The Presses

Kent Aldrich runs five presses at his small print shop in St. Paul. The two work horses at Nomadic Press are its hand-fed Chandler and Price, Old Style, clam shell presses. Commonly known as C&P presses, these machines were built at the end of the 1800s in Cleveland Ohio by the Chandler and Price Company. The 10 x 15 C&P (affectionally known as Grandpa) was built in 1894. It has an electric motor with a variable speed control and can, when running at top speed, print more than 2,000 impressions an hour. The 8 x 12 C&P (known as the beast) was built in 1897. The rod link variable speed control for this press was manufactured using one half of the rear axle assembly from a Ford Model T. Both of the C&P presses can be, and often are, run using a foot treadle. Which saves on the print shop’s electric bill and keeps the pressman warm in the winter.

The 7 x 11 Pearl press (which answers to the name of cutie-pie) was built in 1886 by Golding and Company in Boston and runs only by foot power. It is a smaller press and is used mostly for the printing of business cards.

The Press that is used for long runs is the 12 x 18 Kluge self feed and delivery. Built in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1932 by Brantjen & Kluge Company, this press has all the endearing qualities of a steam locomotive—really.

For large format work, Nomadic Press uses its Vandercook Universal 1. This press was built in 1957 and was originally used to take proofs of galleys of type. But because of the exacting degree of control that it allows its operator, it is an ideal press for close register edition work.

A Paragon guillotine paper cutter from 1890 is used cut the stock that the presses are fed and many other shop tools at Nomadic Press are of similar vintage.

From working on the binding of books using a maple sewing frame to paring leather on a block of polished limestone, the hand work performed at The Nomadic Press is well founded in a sense of craft brought forward from a time when equipment was built to last a couple of hundred years. And the quality of the finished work shows it.