you for sharing this, a fascinating video.

When I was in elementary school, we took a field trip to a newspaper plant where they showed us how they printed a newspaper. I still remember the vat of molten lead. As a souvenir we were each given a section of a linotype row with our name on it. I used it for a few years to stamp my name on things before I eventually lost it. Obviously, lead toxicity was not well known, or at least talked about, back then.

>5 kdweber:
Same here! Lost that little chunk of lead many years ago, but the memory of the typesetting machine persists.

>1 Django6924:
Thank you for this very interesting link.

I’d also remind those interested in the 2017 documentary Pressing On: The Letterpress Film which is fascinating and also troubling in pointing out museums displaying these artifacts of technology is one thing but the art of running and maintaining them is quickly becoming lost. www.letterpressfilm.com

>1 Django6924: Thanks for sharing the fascinating look at printing technology.

>1 Django6924: Great video.

>1 Django6924: Thank you very much!
I watched the video and learned a lot!