THE WALTERS OF THE TIMES: INVENTION OF THE WALTER PRESS.
"Intellect and industry are never incompatible. There is more wisdom,
and will be more benefit, in combining them than scholars like to
believe, or than the common world imagine. Life has time enough for
both, and its happiness will be increased by the union."--SHARON TURNER.
"I have beheld with most respect the man Who knew himself, and knew the
ways before him, And from among them chose considerately, With a clear
foresight, not a blindfold courage; And, having chosen, with a
steadfast mind Pursued his purpose." HENRY TAYLOR--Philip van Artevelde.
The late John Walter, who adopted Koenig's steam printing press in
printing The Times, was virtually the inventor of the modern newspaper.
The first John Walter, his father, learnt the art of printing in the
office of Dodsley, the proprietor of the 'Annual Register.' He
afterwards pursued the profession of an underwriter, but his fortunes
were literally shipwrecked by the capture of a fleet of merchantmen by
a French squadron. Compelled by this loss to return to his trade, he
succeeded in obtaining the publication of 'Lloyd's List,' as well as
the printing of the Board of Customs. He also established himself as a
publisher and bookseller at No. 8, Charing Cross. But his principal
achievement was in founding The Times newspaper.
The Daily Universal Register was started on the 1st of January, 1785,
and was described in the heading as "printed logographically." The
type had still to be composed, letter by letter, each placed alongside
of its predecessor by human fingers. Mr. Walter's invention consisted
in using stereotyped words and parts of words instead of separate metal
letters, by which a certain saving of time and labour was effected.
The name of the 'Register' did not suit, there being many other
publications bearing a similar title. Accordingly, it was re-named The
Times, and the first number was issued from Printing House Square on
the 1st of January, 1788.
The Times was at first a very meagre publication. It was not much
bigger than a number of the old 'Penny Magazine,' containing a single
short leader on some current topic, without any pretensions to
excellence; some driblets of news spread out in large type; half a
column of foreign intelligence, with a column of facetious paragraphs
under the heading of "The Cuckoo;" while the rest of each number
consisted of advertisements. Notwithstanding the comparative innocence
of the contents of the early numbers of the paper, certain passages
which appeared in it on two occasions subjected the publisher to
imprisonment in Newgate. The extent of the offence, on one occasion,
consisted in the publication of a short paragraph intimating that their
Royal Highnesses the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York had "so
demeaned themselves as to incur the just disapprobation of his
Majesty!" For such slight offences were printers sent to gaol in those
days.
Although the first Mr. Walter was a man of considerable business
ability, his exertions were probably too much divided amongst a variety
of pursuits to enable him to devote that exclusive attention to The
Times which was necessary to ensure its success.
He possibly regarded it, as other publishers of newspapers then did,
mainly as a means of obtaining a profitable business in job-printing.
Hence, in the elder Walter's hands, the paper was not only unprofitable
in itself, but its maintenance became a source of gradually increasing
expenditure; and the proprietor seriously contemplated its
discontinuance.
At this juncture, John Walter, junior, who had been taken into the
business as a partner, entreated his father to entrust him with the
sole conduct of the paper, and to give it "one more trial." This was
at the beginning of 1803. The new editor and conductor was then only
twenty-seven years of age. He had been trained to the manual work of a
printer "at case," and passed through nearly every department in the
office, literary and mechanical. But in the first place, he had
received a very liberal education, first at Merchant Taylors' School,
and afterwards at Trinity College, Oxford, where he pursued his
classical studies with much success. He was thus a man of
well-cultured mind; he had been thoroughly disciplined to work; he was,
moreover, a man of tact and energy, full of expedients, and possessed
by a passion for business. His father, urged by the young man's
entreaties, at length consented, although not without misgivings, to
resign into his hands the entire future control of The Times.
Young Walter proceeded forthwith to remodel the establishment, and to
introduce improvements into every department, as far as the scanty
capital at his command would admit. Before he assumed the direction,
The Times did not seek to guide opinion or to exercise political
influence. It was a scanty newspaper--nothing more, Any political
matters referred to were usually introduced in "Letters to the Editor,"
in the form in which Junius's Letters first appeared in the Public
Advertiser. The comments on political affairs by the Editor were
meagre and brief, and confined to a mere statement of supposed facts.
Mr. Walter, very much to the dismay of his father, struck out an
entirely new course. He boldly stated his views on public affairs,
bringing his strong and original judgment to bear upon the political
and social topics of the day. He carefully watched and closely studied
public opinion, and discussed general questions in all their bearings.
