Here are a few pictures of something we will never see again in our lifetimes. These are large billing stands. Perhaps, we'll get a comment or two. I believe these were also referred to as daubs but I'm not a billposter to know for sure.The stand was for the Great Wallace Shows as they appeared in Schenectady, NY. This photo appeared in the Billboard on June 5, 1900 on page 5.
5 comments:
Right, Bob. A "daub" is a stand of paper which has been "posted" on a wall, barn or billboard. Daub is a noun and post is a verb, a synonym of the verb "to paste."
Lithograph is either a noun or a verb; one may "lithograph" (meaning put up in a window with sticks and stickers) a "lithograph" (referring to the actual poster).
Oddly, on the advance of my day the noun "lithograph" related more to the size than the method of printing. Window-size posters (generally one-sheets and smaller) were called lithographs even if printed by letterpress or offset (which is also sometimes called lithography).
And conversely even if printed by lithography, large posters- meaning posting-size, were not referred to by the billers as lithographs. They were usually called by their size, like six-sheets, three-sheets etc.
One of my favorite terms on the advance of my day was the verb "circus." Naturally posters come from the printers batched up as they come off the presses. You will have a box of clown posters, a box of elephant posters, a box of menagerie posters etc etc. If you laid up the hods as they came out of the boxes a guy would be walking down the street putting clown posters in every window and a few days later he would be putting elephants in every window. So every few Sundays we were required to meet down at the truck and "circus" the paper, meaning to mix it up in such a way that the above wouldn't happen.
You would pick a size, say half-sheet flats, and then open all the boxes containing half sheet flats. Then each man would start at one end, picking up a poster from each stack until he reached the end of the line., where he would lay down his six or eight posters. He would then go to the other end of the line and start over. Eventually all the posters in all the sizes would be circused and the car manager or his designate could start laying up the hods.
Had a guy call me today with whom I had lithographed on both the Cristiani and the Beatty-Cole advances. We always talk about the fact that we are about the last of the old lithographers.
Regards, Dave
Thank you Dave. What a great job of explaining the ways of life on the road.
When you say a box of posters, how many came in a box?
Were the bigger ones like 3 and 6 sheet posters folded as one piece?
Thanks again,
Bob
I don't know that I can say how many were in a box. The boxes is my day were a bit larger than a half sheet and maybe 5 or 6 inches think, so that stacks of one-sheets would be folded once and dropped in the box but half-sheets were put in flat.
So I would assume that a box of half-sheets would probably be twice as many posters as a box of one-sheets. Maybe 100 one-sheets or 200 half-sheets?
I remember window cards coming 200 to a box if that helps.
Posting sizes were sometimes "frozen" which means the seams were pre-pasted making the poster one big piece, but this was not always the case. Sometimes you had to put them together like a puzzle as you posted the wall. You always worked from the left end - can you tell me why?
Old billposter Art Beeth told the following story: in the winter in Chicago he would work for a local "plant" (the outfits that owned the billboards) and on this day he was out posting frozen 24-sheets advertising Coke.
He was posting one of these on a billboard which he happened to know was right across the street from Col Clint Finney's house (this must have been in Aurora) and in fact he had seen the Colonel in the yard when he pulled up and started posting the board.
While he was at work, he heard a familiar voice behind him comment, "I never saw a frozen 24 before," and without even turning around Art snapped back, "Yes you have; I used to post them for you on the Ranch Show!"
Best- Dave
ok, what is the reason for going left to right??
On larger paper that is printed in sections, there is a white area or stripe going down the right hand side of each section. You have to lap the next section over this as you go. The white is then hidden but the paper is joined together as you work your way to the right end.
If this white area were not there, you would be trying to fit these sections edge to edge. Try pasting any two pieces of paper edge-to-edge; it can't be done.
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