17 Jun
2020
17 Jun
'20
1:27 p.m.
On Jun 17, 2020, at 3:25 PM, Liam Proven via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
https://archive.org/details/FarewellEtaoinShrdlu
28min documentary on the last ever edition of the NY Times to be
printed using hot metal -- before they switched to what are now a
quite choice assortment of late-'70s minicomputers. I think I spotted
a PDP, a Data General and some IBM device, but I am no expert in this
era.
As a veteran reader of Fredric Brown, especially "the Enchanted
Linotype", I have been using ETAOIN SHRDLU to win at Hangman for many
years... but I'd never seen one working before. It all still seems
like magic to me.
They should be fairly easy to find in printing musea.
There is a pretty detailed description on Wikipedia, with a number of diagrams and photos
from a Linotype handbook published by the company in the 1940s. It also has links to a
pair of training movies that show, section by section, how one of these machines works.
Actually, it shows the Intertype, but that's just a Linotype clone made by a
lesser-known competitor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linotype_machine#External_links
Look for "Typesetting: Linotype vocational instruction film".
paul