The Daily Newspaper: The History of Its Production and Distibution

Title: The Daily Newspaper: The History of Its Production and Distibution

Author: Anonymous

Release date: August 13, 2016 [eBook #52791] Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52791

Credits: Produced by Chris Curnow, Brian Wilsden and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)

ANNUAL PRIZE LIST.

OPEN FOR COMPETITION UNTIL JANUARY 15th, 1879.

In addition to the smaller premiums which we offer and which every body may get, there is a prize of a Lady's or Gentleman's Gold Watch, a Sewing Machine, Silver Watch, and a Small Patent Churn.

The person securing the largest sum in subscriptions to the Witness Publications before January 15th, 1879, will receive a Solid Gold Watch, suitable for either a lady or a gentleman.

The person sending in the second largest amount in subscriptions to the Witness Publications will receive a first-class Sewing Machine.

To the person third on the list, a magnificent Solid Silver watch will be sent.

To the person fourth on the list will be sent a small patent churn, suitable for a farmer who has a small number of cows.

The Churn is most simple in construction, and is therefore easily worked, and is not apt to get out of order.

Renewals, as well as new subscriptions count in for the above mentioned prizes.

JOHN DOUGALL & SON, Montreal.

PREMIUMS FOR THE MILLION.

In making up our Fall list of premiums we have tried to introduce as many new articles as possible, but owing to the request of many of our last year's workers who did not succeed in gaining all the prizes that they wished for, we again offer some of the articles which last year were most sought after. The Skates seem to have been the favorite of the Young Folks, as over 700 pairs have been sent away to successful competitors, and in every case, as far as we have learned, gave entire satisfaction; we, therefore, for a short time only, offer the skates as premiums on the following terms:

To any Boy or girl sending us $9 in new subscriptions to any of the Witness publications, we will send, securely packed and all charges paid, one pair of the CANADIAN CLUB SKATES, worth $2.75 per pair.

For $10 in new subscriptions we will send the all-steel EUREKA CLUB SKATE, which retails at $2.75. For $15 in new subscriptions we will send by express a pair of the celebrated steel and iron welded EUREKA CLUB SKATE, worth $4.

(Continued on Page 29.)

[Pg 1]

THE DAILY NEWSPAPER: THE HISTORY OF ITS PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION.

Re-printed from the "New Dominion Monthly."

MONTREAL: JOHN DOUGALL AND SON, 33 TO 37 BONAVENTURE STREET.

1878.

[Pg 2]

ILLUSTRATIONS.

[Pg 3]

Guttenberg and Faust were good printers. Their beautiful work still remains in proof that the moneyed partner was not in league with the Evil One, even were it not known that the first book which issued from their press was the Bible. Notwithstanding that it has often been asserted, and may be reiterated for centuries to come, that the fruit of the printing press is irreligion, the pages of the Mazarin Bible—the earliest printed book known—remain still perfect and bright as the morn that work issued complete from the press, four hundred years ago and more,—an evidence that in the minds of the pioneers of the art, good, and not evil, was the controlling influence. And the history of printing ever since, shows that the bright days of the art, in any part of the world whatsoever, have been ever contemporaneous with increasing prosperity, intelligence and progress in the more important things of life.

Time had not reached its greatest value in the anticipatory days of the art; the world had not then been scoured to find the materials wherewith [Pg 4] to make cheap ink and cheap paper. The early printers, in their work, had either to rival the exquisite manuscripts of the monkish transcribers of written knowledge, or be considered far behind in the "art preservative of all arts." Everything was done conscientiously in those days, and with the greatest care. The inventors were the printers, and their hearts were in their work. Printers then looked upon their productions as works of art. Their competition did not come in the shape of speed in production, nor lowness of price, but in that of excellence of material and beauty of execution; and when a man paid a fortune for a book, he expected that it would be an heirloom to be handed from generation to generation, to the end of time,—the same volume telling its story to grandfather, father, son, and grandson, gaining value with each generation and sanctity from the mere fact of age.

