WEBVTT - The Facsimile, Part 2 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.360 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:14.280 Heart Radio. Hey are you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.320 --> 0:00:17.400 Your Mind? My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, 0:00:17.440 --> 0:00:20.680 and we're back with part two of our Invention series 0:00:20.760 --> 0:00:25.800 on the history of document duplication and fac simile technology. 0:00:26.000 --> 0:00:27.920 If you haven't heard part one yet, what are you 0:00:27.960 --> 0:00:29.520 doing here? You might want to go back and listen 0:00:29.520 --> 0:00:32.199 to that one first, But I guess before we get 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:35.120 started today we could do a brief refresher on what 0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:38.440 we talked about in the last episode, so uh Rob. 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:44.000 We discussed the emergence of document based culture and business, politics, religion, 0:00:44.040 --> 0:00:48.080 and society through the ancient world, and some examples of 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:51.840 ways that ancient people and people in documents scarce environments 0:00:52.240 --> 0:00:56.400 might think about documents and copying differently than we would 0:00:56.400 --> 0:00:59.960 tend to think about those subjects today. We talked about 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:03.160 the long history of the scribe, a figure of a 0:01:03.320 --> 0:01:06.399 vast importance who usually spend most or even all of 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:11.360 their time merely copying documents. We discussed some early labor 0:01:11.400 --> 0:01:15.160 saving devices designed to duplicate documents without the need for 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:19.080 hand copying. Of course, you know most copying since since 0:01:19.120 --> 0:01:22.080 the invention of writing has been done not by machines 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:25.280 but by scribes or human copy is having to make 0:01:25.319 --> 0:01:29.039 copies of books and letters and everything by hand. But 0:01:29.120 --> 0:01:32.280 these early labor saving devices included things like the so 0:01:32.400 --> 0:01:36.280 called polygraph, not the Lie detector test, but this was 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:39.880 a name for a device designed to produce an exact 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:42.760 copy of a handwritten document at the time of its 0:01:42.760 --> 0:01:46.720 origin by transferring the movement of your pin through a 0:01:46.760 --> 0:01:50.000 system of levers to a second pin writing on a 0:01:50.040 --> 0:01:52.920 second piece of paper. Uh. And then also we talked 0:01:52.960 --> 0:01:56.680 about things like the copy press or the letter copying press, 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:00.400 which refers to a family of related device is which 0:02:00.400 --> 0:02:03.600 I'll operate on the principle of moistening a very thin 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:07.200 piece of paper and then smashing it against an original 0:02:07.240 --> 0:02:10.840 document in a gigantic clamp or sometimes in a kind 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:14.120 of press or roller to cause some ink to bleed 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:17.320 through from the original document onto the copy paper, giving 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:19.920 you a copy to keep for your records. And we 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:22.480 talked about how versions of the copy press were widely 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:25.320 used throughout the nineteenth century and even somewhat into the 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:27.919 twentieth century, though they will start to overlap with other 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:32.639 technologies and and uh, duplication and facsimile solutions that we'll 0:02:32.680 --> 0:02:35.000 be talking about today. Now, I wanted to throw in 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:39.240 a quick note about Facsimile's uh we do. We titled 0:02:39.240 --> 0:02:43.280 these episodes facsimile, and I thought we might point out 0:02:43.840 --> 0:02:49.080 that you get into the idea of duplications and duplicated documents, 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:53.000 but then there is the realm of of facsimiles, which 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:54.800 is where you're really getting the idea of something that 0:02:54.840 --> 0:02:58.959 is supposed to be a perfect copy, a perfect reproduction 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:02.840 of a given text um. And this this can be 0:03:02.840 --> 0:03:05.440 seen in the Latin. The Latin is to make a 0:03:05.480 --> 0:03:08.720 like uh, and it forms the root of the of 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:11.240 the fac simile that is referenced in the in the 0:03:11.280 --> 0:03:14.520 word fax machine, though a fax machine doesn't really produce 0:03:14.520 --> 0:03:17.960 a true fac simile because this generally again this gen 0:03:18.000 --> 0:03:20.320 generally denotes a copy that is perfect or as close 0:03:20.360 --> 0:03:23.560 to perfect as possible in every regard, and in some 0:03:23.639 --> 0:03:26.400 cases we're talking about not merely the contents of the text, 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:29.160 but the way in which it is written, illustrated, and 0:03:29.160 --> 0:03:32.919 even bound. In some cases, so a fac simile is 0:03:33.000 --> 0:03:36.280 especially useful if the original is both highly desired in 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:40.560 its original form but also fragile, exceedingly rare or valuable, 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:46.080 not ideal for wider use or travel. Um. They're numerous 0:03:46.080 --> 0:03:48.560 examples of this, but but one that I was looking 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:52.000 at just yesterday. I mean not the book itself, obviously, 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:56.880 but as an example. There's this book called the Codex Gigus, 0:03:57.440 --> 0:04:01.760 and it is the largest extent medieval illuminated manuscript. It 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:04.760 was created in the thirteenth century, and it is thirty 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:08.480 six inches or cimeters long, and it also contains a 0:04:08.560 --> 0:04:12.280 full page portrait of the devil. Um So I included 0:04:12.280 --> 0:04:15.960 a photograph of a fac simile of this manuscript for 0:04:15.960 --> 0:04:18.520 you to look at here. Joe, Oh, yes, I've seen this. 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:21.920 I've seen this devil illustration before. And a funny note 0:04:22.000 --> 0:04:25.360 on on originals and copies. I think when I've seen 0:04:25.400 --> 0:04:30.240 this before, the comparison that happened in my mind is, oh, 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:34.160 that's similar to the illustrations of Terry Gilliam, like the 0:04:34.160 --> 0:04:37.240 ones that appear in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:41.160 But actually I think I've got the continuity backwards there, 0:04:41.160 --> 0:04:43.600 don't I. So I guess probably Gilliam was trying to 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:47.279 imitate some of the medieval illustration style, like we would 0:04:47.279 --> 0:04:49.240 see here like this looks kind of like the the 0:04:49.279 --> 0:04:52.279 beast in the cave in the Holy Grail, but the 0:04:52.320 --> 0:04:55.200 beast in the Cave is probably somewhat imitating this sort 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.719 of drawing. Yeah, this devil has a wild and comedic appearance, 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.680 at least to modern He's he's pretty, he's pretty narn 0:05:01.720 --> 0:05:03.080 It looks like he could be on the bottom of 0:05:03.160 --> 0:05:06.000 us of a skateboard or writing a rat fink car 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:11.200 around you know. Um, there are other great examples I 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:14.960 think of of modern facsimiles. For instance, the poetry of 0:05:14.960 --> 0:05:18.560 of William Blake. Uh. These were originally printed from copper plates. 0:05:18.640 --> 0:05:22.440 They were hand colored. And certainly you can read the text. 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:24.080 You can read. You can just you know, look up 0:05:24.080 --> 0:05:26.960 the text of a poem by William Blake on the Internet, 0:05:27.600 --> 0:05:30.520 read it in a simple text format and and it 0:05:30.560 --> 0:05:33.360 will be great. I mean, the poetry, uh, you know, 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:39.279 does not lose anything via its transformation into modern text. Likewise, 0:05:39.320 --> 0:05:41.480 you can just pull up the illustrations and look at those. 0:05:41.640 --> 0:05:44.320 But the originals were unique and they provided a distinct 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:48.360 reading experience, So one can understand why the facsimile experience 0:05:48.600 --> 0:05:52.000 is still desired. And yes, you can still get facsimiles 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:55.440 of William Blake's original publications, And of course the same 0:05:55.520 --> 0:05:58.960 is true of various historic illuminated manuscripts, where the book 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:01.200 itself is a work of our art. The same can 0:06:01.200 --> 0:06:05.200 be said of various historic government documents. And uh, you know, 0:06:05.200 --> 0:06:06.760 if you get into the realm of fiction, I guess 0:06:06.800 --> 0:06:09.920 you could also say that you would desire a facsimile 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:14.000 of certain books that do great harm, like the Necronomicon, 0:06:14.360 --> 0:06:16.919 the Book of the Nine Gates, the Kingdom of Shadows, 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:19.880 of the Book of Sand, something like that. Or maybe 0:06:19.920 --> 0:06:24.400 you wouldn't. Maybe the strange things that make them dangerous 0:06:24.640 --> 0:06:26.760 are only going to be found in that singular text, 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:29.960 and maybe each in their own way. These are commentaries 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:33.960 on the the desirability of a singular text, of having 0:06:34.440 --> 0:06:36.800 that book in your hand that has some sort of 0:06:38.160 --> 0:06:40.800 history that reaches back through time in a way that 0:06:40.880 --> 0:06:45.719 it hasn't been translated, it hasn't been transformed by a scribe. Yes, 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:48.880 and of course the idea of making exact copies of 0:06:48.880 --> 0:06:51.680 a page as it as it looks in its original 0:06:51.720 --> 0:06:55.640 form would become much easier later on with digital effects. 