THE STEREOTYPER.
1. The word stereotype is derived from two Greek words—stereos, solid, and tupos, a type. It is applied to pages of types in a single piece, which have been cast in moulds formed on common printing types or wood-cuts. They are composed of lead and antimony, in the proportion of about six parts of the former to one of the latter. Sometimes a little tin is added.
2. The types are set up by compositors, as usual in printing, and imposed, or locked up, one or several pages together, in an iron chase of a suitable size. Having been sent to the casting-room, the types are slightly oiled, and surrounded with a frame of brass or type-metal. They are then covered with a thin mixture of finely pulverized plaster and water. In about ten minutes, the plaster becomes hard enough to be removed.
3. The mould, thus formed, having been baked in an oven, is placed in an iron pan of an oblong shape, and sunk into a kettle of the melted composition above mentioned, which is admitted at the four corners of the cover to the cavities of the mould beneath. The pan is then raised from the kettle, and placed over water. When the metal has become cool, the contents of the pan are removed, and the plaster is broken and washed from the plate.
4. As fast as the pages are cast, they are sent to the finishing-room. Here they are first planed on the back with a machine, for the purpose of making them level and of an equal thickness. The letters are then examined, and, when deficient, are rendered perfect by little steel instruments called picks. Corrections and alterations are made by cutting out original lines, and inserting common printing types, or lines stereotyped for the purpose. The types are cut off close to the back with pincers, and fastened to the place with solder. The plates, when they are finished, are about one-sixth of an inch in thickness.
5. When all the pages of a work have been completed, they are packed in boxes, which are marked with certain letters of the alphabet, to indicate the form or pages which they contain. While the pages are applied in printing, they are fastened to blocks of solid wood, which, with the plates, are intended to be the same in height with common types.
6. The first stereotype plates were cast by J. Van der Mey, a Dutchman, who resided at Leyden about the year 1700. A quarto and folio Bible, and two or three small works, were printed from pages of his casting; but at his death, the art appears to have been lost, although the plates of these two Bibles are still extant, the former at Leyden, and the latter at Amsterdam.