Letterpress Printing, Printmaking & Typefoundry

The Second Monotype Caster Project

My first casting session provided mixed results. On one hand, I am ecstatic that I finally made a solid piece of type in my own shop; but, on the other, that same casting session left me somewhat overwhelmed, in particular because the type that I cast did not match the copy that I typed in my first take at the keyboard.

After a good six hours at the machine I had decent type bodies and the machine was running smoothly, but character output was
Wrong characters on this scale must be a product of a mismatch of Monotype keybars, keybanks, or stop bars. Perhaps a combination. One thing is clear from the materials that came with the Times New Roman: the mat case layout has ‘evolved’ over its lifetime!

New Life in the Typefoundry

I’ve made time lately to work on setting up the typefoundry. Quite a lot has happened since the ‘Monotype’ caster from Heritage Letterpress made its way here—though most of the big changes have taken place just since May of this year.

Typecount: an aid to the letterpress printer

Have you ever wanted to typeset and print a passage of text in a particular face, but knew you had only a limited quantity of the type? Or, have you wondered if a single 12A 25a font would be enough type to finish composing a small job? Just curious how much type it would take to print The Gettysburg Address? For the seasoned printer, the answers to these questions may be a matter of ‘horse sense’, but for students of lettepress printing like me, a little help is in order. I created Typecount to address this simple need.

Typefoundry Inventory

Machinery and specialist tools at The Private Press of Ian Schaefer

A New Monotype Caster

Some two years ago I acquired a ‘Monotype’ Composition Caster – a machine that automatically casts individual printing types from molten metal and sets this type into justified lines, ready for printing. By automatically, I mean that the operation of the machine is controlled by a punched paper tape whose perforations are created by an entirely separate keyboard. For the printer, typographer or general enthusiast of machinery, a running ‘Monotype’ Caster is an amazing thing to witness.