By: Nick Howard | Date: June 2018 | Contact the Author
United States War Department, eager to develop homegrown weapons, listened enthusiastically to what French revolutionary soldier Major Louis de Tousard had to say. He had learned the gun-making craft in France and was a staunch supporter of Le Système Gribeauval. It was the French who first began developing a way of manufacturing guns in a uniform method.
In 1765, General Jean-Baptiste de Gribeauval argued for small firearms to be made with interchangeable parts for a range of reasons. Guns damaged in the field could not be readily repaired. Each part had to be reworked with files to fit. Hard to do in the midst of a bloody battle.
Early attempts by American contractors proved daunting. In 1798, Simeon North, a scythe maker from Connecticut, was handed a cash advance to manufacture five hundred pistols. Later that year, Eli Whitney also received a contract. These two entrepreneurs labored over crude machinery in a quest to make identical interchangeable firearms in mass production.
Read The Full Article »»
|
|
|
Back To The Future The millennium Drupa 2000 trade fair was electric. World economies had just come off the best five years of steady growth, and the internet was only beginning its attack on analog commerce. At Drupa, Komori Corporation showcased a brand new press: the Lithrone S40 Project D. The D stood for Digital. More »» |
|
Running Out of Gun Powder - Du Pont in Graphic ArtsPierre Samuel du Pont, a Frenchman,
immigrated with his
family to America in 1799.
Before setting sail, he was
warned that the French
were rather unpopular in the now independent
colonies. But tiring of French
politics, America drew him like a magnet. More »» |
|
Made In Japan How a Japanese press builder fround its way onto the world stage. Deep inside our Howard Iron Works Museum sits an odd looking offset press. Cast in the frame the word Komori along with the once familiar bat logo. I managed to finagle this press from the hands of an English dealer. More »» |
|
The Big Strike Recounts the time when the Toronto Typographical Union went on strike against the city's major newspapers - the Toronto Star, The Globe & Mail, and the Toronto Telegram. The strike went on for years, and was never resolved.
More »» |
|
The Genius of Friedrich König How Friedrich König lost the battle but ended up winning the war! Friedrich König was a genius. If you visit either KBA’s Würzburg headquarters or the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz, you will see just how advanced his now famous The Times press is. More »» |
|
The Great Disrupter How the Trump administration can affect North
American trade and Canada’s printing industry.More »» |
|
Back In The USSR A unique business trip to the Soviet Union including a look inside the printing operation of the Red Army at the height of Cold War leaves a lasting impression.More »» |
|
| |
|
 |
|
|