0:06:55.640 --> 0:06:59.480 Simile in duplication techniques and and even to some extent 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:02.240 with like zuographic techniques, which we'll talk about later in 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:05.880 this episode, that those would probably often not be producing 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:08.760 perfectly faithful or full color copies, they would at least 0:07:08.839 --> 0:07:11.800 give you, uh the gist of the appearance of an 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:15.400 original page rather than just say the the code of 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:19.520 the text appearing on that page. Speaking of codes, I 0:07:19.560 --> 0:07:22.200 thought it might be good, especially before we sort of 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:25.320 leave the ancient world behind us and and continue to 0:07:25.320 --> 0:07:29.800 talk about more recent inventions in the world of document 0:07:30.200 --> 0:07:33.160 reproduction and duplication. Uh yeah, I thought we might talk 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.560 about some of the the origins of document security. So 0:07:36.680 --> 0:07:38.760 in our last episode we did mention the use of 0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:42.800 sealed envelopes on tablet tablets and Mesopotamia. This, of course, 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:44.640 is one way to secure a document and make it 0:07:44.720 --> 0:07:47.200 so that no one can read it without making it 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:50.800 blatantly obvious that somebody did so. But another way is 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:54.239 of course, to keep the information itself, which is sometimes 0:07:54.240 --> 0:07:57.680 referred to as the plain text, secret by encoding it. 0:07:58.240 --> 0:08:01.120 In this we turned to the realm of encryption, and 0:08:01.240 --> 0:08:04.600 encryption dates back to ancient Egypt, at least as far 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:08.320 back as nineteen hundred b c. E h. This, according 0:08:08.360 --> 0:08:13.720 to anthropologist Brian Fagan, working with writing historian Andrew Robinson, 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:17.040 has written some uh some some wonderful books about the 0:08:17.080 --> 0:08:20.000 history of writing UM. This has pointed out in the 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:25.080 seventy Grade Inventions of the Ancient World UM. But military 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.800 cipher's date back to around the fifth century BC in Greece, 0:08:28.880 --> 0:08:31.800 where they were used by the Spartans, and the substitution 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:35.440 cipher was used by the Romans during the first century CE. 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.679 So the examples that Fagan and Robinson bring up UM 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:42.160 in in this brief chapter in the seventy Grade Inventions 0:08:42.760 --> 0:08:46.520 are really quite interesting. So first of all, the Egyptian example, 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:49.760 this wasn't actually used to send messages, but rather as 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:53.440 a way of encoding multiple readings into a single um 0:08:54.040 --> 0:08:58.080 stela of hieroglyphics, which meant that it was all about 0:08:58.120 --> 0:09:00.640 just challenging the reader. You can think of it as 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:05.520 just sort of encryption, uh, merely for I wouldn't say 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:12.520 entertainment purposes, but without any true practical purpose. Well, I 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:15.080 wouldn't discount the entertainment function. I mean, one of the 0:09:15.080 --> 0:09:18.280 most entertaining things is to have the sensation that you 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:21.600 have discovered a secret, meaning there there are there are 0:09:21.679 --> 0:09:25.760 whole genres of literature based around this. Now, the Spartan 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:29.320 example is really neat because the Spartan Uh, the Spartans 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:33.800 made use of a special staff kyled a scattally and uh. 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:36.559 And yes, Dune fans out there, this is the name 0:09:36.600 --> 0:09:41.079 of the of the face dancer character of the Talilaxa 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:44.160 that shows up in Doom Messiah, which is rather fitted. 