last weekend was hectic. the good husband accompanied his wife and drove her 4 hours away, to stay only 3 hours, to drive back 4 hours on only 2 hours of sleep to the amalgamated printer's association's wayzgoose & 16th annual midwest and great norther printer's fair (that's a mouthful!) in mt. pleasant, iowa. i had no idea what wayzgoose even meant until a few minutes ago when i looked it up on wikipedia, meaning- "Wayzgoose was at one time the name for an entertainment given by a master printer to his workmen each year on or about St Bartholomew's Day (24 August). This marked the traditional end of summer and the point at which the season of working by candlelight began. Later, the word came to refer to the annual outing and dinner of the staff of a printing works or the printers on a newspaper."
on with my little road trip story.. so we awoke at 4am and drove through hours of a whole lot of this
when we arrived though, we saw plenty of neat things like this
and check out this paper cutter.. this is no fiskar's brand paper cutter from hobby lobby
we saw recycled type being cast right in front of us by sky himself, joined by his wife johanna, the dynamic duo of skyline type foundry. i even bought some brand spankin new type and a border set from them
the coolest thing was the newspaper demonstration on the steam powered babcock press. how crazy is this?
after the paper is printed, it's fed through this crazy contraption to get folded and the ends trimmed
we also saw some letterpress posters like this
and amid all the huge, industrial machinery, we also saw these cute collectible hand presses from paul aken's massive collection that make up the platen press museum in zion, il
and after all of that, i just couldn't leave empty handed! i of course had to purchase a few goodies...
-3 used type sets
-7 tubes of oil based ink
-2 new sets of type
-1 new border set
-3 new gauge pins
-a ton of old but never used borders
-and a husband with a greater appreciation for letterpress!
now how fabulous is that?! go wayzgoose.. can't wait until next year!