Traveling Type Nerds Visit Museums

Ever wonder what happens when type nerds like my husband and myself visit printing displays at museums? Are we bored because we already know how the presses work? Not on your life!

Instead, we linger. After that first printing demonstration, most people head to another part of the museum. We’re too fascinated to move. Second demo, we’re still watching. Third demo, you guessed it, still there. After awhile the printer notices, and we get talking type. We share our card and pieces we’ve printed. Sometimes we’re even invited behind the scenes.

That’s what happened at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. We were thoroughly enjoying the depth of their printing collection: the type-casting machines and marvelous old time presses. After hanging out for maybe half a hour watching the demonstration, the printer learned we were fellow printing hobbyists. We ended up being invited to pull an impression on the wooden common press he was demonstrating.



Sometimes half the thrill is getting to know another printer. At the Farmer’s Museum in Cooperstown, New York, the employee demonstrating the press was interested in acquiring his own press someday. Since we were en route to a printer’s convention in New York City later in the week, we told him about it and he ended up attending.


Incidentally, most of our time at the Farmer’s Museum was spent in two places: in the regular print shop, and in a shop with a press for printing wallpaper (something we’d never seen before). We had free tickets to the Baseball Hall of Fame, but we never got there – having too much fun hanging out in print shops!


Sometimes we just luck out. At a prominent museum in the American Southwest, we were disappointed to hear the print shop was closed for renovations. Wandering into the courtyard, we spotted a man wearing what from a distance looked like a printer’s apron. Could it be? We asked him and sure enough, he was the printer. After talking awhile, we were invited behind the scenes and got to see the shop after all.

I need to mention one more printing display: this one at the Missouri Historical Society where my husband works. Notice the video display explaining how this old cast iron press from the Waterloo Advocate works. That’s my husband, demonstrating the press. He loved doing it, too!


Type nerds never get tired of print shops. It’s an endless addiction. Printer’s ink gets in your blood, so to speak. You can’t get enough. Historic sites and museums with print shops rise to the top of your “must see” list. You spend hours. You take pictures of everything. It’s a disease, but an thoroughly enjoyable one to have.

Demonstrating Letterpress

Part of the fun of being a letterpress printer is being able to demonstrate the printing process. People are invariably fascinated. Young and old, sophisticated or not, everybody loves to pull a proof on an old-time press and to be able to say, “I printed this!”

Opportunities to demonstrate letterpress are everywhere, not just limited to historic sites, though they’re most frequent there. Some places make printing demonstrations easy; others present challenges. One historic site where I volunteered years ago made it pretty tough to fulfill my letterpress demo passion. Ever try printing on a 9x12 platen job press sitting on a wheeled dolly that creeps away from you, while wearing a long pioneer style dress? Interesting to say the least. This site had no type, ink, quoins, chases, gauge pins, or paper – I brought in my own. There was also no running water in the house where I was demonstrating, so when I was done I hauled the inky form home.

Never mind – I had fun demonstrating anyway! It was amazing how excited people would get when I turned the flywheel of the press and pulled out a freshly printed piece. Some stayed to watch the process over and over again. I had big wood type for kids to handle and a composing stick to show how type was set. I explained minding your p’s and q’s and making a good impression (see my earlier blog, “Upper Case, Lower Case”).

Kids absolutely love letterpress printing. Once my husband and I demonstrated at the Mark Twain Museum in Hannibal, Missouri and ended up with a long line of kids waiting to print. They were interested enough to be pretty patient until their turn came. And it was great seeing the excitement on their faces when they got to set their name in type and pull an impression on a little tabletop press.

Fascination with letterpress printing isn’t limited to kids, though – far from it. A few years back, my husband and I demonstrated printing on a steamboat cruising the Mississippi River as part of an American Bibliographic Society Convention in St. Louis.

Setting up was challenging. My husband hauled our 5x7 Baltimorean press and gear in his arms across the rugged cobblestones of the St. Louis riverfront. You don’t realize how heavy a little printing press is until you’ve carried it! Once inside the steamboat, we were given a small table to set up. We soon discovered the table wasn’t very stable. With every impression of the Baltimorean, it wobbled. We wondered if this distinguished group of scholars and rare book librarians from major museums and universities would be interested in printing our souvenir bookmark under these conditions.



But it didn’t matter at all – people lined up, watched the process eagerly, and were absolutely thrilled to print their own bookmark. Many said it was one of the highlights of the convention for them to actually print something themselves.
So one more great thing about letterpress is sharing it. I think everybody should get a chance to say, “I printed this!” at least once.