BOOKS BY THE MILLION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18234, 2 May 1921, Page 7

BOOKS BY THE MILLION

WONDERS OF THE MODERN PRESS.

There was a big gathering in the Burt Hall, Technical College, on Saturday evening to hear the illustrated lecture by Mr Charles Francis of the Charles Francis Press, New York City, on “Fifty Years of Printing.” There was, naturally, a large number of those directly interested in the printing trade, either as employers or employees, but the. nature of the audience showed clearly a wide general interest in the subject, besides testifying also to the good impression Mr Francis and his daughter Mrs Fitch, have created in Dunedin.

Mr T. Somerville, who presided, introduced the lecturer, dwelling on the importance of the world’s mission on whiqi. Mr Francis is engaged on behalf of the American Government regarding the relations between employer and employes with a view to a settlement of the industrial unrest. Mr Somerville also referred to the great influence of printing, both as a factor in business and education, a point in which he was taken up by Mr Francis later, with characteristic humour, as a subject he had meant to speak about himself. However, Mr Francis promised, by means of pictures, to take his hearers pretty far into the whole matter of printing, and this promise he amply fulfilled. The first portion of the lecture was by means of still pictures, Mr Francis showing the successive stages in the development of up-to-date printing machines- The slides were good, most of the pictures being wonderfully clear. Present-day colour processes, and the substitution of photogravure for the old woodcut were subjects of perhaps more general interest than the strictly “professional” matters detailed by the speaker, but the lecture was mainly directed to the trade, and of necessity could only be understood properly by people more or less intimately acquainted with printing machinery and methods. However, Mr Francis from time to time threw out thoughts that opened wide vistas, particularly as regarded co-operation between the employer and the worker, his picture _of the school for the training of apprentices made a deep :m----pression. The school works on the piu*ciple of the union and the employer cwh sharing the cost of its upkeep, and the employer gives one half-day off in the week td the apprentice on condition that the apprentice supplies one evening each week, thus providing him with two lessons. Mr Francis pointed out that the conditions of the great population and the gigantic businesses of New York made it impossible for anyone to learn the whole of a business by becoming engaged in it; an employee would necessarily be placed at- one job, and would remain there. But at the school for apprentices it was their aim to teach everything, so that a youth could learn the whole business. Mr Francis acknowledged indebtedness to his connection with the printing business in his young days in Dunedin and Invercargill, where he acquired experience and a knowledge of detail. The second portion of the lecture was devoted to a moving depiction of the Francis Press, and it gave a fine idea of the groat scale on which the business runs and the marvellous machinery to cope with the necessity for rapid production. The works are devoted largely to book and magazine production, and the final depictions were of a machine mechanically turning out complete magazines at the rate of from 2500 to 3000 an hour. A hearty vote of thanks was accorded to the lecturer and Mrs Fitch, the mover being Mr Joseph, with Mr J. Wallace as seconder. In acknowledging the vote, Mr Francis said a word of farewell. Both he and Mrs Fitch had been well repaid for their visit to Dunedin. New Zealand long enjoyed the reputation of being a country without strikes. He was sorry to see that of late it had been losing that reputation, and he hoped that it would be re-established. To that end it was necessary to have friendly human relationship between the employer and the employee; there must be friendship and co-operation. He returned thanks for the good time extended to him by his friends in Dunedin.