A copy of the Times for May 27th, 1873. Automation allowed the Times to keep up with a demand for news that far exceeded what hand-operated presses could possibly meet. As a consequence, jobs were created for journalists, printers, delivery staff and soon the railways: the first newspaper distribution trains were hired by Mansell and Co. in a deal with the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1831.
Part 1 of 2
UNTIL the year 1814, all the printing in the world was done by hand, and “The Times” could only be struck off at the rate of four hundred and fifty copies an hour. Hence the circulation of the paper, when it had reached three or four thousand copies a day, had attained the utmost development then supposed to be possible;* and when such news came as that of the battle of Austerlitz, Trafalgar, or Waterloo,* the edition was exhausted long before the demand was supplied.
There was a compositor in the office of “The Times,” named Thomas Martyn,* who, as early as 1804, conceived the idea of applying Watt’s improved steam-engine to a printing press.* He showed his model to John Walter,* who furnished him with money and room in which to continue his experiments, and perfect his machine. But the pressmen pursued the inventor with such blind, infuriate hate, that the man was in terror of his life from day to day, and the scheme was given up.*
Circulation rose from 5,000 per day to 50,000 per day in 1850. See ‘How the Earlier Media Achieved Critical Mass’ (New York Times). Printing technology, which had barely altered since the fifteenth-century Gutenberg press, took a leap forward in 1798 when Earl Stanhope invented an iron press, and donated it to the nation.
The Battle of Austerlitz on December 2nd, 1805, was a crushing victory for Napoleon Bonaparte over Russia and Austria, and it dampened the recent British triumph at Trafalgar on October 21st that year. Napoleon was defeated once and for all at Waterloo in Belgium on June 18th, 1815.
A compositor arranges type (the letters) in a printing press. Sherlock Holmes boasted that he could ‘tell a compositor by his left thumb’.
Scotsman James Watt (1736-1819) developed the steam engine that drove the industrial revolution, by making significant improvements to an earlier design devised by Thomas Newcomen (1664-1729).
John Walter (1776-1847) was the younger son of the paper’s founder, also called John Walter (1738-1812). John Walter Sr had started a small newspaper called ‘The Daily Universal Register’ on January 1st, 1785, and renamed it ‘The Times’ three years later. He turned the management of the paper over to John Jr in 1803. The younger John sat as an MP for Berkshire and later for Nottingham.
Thanks to the pressmen, the fruitless project cost their employer some £1,482.
Précis
Despite recent advances in technology, in 1804 all printing was done by hand, and supply was falling far behind the public’s rising demand. That year, John Walter, editor of the Times, hired inventor Thomas Martyn to help develop a stream-powered iron press, but pressmen fearful of job losses pressured Martyn into giving up. (52 / 60 words)
Part Two
The Shard at night, with the curved seventeen-storey News Building, home to TalkSport as well as the ‘Times’ and other News UK titles, at its foot to the right. In the 1980s, the printing Unions again became fearful of progress as Fleet Street started to move its presses to new locations with more streamlined printing. A strike was co-ordinated with the rail Unions, which achieved nothing except the demise of newspaper distribution by rail. The last dedicated service ended in 1988.
TEN years later another ingenious inventor, named König,* procured a patent for a steam-press, and Mr Walter determined to give his invention a trial at all hazards. The press was secretly set up in another building, and a few men, pledged to secrecy, were hired and put in training to work it.
On the night of the trial the pressmen in “The Times” building were told that the paper would not go to press until very late, as important news was expected from the Continent. At six in the morning John Walter went into the press-room, and announced to the men that the whole edition of “The Times” had been printed by steam during the night, and that thenceforward the steam-press would be regularly used.* He told the men that if they attempted violence there was a force at hand to suppress it, but if they behaved well no man should be a loser by the invention. They should either remain in their situations, or receive full wages until they could procure others. The men accepted his terms with alacrity.
Friedrich König (1774-1833). He had been living and working in London in 1804, but moved to Wurzburg in Bavaria in 1817.
The first steam-printed edition came out on November 29th, 1814. These events were recounted in an article in the Times for 29th July, 1847.
Précis
Undaunted, Walter resumed his researches into steam-powered printing, with technology developed by London-based Friedrich Koenig. This time, Walter kept the experiment under wraps until he had run off a complete edition of his newspaper on November 29th, 1814. Once his staff were assured that no one would be left unemployed, they accepted the innovation with enthusiasm. (55 / 60 words)
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