He thus invented the modern Leading Article. The adoption of an
independent line of politics necessarily led him to canvass freely, and
occasionally to condemn, the measures of the Government. Thus, he had
only been about a year in office as editor, when the Sidmouth
Administration was succeeded by that of Mr. Pitt, under whom Lord
Melville undertook the unfortunate Catamaran expedition. His
Lordship's malpractices in the Navy Department had also been brought to
light by the Commissioners of Naval Inquiry. On both these topics Mr.
Walter spoke out freely in terms of reprobation; and the result was,
that the printing for the Customs and the Government advertisements
were at once removed from The Times office.
Two years later Mr. Pitt died, and an Administration succeeded which
contained a portion of the political chiefs whom the editor had
formerly supported on his undertaking the management of the paper. He
was invited by one of them to state the injustice which had been done
to him by the loss of the Customs printing, and a memorial to the
Treasury was submitted for his signature, with a view to its recovery.
But believing that the reparation of the injury in this manner was
likely to be considered as a favour, entitling those who granted it to
a certain degree of influence over the politics of the journal, Walter
refused to sign it, or to have any concern in presenting the memorial.
He did more; he wrote to those from whom the restoration of the
employment was expected to come, disavowing all connection with the
proceeding. The matter then dropped, and the Customs printing was
never restored to the office.
This course was so unprecedented, and, as his father thought, was so
very wrong-headed, that young Walter had for some time considerable
difficulty in holding his ground and maintaining the independent
position he had assumed. But with great tenacity of purpose he held on
his course undismayed. He was a man who looked far ahead,--not so much
taking into account the results at the end of each day or of each year,
but how the plan he had laid down for conducting the paper would work
out in the long run. And events proved that the high-minded course he
had pursued with so much firmness of purpose was the wisest course
after all.
Another feature in the management which showed clear-sightedness and
business acuteness, was the pains which the Editor took to ensure
greater celerity of information and dispatch in printing. The expense
which he incurred in carrying out these objects excited the serious
displeasure of his father, who regarded them as acts of juvenile folly
and extravagance. Another circumstance strongly roused the old man's
wrath. It appears that in those days the insertion of theatrical puffs
formed a considerable source of newspaper income; and yet young Walter
determined at once to abolish them. It is not a little remarkable that
these earliest acts of Mr. Walter--which so clearly marked his
enterprise and high-mindedness--should have been made the subject of
painful comments in his father's will.
Notwithstanding this serious opposition from within, the power and
influence of the paper visibly and rapidly grew. The new Editor
concentrated in the columns of his paper a range of information such as
had never before been attempted, or indeed thought possible. His
vigilant eye was directed to every detail of his business. He greatly
improved the reporting of public meetings, the money market, and other
intelligence,--aiming at greater fulness and accuracy. In the
department of criticism his labours were unwearied. He sought to
elevate the character of the paper, and rendered it more dignified by
insisting that it should be impartial. He thus conferred the greatest
public service upon literature, the drama, and the fine arts, by
protecting them against the evil influences of venal panegyric on the
one hand, and of prejudiced hostility on the other.
But the most remarkable feature of The Times that which emphatically
commended it to public support and ensured its commercial success--was
its department of foreign intelligence. At the time that Walter
undertook the management of the journal, Europe was a vast theatre of
war; and in the conduct of commercial affairs--not to speak of
political movements--it was of the most vital importance that early
information should be obtained of affairs on the Continent. The Editor
resolved to become himself the purveyor of foreign intelligence, and at
great expense he despatched his agents in all directions, even in the
track of armies; while others were employed, under various disguises
and by means of sundry pretexts, in many parts of the Continent. These
agents collected information, and despatched it to London, often at
considerable risks, for publication in The Times, where it usually
appeared long in advance of the government despatches.
The late Mr. Pryme, in his 'Autobiographic Recollections,' mentions a
visit which he paid to Mr. Walter at his seat at Bearwood. "He
described to me," says Mr. Pryme, "the cause of the large extension in
the circulation of The Times. He was the first to establish a foreign
correspondent. This was Henry Crabb Robinson, at a salary of 300L. a
year.... Mr. Walter also established local reporters, instead of
copying from the country papers. His father doubted the wisdom of such
a large expenditure, but the son prophesied a gradual and certain
success, which has actually been realised."
Mr. Robinson has described in his Diary the manner in which he became
connected with the foreign correspondence. "In January, 1807," he
says, "I received, through my friend J.D. Collier, a proposal from Mr.
