July 16 -- more historical stuff

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I believe this is the Pennsylvania Department of Records, whiter in the morning sun.

So interesting, how you just can't tell, looking out a window like this, where things are in relation to each other.  This white clock tower is a a good deal farther away than I'd have thought, and it's not all that near to the Drexel Medical Center, which appears to be across the street from it, in one of my other pics.


Love Google satellite view, which lets you look around and identify stuff!





I'm headed back east toward the historical part of town.  Waiting on Market Street for the Phlash bus/trolley, looking west at City Hall and Billy Penn.

Near the waterfront.  Sidewalk tables and palm trees, near Penn's Landing (see the sign, upper right?).

An embellished building.

Another embellished storefront.

I'd thought I might walk down to the waterfront, but got this far and wasn't sure how to proceed.  It all looks very ... car-oriented.  I couldn't tell how a pedestrian might safely get beyond the expressway.

We can see the Delaware River under the bridge, and the hazy buildings in the distance are in New Jersey.

I gave up and went back west on Market.

I wonder what kind of tree this is.  I don't recognize it.

More embellishment.

Christ Church, from the south.

Interesting sidewalk.  Mostly very flat, except where the slate(??) is broken.

This was one of my goals for the day.  I suspected they would have a special cancellation, and sure enough, they did.

I chatted with the postal worker for a bit.  She said that at the end of July a decision would be made as to whether this post office would continue to be staffed, and, if so, for how many hours a week.

It would be sad if these little historic post offices, with their special cancellations, were to go the way of the pony express!

I know they have to save money -- I'd rather have them switch to doing home delivery only
a few days a week.  (Especially as I essentially never get anything I want!  It's all ads and solicitations......)



Models with post office uniforms.

I wonder how many female mail-carriers there actually were, in 1917!  I'm surprised there were any at all...........

There is a print shop, using the sort of equipment Benjamin Franklin's printing business would have used, right by the post office.

This park ranger was printing copies of the Declaration of Independence.

It's cotton rag paper, which they dampen before printing, as damp paper takes the ink better.

The ink is pounced on the type (which is the horizontal nearly-black part, right below the ranger, in the above) with big leather beaters.

In the image below, you can see a hinge above the paper.  That is a rectangle with a rectangular opening (sort of like the mat between a picture and its frame), which holds the paper in place so it can be laid on the type.

Fold the mat-thing down, fold the paper down so it touches the type, then slide all of that under the press.  This is a big-enough piece of paper that it had to be pressed twice.  It would be slid all the way in, the lever pulled back toward the ranger to press, then it would be slid half-way out, pressed again, then slid all the way out, to arrive at the image below.  (The press lever is the thing that goes out of the frame, upper left, in the previous image.)

There was a flat ended paddle-shaped thing, which was used to lift the damp pages up to overhead racks for drying.

I asked about the source of the type, and of the ink, and was told Franklin would have imported both from Europe.  I don't remember asking where they got the paper.  I sort of bet that was imported, too.....

Of course all the type was loose (wedged into place for use).  We were told printers had two cases of loose letters waiting to be set for a page (each letter in its own box in the case).  The capital letters went in the upper case....  (Thinking about this -- they must have had a pair of cases for every font....)

Skilled typesetters could set a page in a few hours.

We were shown the way things would have been printed to fit more than one page on a piece of paper.  Pretty complex stuff, and quite interesting.  So many jobs that are no longer done by hand.....




Walking on west....

A bank embellished...

...with sheep.

I wonder about the round pupils.  Sheep don't have round pupils.  I wonder if the carver knew that and was asked/told to make them round, regardless............

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