Chapter II: Ready for Business

Harry rented a room and engaged board at the home of one of the miners, and then went back downtown. He looked around till he found a room upstairs over a grocery store, that would do for his printing-office. The grocery store proprietor, a German named Gebhart, owned the building, and told the youthful prospective publisher that he might have the room for almost nothing, as it had stood empty several years and he didn’t know of anyone else who would probably be wanting to rent it; so Harry rented the room, paying the first month’s rent in advance. It cost three dollars, as the German said that would be sufficient, and he would take it out in printing after the paper was started--Harry had, of course, told him he intended putting in a printing outfit and would start a newspaper.

Harry had packed his trunk and suitcase before leaving Dellwood to go to Denver to purchase his printing outfit, and had instructed the people at whose home he had boarded while attending to the burial of his father, to send the trunk and suitcase by express, stating the date for them to be sent. They would be there even now, he felt sure, and on going around to the express office he found that he was right. Paying the express charges, he hired a man to haul them to the place where he had engaged room and board, and he and the man carried them up to his room.

The type foundry people of whom he had purchased his printing outfit in Denver were as good as their word. They must have shipped the printing press and material the next day after he purchased it, for it arrived on the third day, and was unloaded from the freight-car onto the railway station platform. It created considerable interest among the people at the station, even the station agent stopping a few moments to look at the printing paraphernalia.

“Somebody is going to start a printing office here,” he said to one of the men standing around. “That will be good. The more industries we have represented, the better it is for the town.”

“That’s the way to look at it,” the man replied.

Harry followed him into his office, and asked how much the freight was on the printing material that had just been unloaded from the car. “I’m Harry Weston,” he added, “and it’s my property.”

“Oh,” the agent said, looking at the youth with some surprise and no little interest. “So you are the person who is going to put in the printing office.”

“Yes, sir; and I am going to do not only job printing, but am going to start a newspaper, too. I don’t know how it will do, but I hope the people here will like the idea of having a newspaper and will subscribe for it, the majority of them at any rate.”

“Likely they will do so,” said the station agent, with a friendly look and intonation. “You can count on me as a subscriber, for one, when you get the paper started. My name is Garland, Henry Garland. The freight charges are fourteen dollars and seventy cents.”

“I’ll make a note of your name and send you a copy of the first issue, and place your name in my subscription ledger as my first subscriber,” said Harry. “And thanks for subscribing. Here is the freight money,” and he placed a ten and a five-dollar bill on the window-ledge.

“Rented a room yet, for your office?” asked Garland as he handed out thirty cents in change, and placed the bank-notes in the money-drawer.

“Yes, upstairs over Mr. Gebhart’s grocery store.”

“That ought to do first rate. It’s right in the heart of the business portion of our town.”

“Yes, it’s a good location.”

Then Harry went out onto the platform and found a drayman there, looking at the printing paraphernalia.

“Who does this belong to?” he asked of one of the men standing around. “I’d like the job of moving it to wherever its owner wants it moved.”

“It’s mine,” said Harry. “What will you charge to haul it to Gebhart’s grocery store and help get it upstairs into the room above?”

The drayman eyed the printing material a few moments and then said:

“Five dollars. Some of it’s pretty heavy, or I’d do it cheaper.”

“That won’t be too much,” said Harry. “Let’s load it into the dray.”

He and the man loaded the printing press and other printing material into the dray, and then Harry got up on the seat beside the man, and they were soon at the grocery store.

It took an hour and a half to get the printing outfit upstairs and into the room Harry had rented, and then he paid the drayman, who departed.

Harry took off his coat and hat and hung them on a nail in one corner of the room, and then, after a few moments of thought, went downstairs and into the grocery store.

“May I borrow a hatchet or hammer, Mr. Gebhart?” he asked of the proprietor. “I need one to uncrate my printing material.”

The man handed him a hammer, and Harry thanked him and went back upstairs. He went to work in real earnest and in an hour’s time had the printing outfit all uncrated. The wooden slats he stood on end in a closet at the back end of the room.

The rack for the type-cases to rest on he placed near the front of the room, at one side, where he could get good light, so he could see to pick up the type when setting it, as the types are small, and good light is needed. The job-press he placed in the corner opposite, edging it into place gradually. The table for the imposing stone to rest on he placed at one side of the room, near the center. The stone itself was too heavy for him to lift alone, as was also the printing press. He would have to have help to handle these, and so he put on his coat and hat and went out to a carpenter-shop about halfway down the block.

