58 TUGboat, Volume 36 (2015), No. 1

Book review: History of theLinotype Company

Boris Veytsman

Frank Romano, History of the Linotype Company.RIT Press, 2014. 480 pp. Softcover, US$39.99.ISBN 978-1-933360-60-7.

Few inventions changed the cultural and politicallandscape as profoundly as those involving cheap andquick copying of words. Gutenberg’s movable typemade books available to multitudes of people withenormous consequences for civilization. However,manual composition was still too slow and expensiveto mass-produce cheap newspapers. The inventionof hot-metal typesetting by Ottmar Mergenthalerand his contemporaries made printing much fasterand cheaper. It is difficult to fully quantify theconsequences since it coincided with the advent ofradio, and both these events had a similar effect: thedeep penetration of news into everyday life. However,there is little doubt that newspapers and cheap bookswere very important in the history of the last century.For about one hundred years — until the advent ofdigital typesetting — Linotype machines ruled theworld of mass-produced copy. While newspaperswere the first adopters of the new technology, manyothers followed; as Frank Romano writes in his book,during World War II every US warship larger thancruiser class had a Linotype machine on board.

The Mergenthaler Linotype Company, estab-lished in 1886 (as Mergenthaler Printing Company)has a rich and interesting history. It included tu-multuous arguments with the eponymous inventor,lawsuits, patent fights, mergers, acquisitions — andalso technological innovations, hard workers, greatartists and daring visionaries. Besides developmentand promotion of hot-metal typesetting, the company

created an enormous number of typefaces, pioneeredteletypesetting (again of huge importance for thenewspaper business), experimented with phototype-setting and contributed to digital composition. Theexperience of its engineers with precision mechanicaldevices allowed the company to venture into otherareas, including the production of bombsights andother armaments (especially during the wars).

Frank Romano, now an Emeritus Professor withRIT, worked at Linotype for eight years. He haswritten a brilliant book about the company — not adry list of milestones, but rather a work of love andappreciation. The book includes, in excerpts or infull, rare or previously unpublished documents, suchas the autobiography of Ottmar Mergenthaler, man-uscripts, letters, earning reports, court filings, news-paper articles, brochures, author’s own interviews,and many others. The book is lavishly illustrated,with hundreds of reproductions of samples, advertise-ments, photographs, books and other materials thatLinotype published over 127 years of its existence.

Romano’s foremost interest is in the people at Lino-type. The book has many vivid biographical sketchesof extraordinary individuals who worked for the com-pany or otherwise influenced it: from Ottmar Mer-genthaler himself to the reclusive investor GurdonWattles (by the way, a role model for Warren Buffett).The people described in the book do not appear ascartoonish figures on a backdrop of Linotype’s his-tory: Romano has a rare ability to portray all hispersonages, even those mentioned only briefly, asalive and real. The human side of the history is hisstrongest feature.

Another interest for the author is evidently thefinancial side of company activity: he writes aboutits mergers, acquisitions and loans with attentionto detail. If one wants to know the net income ofthe Mergenthaler Company in 1967 or how many

Boris Veytsman

TUGboat, Volume 36 (2015), No. 1 59

founders’ shares were issued at the company incor-poration, the information can be found in the book.The author also describes the lawsuits Linotype wasinvolved in, including those about font copyright,which are still very relevant in the US.

The book devotes many pages to the influenceof the company on the art of typography. Romanoreproduces cover pages and spreads of the famousLinotype manuals, which defined the trends for con-temporary typesetting. He describes the huge workthe company did in the design of typefaces. Amongthe people of Linotype described in the book areChauncey H. Griffin, Harry L. Cage, Paul A. Ben-nett, Mike Parker, and many other figures in theworld of font design and typesetting.

Having worked at Linotype from 1959 to 1967,from mail boy to assistant ad manager, Romanodevotes a chapter of his book to his personal remi-niscences. It describes the life at the great companyin the Sixties with loving detail: from the quality offood in the nearby restaurants to the generosity ofexpense accounts to the typical day in the ad depart-ment. This chapter is great reading for any lover ofhistory.

Romano also briefly touches on the history oftechnology: hot-metal typesetting and other rele-vant inventions, such as punch-cutting machines anddouble-wedge spaceband. I wish, however, he hadbeen as detailed here as in other parts of his book. Ifeel the book could have been improved by the inclu-sion of historical drawings, e.g., from the company’spatent applications.

The book has many useful appendices, includinga detailed index, lists of typefaces originated or usedat Linotype (both alphabetical and chronological),a time table and a large bibliography. This makes

the book indispensable for amateur and professionalhistorians.

The book is designed by Marnie Soom and type-set in New Caledonia and MetroNova. The fonts arevery legible, and the illustrations are excellent.

Despite all the above, I confess I have severalgripes with the book design and typesetting.

First, the paper size is 10.5′′ by 8.5′′. This widebook is difficult to read except when sitting at a desk,and even more difficult to leaf through. The book istypeset in three columns with rather narrow margins.More generous margins could have been used for thenotes, which are now put at the end of each chapter.

I also do not understand why the book is typesetragged right. Narrow unjustified columns produce astrange look since the sizes of the gaps are visuallycomparable to the column width. With the raggedright margin, the indented first line of a paragraphsometimes looks centered (an example of such aparagraph can be found in an illustration above).Interestingly enough, justification was one of thecrucial problems for the early Linotype machines,solved only when the company bought John Rogers’sfirm with its patent for the double-wedge justifier. Asdiscussed in the book, before this purchase LinotypeCo. even tried to refuse to pay Mergenthaler hisroyalties unless he invented a way to circumventthis patent, arguing that his machine was uselessotherwise.

Last, but not least, it is not a good idea to breakthe line between “Mr.” and the person’s last name,as it is sometimes done in this book.

Despite these minor gripes it is a very goodbook. I think it might be especially interesting fora TEX audience. Some of the metaphors used inthe description of TEX’s algorithms come from theworld of hot-metal typesetting. It gives a differentperspective to read about the mechanical justifiers, orthe literal setting of the slug. Many digital fonts weuse now originated at Linotype, and it is fascinatingto see how they were created.

I also think this book is essential reading foranybody interested in the history of typesetting andfonts.

� Boris VeytsmanSystems Biology School and

Computational MaterialsScience Center, MS 6A2George Mason University,Fairfax, VA 22030

borisv (at) lk dot net

http://borisv.lk.net

Book review: History of the Linotype Company