On the turn of the 14^th century a boy is born whom we shall remember as Johannes Gutenberg, the ‘man of the millennium’. When he is to choose a profession letter press is unknown. He learns to become a goldsmith. In his younger times books are hand written and they are being reproduced by copying them.

This is rather a time consuming job to do and having only two copies after such a long time is unsatisfactory, young Johannes thinks. He develops the idea of having small stamps that could print a letter each. So you could compose every text you liked, print it, take the text apart and compose another text using the single letter stamps again.

It would still be a lot of work to have the text composed from single letters but once you had composed it you could print it as often as you needed or wanted to print it. So you would be able to have as many books as you wanted. This was Gutenberg’s big idea of letter press printing using metal type. This was how he made education possible for everybody - well, at least principally.

Over the centuries a couple of different types of printing presses developed. These two pictures show platen printing presses - the one on the right being an 8x5 Adana.

Bleikloetzle’s press is a hand driven cylinder proofing press. The printing cylinder, made from steel, moves over the form after ink has been rolled onto it. Presses like this have not been designed to print a great number of copies. So nowadays they are perfect for the artist, who wants to print one-of-a-kinds or small limited editions.
Metal type and wood or lino blocks can be printed at the same time.

Ink has to be rolled out on an even surface. The rollers transfer the ink onto the plate or the metal type.

Once you got the proof it can be checked for mistakes. The layout can be changed, wood blocks, that don’t print properly in all parts , can be adjusted. Sheet after sheet is being printed by hand.

This lovely Columbian belongs to Paul Kershaw who is running his Orbost Gallery in Waternish on the Isle of Sky.