Now it is different. Rapidity of production, novelty, and above all cheapness, are the leading characteristics to be aimed at by the publisher who would reach the public. These latter attainments are found in highest combination in that wonder of the present age, the daily newspaper.

There is probably nothing so common of which so little is known, or about which there is so much curiosity, as the newspaper. Men read it every day; they abuse it, threaten to give it up, praise it, advertise their wants in it, write to it, search it to see if their letters are in it, call it hard names, pay for it year after year,—and still to ninety-nine out of a hundred of them its production is a complete mystery. To them it is a business office, a newsboy, or a post-office, who are simply carriers, and that is all. It is the exemplification of effect without cause,—an impersonal institution with plenty of vitality, and sometimes even with genius; but it is always mysterious even to those most intimately connected with it. The whole of its secrets are known to no single individual. Its personality is swallowed up in the editorial we, into whose depths no man penetrates, and even the inquisition of the law never gets behind the innermost curtain. The only name pertaining to it is that of the publisher, the accoucheur, who becomes responsible for its daily birth.

For the benefit of those who have no opportunity of visiting a city printing office and would know something of how such a one is arranged and regulated, and also for the further satisfaction of those who have visited an office of this description and learned only enough to make them desire to know more, we will endeavor to describe the process of making a daily newspaper, taking for a special subject the Witness Printing House, where this magazine is published.

The general appearance of a newspaper has no little to do with its success. It should be neatly and clearly printed, so that it may be read with ease and pleasure. This depends chiefly on the mechanical workmanship. Good paper is also a desideratum, but then it must not be expensive, and need not be made as if to last for all time, as from its nature the life of any single number of a newspaper is short, although in the continual succession of numbers, day after day, there is much of permanency about an established journal. A daily newspaper is the world's history of one day to be read on the same day or the next, and too often forgotten on the third; and to habitual news readers news forty-eight hours behind the date is almost as ancient history, and only interesting as a memorial of how the people lived so long ago.

There is hardly any portion of the world which has not been ransacked for material of which to make cheap paper. The "American Encyclopædia" gives the following extensive, though [Pg 5] incomplete, list of substances from which paper has been made: "Acacia, althæa, American aloe or maguey, artichoke, asparagus, aspen, bamboo, banana, basswood, bean vines, bluegrass, broom, buckwheat straw, bulrushes, cane, cattail, cedar, china grass, clematis, clover, cork, corn husks and stalks, cotton, couch grass, elder, elm, esparto grass, ferns, fir, flags, flax, grape vine, many grasses, hemp, hop vines, horse chestnut, indigo, jute, mulberry bark and wood; mummy cloth, oak, oakum and straw, osier, palm, palmetto, pampas grass, papyrus, pea vines, pine, plantain, poplar, potato vines, rags of all kinds, reeds, rice straw, ropes, rye straw, sedge grass, silk, silk cotton (bombax), sorghum, spruce, thistles, tobacco, wheat straw, waste paper, willow, and wool." The principal materials are: "1, cotton and linen rags; 2, waste paper; 3, straw; 4, esparto grass; 5, wood; 6, cane; 7,

jute and manila." In Canada, the principal ingredients used in the newspaper are a mixture of cotton rags and basswood; although from a very prevalent habit amongst some of chewing paper, it might almost be presumed that tobacco was also commonly used. The process of converting these different ingredients into pure white paper is a most interesting one, but we shall pass on to other materials used in making the newspaper without further notice.

The central idea in the printing process is the movable type from which the impression, which we call printing, is made. Types are composed from an alloy known as type metal. Its chief ingredient is lead; antimony is added to make it more stiff, and tin to give it toughness. A very small quantity of copper is sometimes added to give it a still greater degree of tenacity, and in some cases the ordinary type is faced with copper through the agency of the galvanic battery,—an expensive operation, but one which adds greatly to the durability of the letters. A type has been described as a small bar of metal, with the letter in relief upon one end, as in the illustration, by which, also, it will be seen that the letter on the type is reversed, so that the impression will appear on the paper as we see it.