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:47.360 But this would be the way the system works is 0:09:47.360 --> 0:09:51.040 you would have this special staff, the scattally, and then 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:53.880 you would have a leather strip that would be wrapped 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:58.080 around this, you know, specific wooden staff in a spiral 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:02.720 fashion without overlap. Um. I hope everybody can picture that 0:10:02.720 --> 0:10:04.800 in your head. Otherwise you can just look up an 0:10:04.840 --> 0:10:07.400 image of this. It's s c y T A l E. 0:10:08.000 --> 0:10:10.000 Then what you would do is you would write your 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:14.640 message horizontally down the staff. UM. So you know, here's 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:16.560 the staff. If you had if you had the staff 0:10:16.760 --> 0:10:19.120 with this wrapping around it, and you laid it out 0:10:19.160 --> 0:10:20.960 on the table in front of you while there would 0:10:20.960 --> 0:10:22.960 be your message across it, and then you could you know, 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:26.040 sort of roll it almost like a like like the 0:10:26.120 --> 0:10:29.320 roller of a typewriter to see other lines of text. Okay, 0:10:29.320 --> 0:10:32.840 Once that message is in place, you unwind the strap, 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:35.520 which now is just going to be nonsense if you 0:10:35.559 --> 0:10:37.240 try to read it. If you try and read it, 0:10:37.320 --> 0:10:39.040 you know, as a as a ribbon of of text, 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:41.520 it's just gonna be nonsense. And you can't just wrap 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:44.800 it around any staff, uh and uh and reproduce it. 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:46.240 First of all, you have to know you know how 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:48.880 it's to be wrapped, and then you need a staff 0:10:48.920 --> 0:10:52.720 with the exact same diameter. And so this is what 0:10:52.880 --> 0:10:56.959 is called a transposition cipher. Okay, so this is basically 0:10:56.960 --> 0:11:00.160 a nu miracle cipher for unlocking the code. But the 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:04.120 cipher is based in the circumference of the staff in 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:07.800 your hand. Yeah, exactly, Yeah, tied up with this this 0:11:08.000 --> 0:11:12.680 physical key to unlock the code. Though, to be clear, 0:11:12.720 --> 0:11:16.280 transposition ciphers don't necessarily need a stick or you know, 0:11:16.360 --> 0:11:19.040 but this is this is the earliest example we have 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:22.280 of this sort of thing. The Romans, however, again, they 0:11:22.280 --> 0:11:25.960 made use of a substitution cipher, in which your symbols 0:11:26.000 --> 0:11:30.400 are replaced by new symbols, usually via a certain algorithm, 0:11:30.480 --> 0:11:32.880 and it can be a very simple algorithm. The basic 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:35.839 version of this as used by the Romans would be 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:38.600 to list out all the Latin letters and then sub 0:11:38.679 --> 0:11:42.240 each one out for a letter three down from its 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:45.400 current position. Uh. And this was exactly the system that 0:11:45.480 --> 0:11:48.400 Julius Caesar used. Now this makes me think about how 0:11:48.559 --> 0:11:54.000 security issues with the contents of sensitive documents have really 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:58.440 changed since the ancient world, when documents themselves were scarce. 0:11:58.520 --> 0:12:00.600 I mean, there you could say, Okay, I will imagine 0:12:00.640 --> 0:12:03.840 there's a sensitive document. Maybe you don't want certain people 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:07.160 seeing it, you don't want people making unauthorized copies of it, 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:10.240 you don't want people making changes to it. For whatever reason. 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:14.000 You need to keep that documents secure. It's a lot 0:12:14.040 --> 0:12:17.240 easier when there's just one fixed physical form of that 0:12:17.280 --> 0:12:20.360 document to start with. Uh. We live in a totally 0:12:20.440 --> 0:12:23.439 different world now, right. We live in a world of limitless, 0:12:23.520 --> 0:12:27.400 lossless copying in which most documents are digital, and that 0:12:27.520 --> 0:12:31.760 unleash is completely different concerns about security, because you can't 0:12:31.800 --> 0:12:34.360 look at where the one original physical copy of the 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:38.480 document is. If the original is digital, you can assume 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:41.520 that there is pretty easy copying of it or of 0:12:41.600 --> 0:12:44.800 the information in it, and it can be really difficult, 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:48.120 especially given all of the other technology we have to 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:50.160 put limits on that, Like, people can try to do 0:12:50.240 --> 0:12:55.680 things like password protect access to documents, encryption for for 0:12:55.760 --> 0:12:59.240 the retrieval of sensitive documents and stuff like that. But uh, 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:01.960 you know, everybody's got a camera in their phone and 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:03.720 stuff like that. So even if like you're in a 0:13:03.760 --> 