Printing Press Field Trip
I hadn’t visited a printer in many years, so the chance to tourKirby Lithographics, coordinated by Washington Book Publishers was a treat. We were a group of mostly editors and writers.
Kirby is a family-owned firm that specializes in books of mid-sized runs. (As interesting as the machinery were piles of pages in various stages of printing, from titles on the Russian economy to hiking trails along the Appalachian Trail.) While technology has reduced the number of employees needed and changed the process–so much for the bluelines I remember–it still takes skill to get a good product.