Types are of a uniform height, ninety-two hundredths of an inch being the invariable height of all types, and of everything used to print along with types all over the world. They are of various sizes, from the letters two or more feet across, used in posters, to the minute type only seen in the very smallest editions of the Bible, or in marginal notes. The largest size commonly used in the present day is "pica," of which 71.27 lines go to a foot. The next smaller is "small pica," with 80 lines to a foot; then "long primer" (with which this article is is printed), with 89.79 lines to a foot; then "bourgeois," 100.79 lines to a foot; "brevier," 113.13 lines to a foot; "minion" (with which the Witness is principally printed), 126.99 lines to a foot; "nonpareil," half the size of "pica;" and "agate" (with which the Witness advertisements are set), 160 lines to a foot.

Pearl.

Machinery now does nearly every part of labor, thus saving tim

Agate.

Machinery now does nearly every part of labor, thus sav

Nonpareil.

Machinery now does nearly every part of labor, thus

Minion.

Machinery now does nearly every part of labor,

Brevier.

Machinery now does nearly every part of

Long Primer.

Machinery now does nearly every part

Small Pica.

Machinery now does nearly every

Pica.

Machinery now does nearly

[Pg 6]

There are also several smaller sizes which are used for special purposes only, as for Bibles. These are "pearl," "diamond," and "brilliant," the last almost a microscopic type.

The different letters of the alphabet vary in thickness. The m, which, whether capital, lowercase, or italic, is nominally square in body,—that is, just as broad as the line is deep,—is taken in America as the basis of measuring the quantity of matter in a page, and, thus used, is written "em." The unit of measurement is a thousand "ems," which means an amount of matter equal to a thousand such square types. A line of this article measures seventeen ems, and there are fifty-five lines to a column, thus a full page contains 1,870 ems, for which a compositor would usually be paid forty-four cents. Every one who reads knows that some letters are used more frequently than others. For the ordinary class of English work, the relative ratios of the letters, as nearly as can be calculated, are as follows :—y, l, k, j, q, x—3; b, v—7; g, p, w, y—10; c, f, u, m—12; d, l—20; h, r—30; a, i, n, o, s—40; t—45; e—60; in all, 532. The "fonts," or supplies [Pg 7] of single styles of type, are made of all sizes, from two or three pounds to thousands of pounds, according to the

quantity needed. Before the types are used they are placed in two "cases," called respectively the "upper" and "lower," which are placed on a stand or "frame." The upper case is divided into ninety-eight boxes of equal size, in which are placed the CAPITAL and SMALL CAPITAL letters, as in the plan given, by which the position of each letter and character may be seen. The lower case has fifty-four compartments of different sizes, in which are the "lowercase" letters, spaces, quadrats—commonly called "quads"—and other prime necessities for a printing office. The quadrats are pieces of metal lower than the type, and are used for filling out blank spaces, such as the incomplete lines at the end of a paragraph, while the "spaces," which vary from the thickness of a hair to the width of the letter n, make the spaces between words. The larger spaces are all multiples of the m, which is square, and are therefore called quadrats, or quads.

With a pair of these cases before him, the compositor begins his work. His "copy" (the reading matter to be set in type) lies before him on the right hand side of the upper case, which is very seldom used. He has in his mind a phrase of the article he is setting, and picks up the letters one by one, placing them in turn in a composing "stick," which he holds in his left hand. He does not pick the letters from their boxes at random, but, as a matter of habit, his eye searches out a particular letter that lies in a position to be grasped before his hand reaches it. He never looks at the face of a letter to be sure of what it is, but only at the notch, or "nick," at one side at the bottom, which must invariably be placed upward [Pg 8] or towards his thumb in the stick. With the nicks down the words would look as follows:

When a line is completed it is "justified,"—that is, the spaces between the words are increased or diminished, so that each line will end with a word or a syllable. An ordinary-sized stick will contain thirteen lines of the size of type in which this article is set; and when the stick is full, then comes one of the most unsatisfactory duties for novices—that of "emptying" it. There will be in the stick some two hundred different pieces of metal. Lifting them out of the stick in one piece is a precarious proceeding. The boy in the illustration has evidently failed in the attempt, as do most beginners.