0:13:07.040 secure location looking at a document that's for your eyes only, 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:08.800 if you've got your camera, you can take a picture 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:10.760 of the screen. I mean, we just live in a 0:13:10.800 --> 0:13:14.439 completely different environment when it comes to the sensitivity of 0:13:14.880 --> 0:13:18.000 document contents. It's a lot harder to keep a lid 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:22.120 on things today. But assuming you trust the person who's 0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:25.320 actually looking at the document not to take pictures of 0:13:25.360 --> 0:13:28.160 it and share them with whoever. H there are tools 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:30.800 available today that I guess we're not available at this time, 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:33.439 such as the stuff we're just mentioning, you know, uh, 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:37.920 password protection, encryption and digital gating of access to documents 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:41.560 and things like that. So, in a weird way, like 0:13:41.679 --> 0:13:45.040 access has become easier than ever to control, but also 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:50.120 harder to control in the in the strictest possible sense. 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:53.360 So the examples that bring up here, you know, largely 0:13:53.400 --> 0:13:58.000 just sort of provides basic bedrock of of encryption. You know, Obviously, 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:00.280 the ages in which these were you it was a 0:14:00.280 --> 0:14:03.840 different it was a different time. Um and uh and 0:14:04.160 --> 0:14:08.679 if memory serves um. Fagan and Robinson also pointed out that, 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:11.200 you know, you just don't see as many examples of 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:13.440 encryption in the ancient world as as you might expect 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:17.079 to find because it's as we as we related, documents 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:21.080 were important. These these empires and um and and kingdoms. 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:24.840 They they they were run on documentation. Uh and so 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:27.040 you would think you would see more examples of encryption. 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:29.320 But uh, maybe part of that is just a lot 0:14:29.400 --> 0:14:32.360 of times you're dealing with singular documents and uh and 0:14:32.520 --> 0:14:35.000 you know, something far removed from what we have in 0:14:35.000 --> 0:14:38.440 the modern world. Yeah. So there's a physical scarcity, there's 0:14:38.440 --> 0:14:40.960 only a single original document to begin with. But I 0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:44.320 guess also there is lower lower levels of literacy means 0:14:44.400 --> 0:14:48.280 that means there is less opportunity for someone to read 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:51.680 this sensitive document. There's more I want to come back to, 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:54.320 actually later in this episode about how the world has 0:14:54.440 --> 0:14:58.680 changed when we transition from documents scarcity to not only 0:14:58.720 --> 0:15:01.960 document abundance but probab document overload. But but I guess 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:04.800 before we get there, we should talk more about the 0:15:04.920 --> 0:15:15.600 history of these document duplication and facsimile technologies than so 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:18.080 picking up after the example of things like the copy 0:15:18.120 --> 0:15:20.200 press that we talked about in the last episode, what 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:25.120 took over before we got to things like computers in 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:28.720 the modern photocopier. Well, I think it is time to 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:33.720 talk about carbon paper. Yes, so carbon paper was. In fact, 0:15:33.960 --> 0:15:36.640 I've used carbon paper, you know. This is not something 0:15:36.680 --> 0:15:40.600 that completely vanished but before we were born in I 0:15:40.600 --> 0:15:42.640 remember I've had some jobs where actually had to do 0:15:42.720 --> 0:15:47.120 stuff on carbon paper. This was in the twenty one century. Yeah, 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:49.640 not at how stuff works, right, I don't remember most 0:15:49.680 --> 0:15:53.680 ever having to write articles on carbon paper. But so, okay, 0:15:53.720 --> 0:15:57.280 carbon paper was invented long before it became a dominant 0:15:57.280 --> 0:16:02.080 player in the document duplication world throughout office settings and stuff. 