Walter that I should take up my residence at Altona, and become The
Times correspondent. I was to receive from the editor of the
'Hamburger Correspondenten' all the public documents at his disposal,
and was to have the benefit also of a mass of information, of which the
restraints of the German Press did not permit him to avail himself.
The honorarium I was to receive was ample with my habits of life. I
gladly accepted the offer, and never repented having done so. My
acquaintance with Mr. Walter ripened into friendship, and lasted as
long as he lived."[1]
Mr. Robinson was forced to leave Germany by the Battle of Friedland and
the Treaty of Tilsit, which resulted in the naval coalition against
England. Returning to London, he became foreign editor of The Times
until the following year, when he proceeded to Spain as foreign
correspondent. Mr. Walter had also an agent in the track of the army
in the unfortunate Walcheren expedition; and The Times announced the
capitulation of Flushing forty-eight hours before the news had arrived
by any other channel. By this prompt method of communicating public
intelligence, the practice, which had previously existed, of
systematically retarding the publication of foreign news by officials
at the General Post Office, who made gain by selling them to the
Lombard Street brokers, was effectually extinguished.
This circumstance, as well as the independent course which Mr. Walter
adopted in the discussion of foreign politics, explains in some measure
the opposition which he had to encounter in the transmission of his
despatches. As early as the year 1805, when he had come into collision
with the Government and lost the Customs printing, The Times despatches
were regularly stopped at the outports, whilst those for the
Ministerial journals were allowed to proceed. This might have crushed
a weaker man, but it did not crush Walter. Of course he expostulated.
He was informed at the Home Secretary's office that he might be
permitted to receive his foreign papers as a favour. But as this
implied the expectation of a favour from him in return, the proposal
was rejected; and, determined not to be baffled, he employed special
couriers, at great cost, for the purpose of obtaining the earliest
transmission of foreign intelligence.
These important qualities--enterprise, energy, business tact, and
public spirit--sufficiently account for his remarkable success. To
these, however, must be added another of no small
importance--discernment and knowledge of character. Though himself the
head and front of his enterprise, it was necessary that he should
secure the services and co-operation of men of first-rate ability; and
in the selection of such men his judgment was almost unerring. By his
discernment and munificence, he collected round him some of the ablest
writers of the age. These were frequently revealed to him in the
communications of correspondents--the author of the letters signed
"Vetus" being thus selected to write in the leading columns of the
Paper. But Walter himself was the soul of The Times. It was he who
gave the tone to its articles, directed its influence, and
superintended its entire conduct with unremitting vigilance.
Even in conducting the mechanical arrangements of the paper--a business
of no small difficulty--he had often occasion to exercise promptness
and boldness of decision in cases of emergency. Printers in those days
were a rather refractory class of work men, and not unfrequently took
advantage of their position to impose hard terms on their employers,
especially in the daily press, where everything must be promptly done
within a very limited time. Thus on one occasion, in 1810, the
pressmen made a sudden demand upon the proprietor for an increase of
wages, and insisted upon a uniform rate being paid to all hands,
whether good or bad. Walter was at first disposed to make concessions
to the men; but having been privately informed that a combination was
already entered into by the compositors, as well as by the pressmen, to
leave his employment suddenly, under circumstances that would have
stopped the publication of the paper, and inflicted on him the most
serious injury, he determined to run all risks, rather than submit to
what now appeared to him in the light of an extortion.
The strike took place on a Saturday morning, when suddenly, and without
notice, all the hands turned out. Mr. Walter had only a few hours'
notice of it, but he had already resolved upon his course. He
collected apprentices from half a dozen different quarters, and a few
inferior workmen, who were glad to obtain employment on any terms. He
himself stript to his shirt-sleeves, and went to work with the rest;
and for the next six-and-thirty hours he was incessantly employed at
case and at press. On the Monday morning, the conspirators, who had
assembled to triumph over his ruin, to their inexpressible amazement
saw The Times issue from the publishing office at the usual hour,
affording a memorable example of what one man's resolute energy may
accomplish in a moment of difficulty.
The journal continued to appear with regularity, though the printers
employed at the office lived in a state of daily peril. The
conspirators, finding themselves baffled, resolved upon trying another
game. They contrived to have two of the men employed by Walter as
compositors apprehended as deserters from the Royal Navy. The men were
taken before the magistrate; but the charge was only sustained by the
testimony of clumsy, perjured witnesses, and fell to the ground. The
turn-outs next proceeded to assault the new hands, when Mr. Walter
resolved to throw around them the protection of the law. By the advice
of counsel, he had twenty-one of the conspirators apprehended and
tried, and nineteen of them were found guilty and condemned to various
periods of imprisonment. From that moment combination was at an end in
Printing House Square.
