My family's involvement in printing goes back to about the time of the Civil War. My great grandfather was the editor and publisher of The Dahlonega (Georgia) Signal in the 1870's. He had been a Captain in the Confederate cavalry and so was unemployed after 1864. In 1890 he traded a gold pocket watch valued at $50 for the Dawson County Advertiser in Dawsonville, GA. When he died in 1911 his then 15 year old daughter Maude took over and operated the paper for the next fifty years. She was my grandmother and when I was six years old she taught me to set type by hand.  Since then I have been involved in the printing business in one form or another all my life, except for some time spent in the Navy working on radar and computers and later going back to school for a Masters in Philosophy.

 

Some of the equipment I have owned and operated over the years: C&P hand fed presses, Craftsman press with auto feeder; Kluge, both printing and stamping presses; Heidelberg windmills and cylinders; Kelly and Miller cylinder presses; Little Giant; Model 5, 8 and 31 Linotype; and Ludlow. On the non-letterpress side: 1250 Multiliths, Davidson offset presses, ATF Chief 15 and 20, various cameras and have set type using Varitypers, IBM Selectric Composer, Compugraphic Editwriter, Itek and AM Varityper phototypesetting equipment.

 

At the present time I have in my shop 2 C&P hand fed presses, a 10x15 Kluge and a 14x22 Kluge stamping press. I have some hand set type, but most of the day to day composition is now done on a Mac computer using Quark and Pagemaker.

 

I'm located in Atlanta, GA, if anyone wants to stop by I'd be glad to have you.

David Brough