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:05.680 And there are many variations, but basically all carbon paper 0:16:05.720 --> 0:16:09.440 works something like this. You have the carbon paper itself, 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:12.760 which is a thin piece of paper covered on one 0:16:12.840 --> 0:16:16.280 side with some kind of ink or pigment, often bound 0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:18.960 to the paper with wax. And then to use the 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:22.320 carbon paper, you would create a stack of at least 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:25.680 three sheets of paper lined up on top of one another, 0:16:25.720 --> 0:16:28.680 so you'd have the original paper copy on top and 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:31.440 then you'd have the carbon paper in the middle underneath that, 0:16:31.840 --> 0:16:34.360 and then you'd have the paper you intended for the 0:16:34.400 --> 0:16:37.520 second copy on the bottom. So you write or type 0:16:37.560 --> 0:16:39.760 your message on the top sheet, and as you do, 0:16:40.280 --> 0:16:44.280 the pressure from your pencil or pin bearing down, or 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:47.280 the pressure from the type bars of a typewriter striking 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:51.120 the page will cause the dried ink or pigment on 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:54.120 the back of the carbon paper sheet to leave a 0:16:54.200 --> 0:16:57.840 mark on the copy page underneath. So the work of 0:16:58.040 --> 0:17:01.800 making one copy creates a second copy automatically. The pressure 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:05.800 pushes the pigment through and it imprints on that second page. 0:17:06.400 --> 0:17:09.119 Credit for the invention of carbon paper is often given 0:17:09.160 --> 0:17:12.520 to an English inventor named Ralph Wedgewood because of an 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:16.280 eighteen o six patent he received for an invention called 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:20.920 the manifold style a graphic writer h So this is 0:17:20.960 --> 0:17:24.119 an invention that, like the polygraph, drew the interest of 0:17:24.119 --> 0:17:27.560 Thomas Jefferson, and in a letter to Charles Wilson Peel 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:30.560 in eighteen o nine, remember Charles Wilson Peel was the 0:17:30.600 --> 0:17:34.840 guy who perfected the design of the polygraph, Jefferson complained 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:37.639 that the carbon paper only really worked if you wrote 0:17:37.640 --> 0:17:40.720 with a hard pointed stylus on a hard surface, which 0:17:40.920 --> 0:17:43.639 I guess he didn't like to do, and also complained 0:17:43.680 --> 0:17:46.840 that quote the smell of the paper is so fetted 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:49.320 that one could not stay in a room where there 0:17:49.359 --> 0:17:51.760 was much of it. This is something we'll come back 0:17:51.760 --> 0:17:55.920 to numerous times here. But uh, we were so far 0:17:55.960 --> 0:17:58.640 removed from this for the most part in today's world, 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:01.199 Like we don't think about the uh, the fact that 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:03.600 you might need to open a window or have proper 0:18:03.680 --> 0:18:05.840 ventilation in a room if you're going to be engaging 0:18:06.359 --> 0:18:09.920 in the work of the scribe and or any kind 0:18:09.960 --> 0:18:13.800 of document duplication. But this seems to be the case. 0:18:13.880 --> 0:18:17.080 You see this reference to, you know multiple times. Yeah, well, 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:19.439 I mean so a lot of these methods would produce fumes. 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:22.119 Though it's funny he's complaining about the smell here. Some 0:18:22.200 --> 0:18:23.919 of the technologies we're going to talk about in a bit, 0:18:23.920 --> 0:18:25.680 I guess they would have been using different kinds of 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:29.720 dyes or inks or something produce smells that that many have. 0:18:30.000 --> 0:18:33.200 Many people today is still alive today have great nostalgia 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:36.280 for if you found the part of the internet where 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:40.240 everybody's just like, oh, I miss the smell of the mimiograph. Um. 0:18:40.440 --> 0:18:42.399 I did not find that part of the Internet, but 0:18:42.440 --> 0:18:45.399 I did find some wonderful videos with people demonstrating some 0:18:45.440 --> 0:18:48.560 of these uh uh these techniques, which I found very 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:51.040 helpful because some of the techniques we end up talking 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:53.080 about there there may be a little difficult to picture 0:18:53.080 --> 0:18:56.119 in your mind. Uh, but if you see someone doing it, 0:18:56.200 --> 0:18:58.119 you're like, oh, okay, yeah, yeah, I can I can 0:18:58.160 --> 0:19:00.320 see what's what what they're doing there. I see the acess. 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:04.280 I see how this is producing a duplication of text. Yeah, 0:19:04.400 --> 0:19:05.840 we'll try to be as clear as we can to 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:08.159 help you picture it. But yeah, looking up videos is 0:19:08.160 --> 0:19:12.119 always helpful. Um. So, carbon paper was not like a 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:16.080 photo copier. Again, you could not mechanically produce copies of 0:19:16.119 --> 0:19:19.960 a pre existing document. Instead, it was more like the 0:19:19.960 --> 0:19:22.679 polygraph machine. It was an invention that would allow you 0:19:22.760 --> 0:19:26.359 to produce extra copies of a document at the point 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:30.400 of the documents composition or at the point of the copying. 