Mr. Walter's greatest achievement was his successful application of
steam power to newspaper printing. Although he had greatly improved
the mechanical arrangements after he took command of the paper, the
rate at which the copies could be printed off remained almost
stationary. It took a very long time indeed to throw off, by the
hand-labour of pressmen, the three or four thousand copies which then
constituted the ordinary circulation of The Times. On the occasion of
any event of great public interest being reported in the paper, it was
found almost impossible to meet the demand for copies. Only about 300
copies could be printed in the hour, with one man to ink the types and
another to work the press, while the labour was very severe. Thus it
took a long time to get out the daily impression, and very often the
evening papers were out before The Times had half supplied the demand.
Mr. Walter could not brook the tedium of this irksome and laborious
process. To increase the number of impressions, he resorted to various
expedients. The type was set up in duplicate, and even in triplicate;
several Stanhope presses were kept constantly at work; and still the
insatiable demands of the newsmen on certain occasions could not be
met. Thus the question was early forced upon his consideration,
whether he could not devise machinery for the purpose of expediting the
production of newspapers. Instead of 300 impressions an hour, he
wanted from 1500 to 2000. Although such a speed as this seemed quite
as chimerical as propelling a ship through the water against wind and
tide at fifteen miles an hour, or running a locomotive on a railway at
fifty, yet Mr. Walter was impressed with the conviction that a much
more rapid printing of newspapers was feasible than by the slow
hand-labour process; and he endeavoured to induce several ingenious
mechanical contrivers to take up and work out his idea.
The principle of producing impressions by means of a cylinder, and of
inking the types by means of a roller, was not new. We have seen, in
the preceding memoir, that as early as 1790 William Nicholson had
patented such a method, but his scheme had never been brought into
practical operation. Mr. Walter endeavoured to enlist Marc Isambard
Brunel--one of the cleverest inventors of the day--in his proposed
method of rapid printing by machinery; but after labouring over a
variety of plans for a considerable time, Brunel finally gave up the
printing machine, unable to make anything of it. Mr. Walter next tried
Thomas Martyn, an ingenious young compositor, who had a scheme for a
self-acting machine for working the printing press. He was supplied
with the necessary funds to enable him to prosecute his idea; but Mr.
Walter's father was opposed to the scheme, and when the funds became
exhausted, this scheme also fell to the ground.
As years passed on, and the circulation of the paper increased, the
necessity for some more expeditious method of printing became still
more urgent. Although Mr. Walter had declined to enter into an
arrangement with Bensley in 1809, before Koenig had completed his
invention of printing by cylinders, it was different five years later,
when Koenig's printing machine was actually at work. In the preceding
memoir, the circumstances connected with the adoption of the invention
by Mr. Walter are fully related; as well as the announcement made in
The Times on the 29th of November, 1814--the day on which the first
newspaper printed by steam was given to the world.
But Koenig's printing machine was but the beginning of a great new
branch of industry. After he had left this country in disgust, it
remained for others to perfect the invention; although the ingenious
German was entitled to the greatest credit for having made the first
satisfactory beginning. Great inventions are not brought forth at a
heat. They are begun by one man, improved by another, and perfected by
a whole host of mechanical inventors. Numerous patents were taken out
for the mechanical improvement of printing. Donkin and Bacon contrived
a machine in 1813, in which the types were placed on a revolving prism.
One of them was made for the University of Cambridge, but it was found
too complicated; the inking was defective; and the project was
abandoned.
In 1816, Mr. Cowper obtained a patent (No.3974) entitled, "A Method of
Printing Paper for Paper Hangings, and Other Purposes."
The principal feature of this invention consisted in the curving or
bending of stereotype plates for the purpose of being printed in that
form. A number of machines for printing in two colours, in exact
register, was made for the Bank of England, and four millions of One
Pound notes were printed before the Bank Directors determined to
abolish their further issue. The regular mode of producing stereotype
plates, from plaster of Paris moulds, took so much time, that they
could not then be used for newspaper printing.
