Print your name with wood type in the “Alphabet Factory”, see printing presses dating back to the 1880s, as well as “ancient” computers, and type on an actual typewriter at the Museum of Printing’s Printing Arts Fair, September 23, located at 15 Thornton Avenue in Haverhill.
Then see and hear the amazing Linotype, the 8th wonder of the world, and hear the soothing sounds of its matts dropping to be cast, then redistributed automatically. Set your name the way news was set for 80 years – from 600-degree molten metal. Then print it on a proof press to prove to the world you are a Slug Caster.
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Linotype: With over 10,000 parts, the Linotype is considered the 8th mechanical wonder of the world. For over 80 years it was the main way to set type for newspapers, books, and magazines.
Lithographic artist Carolyn Mustak (the Litho Queen) will be producing original prints from her hand drawn designs on a litho stone.
Print a copy of one of local artists Anna Hogan’s woodcuts.
Letterpress and type aficionados can purchase letterpress equipment and handset type from vendors and the museum store. Rare books sellers will be exhibiting and you can purchase reproductions of some of the museum’s art.
Select Linotype font drawings from the Museum’s Font Vault will be available for viewing. 80 percent of today’s fonts originated with the Linotype font library. The museum has the most extensive collection with over 3,300 fonts of over 400,000 characters.
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Lithographic artist Carolyn Mustak (the Litho Queen)
The Printing Arts Fair is free, supported in part by grants from the Haverhill, Georgetown, Merrimac, Boxford, and West Newbury cultural councils, local agencies which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council.