:: NATIONAL PRINT MUSEUM - IRELAND

During reading week I popped across to Dublin for a couple of days and whilst I was there I visited the National Print Museum just outside the city centre.
It's home to a collection of artifacts and objects relating to the printing history.

You got the chance to see how printing developed and books were composed. To see how mechanical typesetting machines such as the Linotype and Interface were operated in the newspaper industry and how historical hand presses such as the columbian and the Albion made the wooden presses of Gutenberg's time redundant.



The National Print Museum offered a programme of workshops and activities for people to take part in. Such as bookbinding, batik, calligraphy, woodblock printing, drypoint and etching printmaking, letterpress, linocutting, paper making and origami.
Most of the machinery that was there were still in working order and operated by volunteers.





Hand Composing (above images)
Gutenberg invented a mould which cast metal type, this method revolutionised the printing world. Until the late 1800s, all type was composed or assembled by by hand. This practice continued until the invention of the hot metal typesetting machines.
A 'compositor' arranged text on a composing stick, selecting type from the case shown called an economy case. After completing the line he set it in a tray, called a gallery. It would then be tied together with page cord and moved onto the stone. The stone is where the type was put together and made ready for printing. Text was put in a frame called a 'chase', locked up using quions and a key. The result is called a 'forme' and from this copies are made.







The two images above shows Linotype. In 1885 the first hot metal typesetting machine was invented and this meant type could be composed much quicker. The moulds or matrices are contained in a magazine, and the operator would release moulds as he struck the keyboard. The assembled line would be injected with hot metal.
The Linotype arrived in Ireland in 1893 and was used mainly to produce newspapers



Above is the Wharfedale Stop Cylinder Printing Press, which was invented in 1858 by a man called David Payne. It could produce 1500 copies an hour.



This is the front page of the last edition of the Sunday Press in Ireland which was printed using the got metal process. The end of the hot metal era marked the beginning of the computer age and while new technology has hugely benefited the printing industry, it marked a turbulent time for many of the older printers whose skills were no longer required.