Two years later, in 1818, Mr. Cowper invented and patented (No. 4194)
his great improvements in printing. It may be mentioned that he was
then himself a printer, in partnership with Mr. Applegath, his
brother-in-law. His invention consisted in the perfect distribution of
the ink, by giving end motion to the rollers, so as to get a
distribution crossways, as well as lengthways. This principle is at
the very foundation of good printing, and has been adopted in every
machine since made. The very first experiment proved that the
principle was right. Mr. Cowper was asked by Mr. Walter to alter
Koenig's machine at The Times office, so as to obtain good
distribution. He adopted two of Nicholson's single cylinders and flat
formes of type. Two "drums" were placed betwixt the cylinders to
ensure accuracy in the register,--over and under which the sheet was
conveyed in it s progress from one cylinder to the other,--the sheet
being at all times firmly held between two tapes, which bound it to the
cylinders and drums. This is commonly called, in the trade, a
"perfecting machine;" that is, it printed the paper on both sides
simultaneously, and is still much used for "book-work," whilst single
cylinder machines are often used for provincial newspapers.
After this, Mr. Cowper designed the four cylinder machine for The
Times,--by means of which from 4000 to 5000 sheets could be printed
from one forme in the hour. In 1823, Mr. Applegath invented an
improvement in the inking apparatus, by placing the distributing
rollers at an angle across the distributing table, instead of forcing
them endways by other means.
Mr. Walter continued to devote the same unremitting attention to his
business as before. He looked into all the details, was familiar with
every department, and, on an emergency, was willing to lend a hand in
any work requiring more than ordinary despatch.
Thus, it is related of him that, in the spring of 1833, shortly after
his return to Parliament as Member for Berkshire, he was at The Times
office one day, when an express arrived from Paris, bringing the speech
of the King of the French on the opening of the Chambers. The express
arrived at 10 A.M., after the day's impression of the paper had been
published, and the editors and compositors had left the office. It was
important that the speech should be published at once; and Mr. Walter
immediately set to work upon it. He first translated the document;
then, assisted by one compositor, he took his place at the type-case,
and set it up. To the amazement of one of the staff, who dropped in
about noon, he "found Mr. Walter, M.P. for Berks, working in his
shirt-sleeves!" The speech was set and printed, and the second edition
was in the City by one o'clock. Had he not "turned to" as he did, the
whole expense of the express service would have been lost. And it is
probable that there was not another man in the whole establishment who
could have performed the double work--intellectual and physical--which
he that day executed with his own head and hands.
Such an incident curiously illustrates his eminent success in life. It
was simply the result of persevering diligence, which shrank from no
effort and neglected no detail; as well as of prudence allied to
boldness, but certainly not "of chance;" and, above all, of highminded
integrity and unimpeachable honesty. It is perhaps unnecessary to add
more as to the merits of Mr. Walter as a man of enterprise in business,
or as a public man and a Member of Parliament. The great work of his
life was the development of his journal, the history of which forms the
best monument to his merits and his powers.
The progressive improvement of steam printing machinery was not
affected by Mr. Walter's death, which occurred in 1847. He had given
it an impulse which it never lost. In 1846 Mr. Applegath patented
certain important improvements in the steam press. The general
disposition of his new machine was that of a vertical cylinder 200
inches in circumference, holding on it the type and distributing
surfaces, and surrounded alternately by inking rollers and pressing
cylinders. Mr. Applegath estimated in his specification that in his
new vertical system the machine, with eight cylinders, would print
about 10,000 sheets per hour. The new printing press came into use in
1848, and completely justified the anticipations of its projector.
Applegath's machine, though successfully employed at The Times office,
did not come into general use. It was, to a large extent, superseded
by the invention of Richard M. Hoe, of New York. Hoe's process
consisted in placing the types upon a horizontal cylinder, against
which the sheets were pressed by exterior and smaller cylinders. The
types were arranged in segments of a circle, each segment forming a
frame that could be fixed on the cylinder. These printing machines
were made with from two to ten subsidiary cylinders. The first presses
sent by Messrs. Hoe & Co. to this country were for Lloyd's Weekly
Newspaper, and were of the six-cylinder size. These were followed by
two ten-cylinder machines, ordered by the present Mr. Walter, for The
Times. Other English newspaper proprietors--both in London and the
provinces--were supplied with the machines, as many as thirty-five
having been imported from America between 1856 and 1862. It may be
mentioned that the two ten-cylinder Hoes made for The Times were driven
at the rate of thirty-two revolutions per minute, which gives a
printing rate of 19,200 per hour, or about 16,000 including stoppages.
Much of the ingenuity exercised both in the Applegath and Hoe Machines
was directed to the "chase," which had to hold securely upon its curved
face the mass of movable type required to form a page. And now the
enterprise of the proprietor of The Times again came to the front. The
change effected in the art of newspaper-printing, by the process of
stereotypes, is scarcely inferior to that by which the late Mr. Walter
applied steam-power to the printing press, and certainly equal to that
by which the rotary press superseded the reciprocatory action of the
flat machine.