“I’ll tell you what I want,” said Harry, when the carpenter turned to him inquiringly. “I am in need of a narrow table about six feet long. It ought to be pretty strong, but pine wood will do. I want to put a printing press on it, a hand-press, weighing only about one hundred and fifty pounds, but in printing, the form is run through under an iron cylinder and this would make the table shake and quiver and rack it in due time unless tolerably strong. What will you charge me to make a table of this kind?”

“Where is your press? Perhaps I had better take a look at it, and then I can tell better how strong a table to make,” said the carpenter. He seemed friendly and somewhat interested. “I didn’t know we were going to have a printing office in our town,” he continued. “Are you its owner?”

“Yes, sir,” said Harry. “I’m going to do job printing, and also I am going to publish a newspaper. I don’t know how well it will succeed, but hope the people here and in this vicinity will be pleased and subscribe. I have one subscriber already,” he added with a smile. “Mr. Garland, the station agent, told me I might put his name on my list as a subscriber, and that’s some encouragement.”

“I’ll take the paper, too,” said the carpenter. “My name is Merwin, James Merwin.” He, like the station agent, seemed to have taken a liking to this young fellow who was possessed of such good business ambitions as to be on the point of starting a newspaper in their town, and he only a youth of about eighteen years. They were leaving the carpenter shop as he was talking, Harry leading the way.

“Thanks,” said Harry. “I’ll enter your name in my subscription ledger along with Mr. Garland’s.”

They were soon upstairs in the room where the printing press and material were, and Harry pointed to the press, resting on the floor. It was so small and unimposing-looking that the man almost smiled. “I wouldn’t have thought a newspaper could be printed on such a small press as that,” he said.

“The table that I want you to make will be practically a part of the press,” said Harry. “In effect, I mean. You see, cylinder presses have an iron frame reaching to the floor, and actually a part of the press, while with this hand-press it is different, as I have to have the frame portion made extra, and as this little press isn’t heavy, a wooden table will do.”

The carpenter nodded. “I see,” he said. “What you have explained is clear.”

He stepped forward and lifted up the press, taking hold of the cylinder at one side. “I’ll make you a table strong enough to stand the grind of printing,” he said. “I’ll charge you three dollars.”

“That will be cheap enough. How soon can you have it ready?”

“By three o’clock this afternoon. I have some other work I have to do first. I’ll help you bring it up here, too, for good measure,” and he smiled.

“Thank you,” said Harry.

The carpenter departed and Harry set about other work he could do. He placed the type-cases on the rack, and the job-cases he slipped into place on the wooden flanges underneath the top cases, and then he put the labor-saving leads and slugs in an extra case he had purchased for the purpose and slipped it in under the type-cases; after which he began laying, as it is termed, the job and advertising type. This consists of putting the type in the job-cases. The new font is the type to which the word “laying” applies, specifically explained, and not to the second-hand type, which is tied up just as it was printed when last used for that purpose, and this is simply “thrown in,” as it is termed in printing parlance.

When he had gotten all the job and advertising type laid and thrown in, Harry went to work on the body type. This was small-sized type, eight-point size, which is the size almost universally used in printing both country and metropolitan newspapers. All printing type is based on what is termed “the point system,” which means that the types are graduated sizes, differing in size from each other not less than two points, which equals one-eighteenth of an inch. Previous to the adoption of the point system, the type differed in size only one point, which was only one-thirty-sixth of an inch. This was deemed not enough of a difference, hence the adoption of the point system.

The eight-point “body type,” as it is called, was all second-hand, and was tied up in paper, with a string around each lot of type, about five or six inches in size, just as it had last been used in printing. As there were about one hundred pounds--enough to fill two type-cases, both upper and lower, (the upper case contains the capitals and small capitals and the lower case the small letters)--this work could not be done quickly but would furnish Harry enough to do during the rest of the day. He had one of the cases, both upper and lower, filled by the time the carpenter had said he would have the table for the printing press finished.

Putting on his hat and coat, he went around to the shop and found the table ready. He paid Mr. Merwin three dollars, then they lifted up the table, carried it out and down the street and upstairs into the printing-office.

