JUBILEE OF LINOTYPE MACHINE

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21939, 13 November 1936, Page 10

JUBILEE OF LINOTYPE MACHINE

.REVOLUTION IN PRINTING The present year is the jubilee year of the linotype machine. In a reference to the history of the machine at the annual meeting of linotype and Machinery, Ltd., London, Mr V. E. Walker, chairman, said its history actually began as far back as the early seventies, but complete success of the Mergenthaler invention was not attained until 1886, when the first newspaper was printed from bars of' type produced by a linotype machine. Mr Walker went on to point out that that was the greatest revolution in printing since the invention of separate type by Gutenberg in the fifteenth century. The history of the machine since then, and of the difficulties which had been overcome, were well known. All the world knew of the developments from the original machine with one magazine setting one size of type to the present machine with its eight magazines and varied sizes of type. There was, in fact, hardly any limit to the uses to which the machine was adapted; and he mentioned for example the Bank of England printing department, which to-day had no fewer than 36 linotype machines, none of them used for regular printpurposes, but which had rendered possible the type of dividend warrant and other documents which the bank sent out in which everything, Including the amount and the name of the payee, was printed.