0:19:30.600 --> 0:19:33.520 You know, it takes writing or typing in order to 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:36.879 make the copies that will give you extra copies. But 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:39.880 assuming you're either composing in the first place or you're 0:19:39.920 --> 0:19:42.119 able to type or rite out a copy by hand, 0:19:42.840 --> 0:19:45.760 you actually didn't have to stop at that single carbon 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:49.080 paper sandwich and it's single extra copy. You can actually 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:52.320 create a stack of carbon paper sandwiches, so you'd have 0:19:52.359 --> 0:19:55.240 original on top, then carbon paper than the paper for 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:57.960 the first copy, then carbon paper than paper for the 0:19:58.000 --> 0:20:02.080 second copy, and so forth. But as you might imagine, 0:20:02.119 --> 0:20:06.080 the quality of the copies deteriorates pretty rapidly the further 0:20:06.200 --> 0:20:09.320 down the stack you go, So there was a technical 0:20:09.400 --> 0:20:12.439 limit to how many copies you could duplicate from a 0:20:12.480 --> 0:20:16.040 single original if you cared about them being legible. I 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:19.120 think anyone who has used a physical checkbook can probably 0:20:19.440 --> 0:20:22.760 understand what we're getting at here, because the physical check 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:26.400 book will often have those carbon pages. That that mean 0:20:26.440 --> 0:20:28.119 that when you write out that check, you have an 0:20:28.160 --> 0:20:31.760 automatic copy of it underneath on the carbon sheet. However 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:34.560 you can it's not going to be as clear as 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:37.800 your original check it's going to be, you know, very legible. 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:40.639 You can imagine if you had multiple layers, uh, you 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:43.560 know that there are going to be huge limitations about 0:20:43.600 --> 0:20:46.119 how deep you can go. Apparently, the use of carbon 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:50.320 paper became even more pronounced starting in the late nineteenth century. 0:20:50.359 --> 0:20:53.399 Around the eighteen seventies, or eighteen eighties with the spread 0:20:53.400 --> 0:20:56.000 of typewriters. Since you know the hard punch of a 0:20:56.040 --> 0:20:59.240 typewriter key, when that bar hits the page, that's pretty 0:20:59.240 --> 0:21:02.679 good at driving the carbon imprint through several layers. But 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:04.760 carbon paper is not going to solve all of the 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:08.640 world's duplication need problems. Because so in the last episode, 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:11.119 you know, we talked about the difficulties created when you 0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:14.400 need a medium number of copies of something and it's 0:21:14.440 --> 0:21:18.640 something of medium importance. So if you just need two 0:21:18.720 --> 0:21:21.280 or three copies, you could use the existing methods, you 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:24.280 could use carbon paper, or you could use the copy press. 0:21:24.960 --> 0:21:28.320 If you needed thousands of copies of something and you 0:21:28.400 --> 0:21:30.840 had the budget and the time and the access, you 0:21:30.880 --> 0:21:32.879 could hire out a printing press and they do all 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:35.159 the you know, the setting the movable type, and they 0:21:35.240 --> 0:21:37.960 print out a run for you. But if you're in 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:41.560 the medium zone, so you just need fifty copies of something, 0:21:42.320 --> 0:21:47.080 especially if it is some piece of ephemeral office memoranda, 0:21:47.200 --> 0:21:50.560 some kind of small business document, or if it's a 0:21:50.600 --> 0:21:54.359 grade school worksheet or church bulletin or anything in that 0:21:54.480 --> 0:21:57.120 kind of category, it would not make sense to hire 0:21:57.119 --> 0:21:59.520 out a printing press. You know, you don't have the time, 0:21:59.600 --> 0:22:01.960 the lay burn, the money involved would just not really 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:05.400 be justified for that kind of printing. And yet it's 0:22:05.480 --> 0:22:07.720 definitely more than you could easily make with a stack 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:10.639 of carbon paper sandwiches under a pencil or a typewriter. 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:15.720 And so this kind of mid level document duplication, for 0:22:15.720 --> 0:22:20.000 for for schools, for small businesses, for whatever was constantly 0:22:20.000 --> 0:22:23.000 in demand all throughout society. But there was nothing exactly 0:22:23.160 --> 0:22:26.919 to satisfy this kind of need until we get to 0:22:27.040 --> 0:22:30.399