Ludlow!

Spent a lot of the weekend doing stuff, so I've been a little quiet.

Well, doing stuff and being in a great amount of pain. Friday night my neck had malfunctioned enough that I couldn't move it at all. It was better by Saturday morning, but that was just weird.

Saturday I spent helping a friend set up part of his new typecasting press. He bought a Ludlow from a guy who was getting out of the business. A great little setup which included:

• The Ludlow type caster
• A rack of about 20 Ludlow fonts
• The saw to cut up old type
• Bunches of paper, ink, solvents, cleaning solutions, furniture, leading, etc.

We moved an entire truck and car full of stuff, and we didn't even get to the big parts: the press, type caster, and paper cutter. All of those weigh about 1300 pounds each. More than the four of us could reasonably carry up a flight of stairs, not to mention the truck. So we'll back for those later.

The Ludlow press itself is fascinating. Type is made by laying out the mold for the type, heating lead up to about 600 degrees, and pouring it into the mold. Then you lead the lines (hence the term leading in most page layout programs) for spacing. A drawer full of leading is freaking heavy, let me tell you.

Then once you've assembled enough lines of type, spaced it properly, and laid it out, you ink up the press and press it. Then cut to order depending on the desired end size. Once the press has finished its work, you can cut up the old type and re-smelt it. (The heaviest thing we moved, barring the type saw, was the bucket of lead.)

It was fun. I would need a much bigger house and a better-paying job to pursue this as a hobby, but it's interesting. Hopefully we'll be moving more later next month and then maybe start printing something.

Assuming World of WarCraft doesn't eat up my life first. Or the Stumptown MST3K Society. Following a day of moving type equipment, we went out to dinner, then sat down with friends to watch Manos, Mitchell, and Pod People. Good times, man.