Editorʼs Notebook

I have great respect for the newspaper crews who produced newspapers with handset type. As a journalism student at Kansas State University, my introductory course was one that dealt with the history of printing and the various methods used.The instructor was an old man in poor health. He knew his material but when the class met I prayed he wouldn’t keel over dead in our presence.

Professor Byron Ellis required each of his students learn how to handset type. In the lab portion of the class, we composed things like business cards and advertisements and printed our work.

At the time I thought it...