THERE IS A MANHOLE COVER in Union Square Park that I pass all the time. It was cast years ago as part of some New York City Public Art Fund and the raised letters on its surface read: IN DIRECT LINE WITH ANOTHER & THE NEXT. I have no idea what this bit of doggerel means, but every time I see that manhole cover I think of the metal type used in letterpress printing. Back in the early 1990s one of my first jobs was in a typesetting shop not too far from the Holland Tunnel entrance. The place had been in business since 1919 and was manned by a bunch of old-time typesetters. When I got there they were using a photo-typesetting system and just beginning to changeover to digital. I was hired to teach these guys “computer typesetting.” One of them, named Eddy, straight out told me he had no interest in learning another typesetting system and planned to retire the next year. Now in the corner of the loft where I worked there was an antique looking hulk of a machine with a massive keyboard. I learned that it was an old hot-metal Linotype Composer kept by the owner as a memento of the shop’s early history. Eddy seeing my fascination with the Linotype fired it up one night. Any steampunk fan would have been in ecstasy watching man and machine working in total accord. The Linotype worked by using a keyboard to create letter impressions in a matrix, then molten lead, heating within the machine, was poured into this matrix to create lines of type slugs. Eddy was clanking along, looking to my eyes like the Phantom of the Opera at the keyboard, when the Linotype suddenly made a strange hissing noise and began spitting out molten lead. We both drove for cover. After the Linotype cooled down a bit Eddy patted it and with a big smile on his face said, “Just like the old days.”
(Photo: Luis Ortiz)