Stereotyping has a curious history. Many attempts were made to obtain
solid printing-surfaces by transfer from similar surfaces, composed, in
the first place, of movable types. The first who really succeeded was
one Ged, an Edinburgh goldsmith, who, after a series of difficult
experiments, arrived at a knowledge of the art of stereotyping. The
first method employed was to pour liquid stucco, of the consistency of
cream, over the types; and this, when solid, gave a perfect mould.
Into this the molten metal was poured, and a plate was produced,
accurately resembling the page of type. As long ago as 1730, Ged
obtained a privilege from the University of Cambridge for printing
Bibles and Prayer-books after this method. But the workmen were dead
against it, as they thought it would destroy their trade. The
compositors and the pressmen purposely battered the letters in the
absence of their employers. In consequence of this interference Ged
was ruined, and died in poverty.
The art had, however, been born, and could not be kept down. It was
revived in France, in Germany, and in America. Fifty years after the
discovery of Ged, Tilloch and Foulis, of Glasgow, patented a similar
invention, without knowing anything of what Ged had done; and after
great labour and many experiments, they produced plates, the
impressions from which could not be distinguished from those taken
from the types from which they were cast. Some years afterwards, Lord
Stanhope, to whom the art of printing is much indebted, greatly
improved the art of stereotyping, though it was still quite
inapplicable to newspaper printing. The merit of this latter invention
is due to the enterprise of the present proprietor of The Times.
Mr. Walter began his experiments, aided by an ingenious Italian founder
named Dellagana, early in 1856. It was ascertained that when
papier-mache matrices were rapidly dried and placed in a mould,
separate columns might be cast in them with stereotype metal, type
high, planed flat, and finished with sufficient speed to get up the
duplicate of a forme of four pages fitted for printing. Steps were
taken to adapt these type-high columns to the Applegath Presses, then
worked with polygonal chases. When the Hoe machines were introduced,
instead of dealing with the separate columns, the papier-mache matrix
was taken from the whole page at one operation, by roller-presses
constructed for the purpose. The impression taken off in this manner
is as perfect as if it had been made in the finest wax. The matrix is
rapidly dried on heating surfaces, and then accurately adjusted in a
casting machine curved to the exact circumference of the main drum of
the printing press, and fitted with a terra-cotta top to secure a
casting of uniform thickness. On pouring stereotype metal into this
mould, a curved plate was obtained, which, after undergoing a certain
amount of trimming at two machines, could be taken to press and set to
work within twenty-five minutes from the time at which the process
began.
Besides the great advantages obtained from uniform sets of the plates,
which might be printed on different machines at the rate of 50,000
impressions an hour, or such additional number as might be required,
there is this other great advantage, that there is no wear and tear of
type in the curved chases by obstructive friction; and that the fount,
instead of wearing out in two years, might last for twenty; for the
plates, after doing their work for one day, are melted down into a new
impression for the next day's printing. At the same time, the original
type-page, safe from injury, can be made to yield any number of copies
that may be required by the exigencies of the circulation. It will be
sufficiently obvious that by the multiplication of stereotype plates
and printing machines, there is practically no limit to the number of
copies of a newspaper that may be printed within the time which the
process now usually occupies.
This new method of newspaper stereotyping was originally employed on
the cylinders of the Applegath and Hoe Presses. But it is equally
applicable to those of the Walter Press, a brief description of which
we now subjoin. As the construction of the first steam newspaper
machine was due to the enterprise of the late Mr. Walter, so the
construction of this last and most improved machine is due in like
manner to the enterprise of his son. The new Walter Press is not, like
Applegath and Cowper's, and Hoe's, the improvement of an existing
arrangement, but an almost entirely original invention.
In the Reports of the Jurors on the "Plate, Letterpress, and other
modes of Printing," at the International Exhibition of 1862, the
following passage occurs:--"It is incumbent on the reporters to point
out that, excellent and surprising as are the results achieved by the
Hoe and Applegath Machines, they cannot be considered satisfactory
while those machines themselves are so liable to stoppages in working.
No true mechanic can contrast the immense American ten-cylinder presses
of The Times with the simple calico-printing machine, without feeling
that the latter furnishes the true type to which the mechanism for
newspaper printing should as much as possible approximate."
