The latest addition to our archive is a box of printing blocks used to create the images in articles by mill expert Rex Wailes. We’ve got several boxes of these already, and I’ve never been quite sure what to do with them. Are they worth keeping? Can we generate a usable image from them? Or are they curiosities that would best be skipped to save some space on our overcrowded shelves?
I thought I’d experiment and try putting one on one of our scanners to see what resulted. With a bit of digital manipulation the above image emerged. This was better than I expected – and actually quite attractive looking. But what does it show? The old newspaper wrapping has the rather unhelpful note ‘Woad’ written on it. Clearly some detective work would be needed to find out what this image showed.
Looking in the box again I found another with a more helpful description – ‘Transactions Vol XV, Long I USA, Plate 14’ – clearly a reference to the Newcomen Society Transactions where many of Rex’s papers were published.
I scanned this in, this time saving it in greyscale. The result is perhaps not as pretty compared to the coppery colour of the first image but closer to what the printed image should look like. I also mirrored the image – as of course the printing plate is the reverse of the image it produces. This was the result:
Looking up the original article in the ‘Newcomen Transactions’, this turned out to be a photo of a saw mill at Seven Ponds, Long Island – not one of Rex’s own images but reproduced from a 1912 magazine article, the mill having disappeared some years earlier. Rex noted the photo’s significance as the only image he had come across of a ‘sunk post mill’, an early type of post mill where the trestle on which the mill rests was buried underground.
I tried scanning the image from the article to compare with the image taken from the print itself. Below shows them side-by-side:
They are obviously a bit different. An extreme close up reveals why this is:
The image on the left is a photograph of the contours of the printing block, showing the raised bumps and the space in between which would be filled with ink, while the other shows the pattern of ink left by this on the surface of the paper.
So the results of attempting to create a usable image from these items have been fairly successful. However, I still think the printed image looks better than the one produced by scanning the block – so whether the blocks are worth keeping if we have a copy of the publication they were used in is something we have to decide.
Our neighbours at the Museum of English Rural Life also have a printing block collection, which they have displayed in an innovative way – you can read about it here.
UPDATE
Thanks to the help of Susan and Brian Davies we have now identified the first image above as Algarkirk Woad Mill. The image was printed in Clark, H. O. and Wailes, Rex The Preparation of Woad in England, Transactions of the Newcomen Society, 1935-1936, Volume XVI: p.69-95. The original negative from which it was taken was by Hallam Ashley and is also in our archive: http://catalogue.millsarchive.org/algarkirk-woad-mill.