Portable Copying Press – president Thomas Jefferson’s contribution to the print and copy trade…
Was reading this CNN article on an 1808 personal letter from the 3rd US president found by a college student studying to be a historian, which reminded me of the many inventions that Thomas Jefferson, “principal author of the Declaration of Independence (1776)”[source] made; some of which are directly in the print and copy trade:
“Historians had been aware of the existence of the letter, thanks to Jefferson’s use of a portable copying press, one of his many inventions. But its physical whereabouts had been unknown.”
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/12/04/jefferson.letter/index.html
So what is this “Jefferson’s portable copying press”?
“Jefferson invented the portable copying press when his overseas travel called for a compact version of the copying press previously invented by James Watt. In the original copying machine, one wrote with ink on a copper plate which could then produce numerous copies; Jefferson praised this enthusiastically because of how well it facilitated record-keeping and correspondence and subsequently sought to improve it. Jefferson designed a lap desk which would hold all the essentials of his day, from a thermometer to pencils to a nightcap, as well as his portable copying press.”
Source: http://cti.itc.virginia.edu/~meg3c/classes/tcc313/200Rprojs/jefferson_invent/invent.html
Note: Jefferson did not invent this, but improved on it really. This image is of James Watt copying press, 1780 patent diagram, of which Thomas Jefferson improved and worked closely with…
Then, we see president Jefferson’s contribution to The Polygraph (duplicating device), which today is called the pantograph:
“The polygraph, another letter copying device, was invented by an Englishman, John Hawkins, but was perfected by Thomas Jefferson. When Jefferson first received the polygraph, constructed of two connected pens, he called it “the finest invention of the present age”. (Jefferson to Bowdoin, 1806)In correspondence with museum director Charles Peale, Jefferson continually suggested improvements that arose through his observant use of the polygraph.”
Source: http://cti.itc.virginia.edu/~meg3c/classes/tcc313/200Rprojs/jefferson_invent/invent.html
Here is a great site on the history of copy machines and the early office in general – wow:
http://www.officemuseum.com/copy_machines.htm
Now, surely Xerox has blogged about this too (Can you make me a Xerox of that document?)! Speaking of inventions, did you know that Markzware is the inventor of preflighting? (Can you do a FlightCheck on that document please?) And then there is that matter of modern, legacy content and the solution with PageZephyr…
February 1st, 2010
[...] to then-president Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, who has patents and inventions which included the portable copy press, also dabbled in secret code (The Wheel Cipher): “Jefferson even wrote about his own [...]