On this principle, so clearly put forward, the Inventors of the Walter
Press proceeded in the contrivance of the new machine. It is true that
William Nicholson, in his patent of 1790, prefigured the possibility of
printing on "paper, linen, cotton, woollen, and other articles," by
means of type fixed on the outer surface of a revolving cylinder; but
no steps were taken to carry his views into effect. Sir Rowland Hill
also, before he became connected with Post Office reform, revived the
contrivance of Nicholson, and referred to it in his patent of 1835 (No.
6762); and he also proposed to use continuous rolls of paper, which
Fourdrinier and Donkin had made practicable by their invention of the
paper-making machine about the year 1804; but both Nicholson's and
Hill's patents remained a dead letter.[2]
It may be easy to conceive a printing machine, or even to make a model
of one; but to construct an actual working printing press, that must be
sure and unfailing in its operations, is a matter surrounded with
difficulties. At every step fresh contrivances have to be introduced;
they have to be tried again and again; perhaps they are eventually
thrown aside to give place to new arrangements. Thus the head of the
inventor is kept in a state of constant turmoil. Sometimes the whole
machine has to be remodelled from beginning to end. One step is gained
by degrees, then another; and at last, after years of labour, the new
invention comes before the world in the form of a practical working
machine.
In 1862 Mr. Walter began in The Times office, with tools and machinery
of his own, experiments for constructing a perfecting press which
should print the paper from rolls of paper instead of from sheets.
Like his father, Mr. Walter possessed an excellent discrimination of
character, and selected the best men to aid him in his important
undertaking. Numerous difficulties had, of course, to be surmounted.
Plans were varied from time to time; new methods were tried, altered,
and improved, simplification being aimed at throughout. Six long years
passed in this pursuit of the possible. At length the clear light
dawned. In 1868 Mr. Walter ventured to order the construction of three
machines on the pattern of the first complete one which had been made.
By the end of 1869 these were finished and placed in a room by
themselves; and a fourth was afterwards added. There the printing of
The Times is now done, in less than half the time it previously
occupied, and with one-fifth the number of hands.
The most remarkable feature in the Walter Press is its wonderful
simplicity of construction. Simplicity of arrangement is always the
beau ideal of the mechanical engineer. This printing press is not only
simple, but accurate, compact, rapid, and economical.
While each of the ten-feeder Hoe Machines occupies a large and lofty
room, and requires eighteen men to feed and work it, the new Walter
Machine occupies a space of only about 14 feet by 5, or less than any
newspaper machine yet introduced; and it requires only three lads to
take away, with half the attention of an overseer, who easily
superintends two of the machines while at work. The Hoe Machine turns
out 7000 impressions printed on both sides in the hour, whereas the
Walter Machine turns out 12,000 impressions completed in the same time.
The new Walter Press does not in the least resemble any existing
printing machine, unless it be the calendering machine which furnished
its type. At the printing end it looks like a collection of small
cylinders or rollers. The first thing to be observed is the continuous
roll of paper four miles long, tightly mounted on a reel, which, when
the machine is going, flies round with immense rapidity. The web of
paper taken up by the first roller is led into a series of small hollow
cylinders filled with water and steam, perforated with thousands of
minute holes. By this means the paper is properly damped before the
process of printing is begun. The roll of paper, drawn by nipping
rollers, next flies through to the cylinder on which the stereotype
plates are fixed, so as to form the four pages of the ordinary sheet of
The Times; there it is lightly pressed against the type and printed;
then it passes downwards round another cylinder covered with cloth, and
reversed; next to the second type-covered roller, where it takes the
impression exactly on the other side of the remaining four pages. It
next reaches one of the most ingenious contrivances of the
invention--the cutting machinery, by means of which the paper is
divided by a quick knife into the 5500 sheets of which the entire web
consists. The tapes hurry the now completely printed newspaper up an
inclined plane, from which the divided sheets are showered down in a
continuous stream by an oscillating frame, where they are met by two
boys, who adjust the sheets as they fall. The reel of four miles long
is printed and divided into newspapers complete in about twenty-five
minutes.
The machine is almost entirely self-acting, from the pumping-up of the
ink into the ink-box out of the cistern below stairs, to the
registering of the numbers as they are printed in the manager's room
above. It is always difficult to describe a machine in words. Nothing
but a series of sections and diagrams could give the reader an idea of
the construction of this unrivalled instrument. The time to see it and
wonder at it is when the press is in full work. And even then you can
see but little of its construction, for the cylinders are wheeling
round with immense velocity. The rapidity with which the machine works
may be inferred from the fact that the printing cylinders (round which
the stereotyped plates are fixed), while making their impressions on
the paper, travel at the surprising speed of 200 revolutions a minute,
or at the rate of about nine miles an hour!
