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Article: Ottmar Mergenthaler: The Man and his Machine.(Review)
- Article from:
- Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada
- Article date:
- March 22, 2001
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2001 Bibliographical Society of Canada. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Basil Kahan. Ottmar Mergenthaler: The Man and his Machine. New Castle, Del.: Oak Knoll, 2000. 224 pp.; $55.00 US. (hardcover). ISBN 1-58456-007-X.
After the introduction of high speed steam presses in the mid-19th century, the hand composition of type remained a major impediment to rapid, mechanized production of printed matter. Composition became, in the words of Thomas Hughes, historian of technology, a "reverse salient," the trailing edge of advancing technique. Printing proprietors, particularly in daily newspapers, could not realize the full profits of mechanized printing until the composition of type proceeded with the same dispatch as the process of ...