The result of such a slip is "pi," which is made by no stated rules, but in numberless ways. A common work for beginners is setting up the "pi," which, when set up, looks like this:

heq ae tti d, mc cu bah, tchi ooh hi jz. vbcmwp;"—MKe 3 : - hx. i.r ta wsmt [fl]mcb2uo'zewlect 3o,gsu ,s—qvuke9oi?b [fi]y atim o irr ,h ae6 Ij gss off ieer xo a lpgt ro ,renc oc thd adeo sirt , ifofy

From the stick the type is transferred to a "galley," a long metal or wooden tray, against whose side and end the type rests. It is usually placed in an inclined position that there may be no danger of the type "pying," or becoming so mixed up as to be useless. When the galley becomes filled it is "locked up"—an operation made plain by our illustration—and "proofs" taken. This is done by "inking" the type by means of a roller, then placing a sheet of damped paper upon it and passing a heavy iron roller, surrounded by a "blanket," over it.

The proof is then sent to the proof-reader, who goes over it carefully, comparing it with the copy, which is read aloud to him by the "copy-holder." Any corrections to be made are indicated by certain hieroglyphical marks, which, with slight variations, are recognized by printers everywhere.

In daily papers, when great expedition is required, the proofs are read in "takes,"—which requires us to turn back for a moment in this description. Doubtless many of our readers have desired to know why it is that newspaper publishers are continually requiring correspondents to write only on one side of the paper, and thus encouraging so much waste and additional postage. It is this:—the copy is given out in "takes," or sections, of a dozen lines, more or less. To do this the sheets are often cut and renumbered. Thus, if the manuscript were written on both sides, endless confusion would ensue. The proofs are often read in these "takes," the impression being obtained from the type while in the stick. At times, when the news arrives immediately before the paper is sent to press, this reading is the only one it receives. Ordinarily they are read two or three times over, or oftener; first with the copy-holder, who reads the copy while the proof-reader compares it with the printed proof before him, then "revised" by the proof-reader, who compares the [Pg 9]

second impression, or "revise" with the one on which the errors or omissions had been previously indicated, and glanced over a third time, to see that no mistakes have been overlooked in the previous reading and with more careful attention to the sense of the passage. Then a proof goes to the writer for further revision, if necessary.

The best proof-readers are usually those who have had some experience as compositors, and thus know from experience the errors most likely to be made, and the manner of correcting them so as to cause the least delay. Proof-reading requires a very unusual association of qualifications. The really good proof-reader must be perfectly acquainted with his own language, and have some general knowledge of almost all others, besides of the dialects of his own. He must have a general acquaintance with literature and be able to confirm every quotation, and have the dictionary and gazeteer at his fingers' ends. He must have an eye which nothing escapes (technically called a typographical eye), and be able to detect and correct the errors made by both author and compositor,—and the number by the former is usually not inconsiderable. And withal he must have a temper which nothing can ruffle, a power of centring his attention on the dryest matter read for the second and third time, and determination sufficient to see that every correction indicated is duly made—and this last is by no means

the least of his necessary qualifications.

In the early days of printing, the proof-readers were eminent scholars, and it was no unusual thing for a proof to pass through the hands of several of the most learned men of the time and neighborhood before the sheets were printed. It is related of Raphelingus, a distinguished scholar who was engaged in reading proofs in Antwerp about 1558, that he declined the professorship of Greek at Cambridge, preferring to correct the text of the oriental languages. Plantin, of Antwerp, and Stephens, of Paris, used to expose publicly the sheets of their books, offering a reward to any who would discover errors in them. But it is very seldom, if ever, that a work is issued from the press absolutely typographically perfect. In this respect the Oxford edition of the Bible is said to be the most successful work published.