Contrast this speed with the former slowness. Go back to the beginning
of the century. Before the year 1814 the turn-out of newspapers was
only about 300 single impressions in an hour--that is, impressions
printed on only one side of the paper. Koenig by his invention
increased the issue to 1100 impressions. Applegath and Cowper by their
four-cylinder machine increased the issue to 4000, and by the
eight-cylinder machine to 10,000 an hour. But these were only
impressions printed on one side of the paper. The first perfecting
press--that is, printing simultaneously the paper on both sides--was
the Walter, the speed of which has been raised to 12,000, though, if
necessary, it can produce excellent work at the rate of 17,000 complete
copies of an eight-page paper per hour. Then, with the new method of
stereotyping--by means of which the plates can be infinitely multiplied
and by the aid of additional machines, the supply of additional
impressions is absolutely unlimited.
The Walter Press is not a monopoly. It is manufactured at The Times
office, and is supplied to all comers. Among the other daily papers
printed by its means in this country are the Daily News, the Scotsmam,
and the Birmingham Daily Post. The first Walter Press was sent to
America in 1872, where it was employed to print the Missouri Republican
at St. Louis, the leading newspaper of the Mississippi Valley. An
engineer and a skilled workman from The Times office accompanied the
machinery. On arriving at St. Louis--the materials were unpacked,
lowered into the machine-room, where they were erected and ready for
work in the short space of five days.
The Walter Press was an object of great interest at the Centennial
Exhibition held at Philadelphia in 1876, where it was shown printing
the New Fork Times one of the most influential journals in America.
The press was surrounded with crowds of visitors intently watching its
perfect and regular action, "like a thing of life." The New York Times
said of it: "The Walter Press is the most perfect printing press yet
known to man; invented by the most powerful journal of the Old World,
and adopted as the very best press to be had for its purposes by the
most influential journal of the New World.... It is an honour to Great
Britain to have such an exhibit in her display, and a lasting benefit
to the printing business, especially to newspapers.... The first
printing press run by steam was erected in the year 1814 in the office
of The Times by the father of him who is the present proprietor of that
world-famous journal. The machine of 1814 was described in The Times
of the 29th November in that year, and the account given of it closed
in these words: 'The whole of these complicated acts is performed with
such a velocity and simultaneosness of movement that no less than 1100
sheets are impressed in one hour.' Mirabile dictu! And the Walter
Press of to-day can run off 17,000 copies an hour printed on both
sides. This is not bad work for one man's lifetime."
It is unnecessary to say more about this marvellous machine. Its
completion forms the crown of the industry which it represents, and of
the enterprise of the journal which it prints.
Footnotes for Chapter VII.
[1] Diary, Reminiscences, and Correspondence of Henry Crabb Robinson,
Barrister-at-Law, F.S.A., i. 231.
[2] After the appearance of my article on the Koenig and Walter Presses
in Macmillan's Magazine for December, 1869, I received the following
letter from Sir Rowland Hill:--
"Hampstead" January 5th, 1870.
"My dear sir,
"In your very interesting article in Macmillan's Magazine on the
subject of the printing machine, you have unconsciously done me some
injustice. To convince yourself of this, you have only to read the
enclosed paper. The case, however, will be strengthened when I tell
you that as far back as the year 1856, that is, seven years after the
expiry of my patent, I pointed out to Mr. Mowbray Morris, the manager
of The Times, the fitness of my machine for the printing of that
journal, and the fact that serious difficulties to its adoption had
been removed. I also, at his request, furnished him with a copy of the
document with which I now trouble you. Feeling sure that you would
like to know the truth on any subject of which you may treat, I should
be glad to explain the matter more fully, and for this purpose will,
with your permission, call upon you at any time you may do me the
favour to appoint. "Faithfully yours,
"Rowland Hill."
On further enquiry I obtained the Patent No. 6762; but found that
nothing practical had ever come of it. The pamphlet enclosed by Sir
Rowland Hill in the above letter is entitled 'The Rotary Printing
Machine.' It is very clever and ingenious, like everything he did. But
it was still left for some one else to work out the invention into a
practical working printing-press. The subject is fully referred to in
the 'Life of Sir Rowland Hill' (i. 224,525). In his final word on the
subject, Sir Rowland "gladly admits the enormous difficulty of bringing
a complex machine into practical use," a difficulty, he says, which
"has been most successfully overcome by the patentees of the Walter
Press."