The two-story sandy brick colored Duplin Times building looked onto the sidewalk through double doors and two picture windows. People walking to and from the busy stores and offices of Kenansville (all one block of it!) peered into the windows at movie theatre schedules printed in color on heavy card stock propped up against wood racks.
Beyond those racks in the left window you could see a "job press." One of the local teenagers would be running it, printing one flyer at a time. This job press was a machine that operated on manpower, using a foot pedal and wheel and belt to keep the big, heavy, flat, circle shaped metal press rocking forward and backward. It clanked a tune as it churned through its duties. The machine inked the type. The machine operator placed the paper on the type, and the machine closed on it, pressing down to imprint the paper. Or a finger!
The printer's ink and the wood floors mixed into a musty smell. In the winter, a heater overhead blew out heater odors. Add that to the clanking of the slow moving job press and the busy noises the linotype made, and you've got newspaper office music and aroma. I loved it but didn't know it at the time.
No comments:
Post a Comment