“Where do you want it put?” the carpenter asked. “Show me the spot and we’ll place the table there and then I’ll help you put the press on it.”

“Here,” said Harry, indicating the point at which he wished the table placed. After placing it, they lifted the press and set it on the table.

“There,” said Mr. Merwin, with a smile. “There’s your press complete.”

Harry nodded. “Thank you,” he said. “Yes, the press looks better on the table than on the floor.”

“Quite right,” the carpenter said. “Well, I wish you success,” and departed.

Another man came in just at that moment. He was one who had been at the railway station when the printing outfit was unloaded and had been aroused to dropping around by the usual incentive, curiosity. Harry put down some type he was just going to throw into the case, and nodding to the man, said: “I’m glad some big, able-bodied man dropped in. I have some lifting here that is too heavy for me alone. It’s this stone,” and he indicated the imposing stone resting on the floor. “I want it placed on this table,” and he nodded toward the stand that he had purchased for the stone to rest on. “Will you help me put it up there?”

“Sure I will,” said the man good-naturedly, and he and Harry lifted the stone--with some difficulty, for it was pretty heavy--and placed it on the stand.

Harry offered the man a quarter, but he wouldn’t take it. “I wouldn’t accept pay for doing a little lifting like that,” he said.

“All right, and thank you, sir,” said Harry. “Perhaps I can do you a favor sometime.”

In response to the man’s friendly questions, Harry told him his plans for starting a newspaper in Coalville, and for doing job-printing for the business men, and explained that he hoped to make a success of his business venture.

“I guess you’ll do pretty well with your newspaper,” the man said, “for that’s something we’ve been needing, I’m sure, and I’ve heard some of the business men say they wished we had a paper here. You ought to get quite a good deal of job-printing to do, too.”

“I hope so,” said Harry. “And thank you for your encouragement.”

“That’s all right,” the friendly man said. “I wish you success. I’ll subscribe for your paper, dating from the first issue. My name’s Williams, Frank Williams.”

“Thank you, Mr. Williams. I’ll put your name on my subscription list along with those of Mr. Garland, the station agent, and Mr. Merwin, the carpenter who made the table that the press rests on. They both subscribed.”

“All right. I’ll call again and pay for a year’s subscription as soon as you get out the first issue.” Then he took his leave.

Harry finished distributing the rest of the body type into the other pair of cases by half-past five o’clock, and then looked around him with considerable satisfaction. There was the new table, with the printing press resting on it. There was the table, or stand, with the imposing stone resting on it. There was the job-press in the corner, opposite the rack, and type-cases. There was the type-cases rack, containing the type-cases filled with body type on top, job cases with the job and advertising type underneath, and the case with the labor-saving leads and slugs in it. There were the wooden reglets, the composing sticks, a small one for body-type setting and a long one for setting jobs and advertisements. There were the ink-roller, the can of ink, the benzine can, the small collapsible tubes of various-colored job-printing inks, and other items of printing paraphernalia.

“Well, here I am with my printing presses and material all in place,” murmured Harry. “Now the real work of getting ready to publish the first issue of my paper will begin. I must see all the merchants, tell them how many papers I am going to print and get some advertisements from them, then set the advertisements. Then I will have to get news enough for the first issue, and will have to write a salutatory; however, I’ll make that brief and to the point and of course friendly to the place. This and the local news items will have to be set, after which the forms will have to be made up, and all will be ready for the printing of the first number of the paper.

“The ready-printed sheets to print the local news on will be here a week from next Thursday, and I will get the paper out Friday afternoon of next week. This is Wednesday, which leaves three days of this week, and there will be four days of next week in which to do the work I have to do. I instructed the paper people to send me twenty quires of paper. That’s four hundred and eighty papers, and ought to be enough to start with. It only costs eighteen cents per quire, but I don’t want to print more papers than I will need.” He pondered a few moments, and then went on: “I haven’t decided what to name my paper. Let’s see, what shall I call it?” Again he pondered a few moments, and then said: “I’ll call it ‘The Coalville News’. Yes, that’ll do. ‘The Coalville News’ it shall be, and long live ‘The Coalville News’!” And with a smile he put on his coat and hat and went out, locking the door, and made his way to his boarding-house, where he did full justice to Mrs. Tompkins’ splendid supper of fried chicken.