The 1924 Cossar brought the news from the far corners of the world to the eyes of the people from Greymouth to Kaitaia. Photo/Steve Carle
The 1924 Cossar brought the news from the far corners of the world to the eyes of the people from Greymouth to Kaitaia. Photo/Steve Carle
An urgent appeal is going out to save two Cossar newspaper printing presses - two of only four left in the world - from becoming scrap metal.
The two reel-fed, flatbed letterpress presses have some history to boast with one unit manufactured in 1924 having printed the last Labour Party owned newspaper, the Grey River Argus, in Greymouth.
The other unit printed the Kapi Mana Argus and Thames Star. The Bush Telegraph in Pahiatua was the last publication printed on the press.
Despite having been built in Yorkshire, England, to the design of a Scotsman, the Cossar had a special place in the hearts of New Zealand newspaper publishers, one of whom bought the first press in 1903.
A radical new model introduced in 1915 was also popular and two of the last four known to exist in the world are still in working order in the country's North Island at Pahiatua.
Other New Zealand users included Franklin Press (Pukekohe), Hawera Star, Bay of Plenty Times (Tauranga), Wairoa Star, Martinborough Star, Wairarapa Times-Age (Masterton), Viscount Press (Palmerston North), Hutt News (Lower Hutt), Sentinel Newspapers (Wellington), Marlborough Express (Blenheim), Evening Star (Greymouth), Timaru Herald and the Oamaru Mail.
In Pahiatua, in the south of New Zealand's North Island, Steve Carle, former proprietor of the Bush Telegraph, still turns over the presses - used until the late 1980s - for visitors.
One installed around 1923 at the Grey River Argus was later moved to Viscount Press in Palmerston North, where it printed a variety of newspapers including the Telegraph under contract.
When Viscount switched to offset, Carle says he decided it was time for the family-owned newspaper to print its own title again... and acquired the press.
A rewind unit and a second Cossar - a lightly-used late 1960s model, possibly the second-last made - came from the Kapi-Mana Argus and were added to the first, along with a heavy-duty P-type folder.
The Telegraph team linked the two presses using a duplex chain - timed half a revolution apart to moderate the load on the drive - printing larger papers or spot colour, the latter with a turner bar and modifications to the gantry. In tandem, the presses would print a 32-page tabloid.
Steve Carle brandishes a spanner and oil can, used to maintain the Cossar press.
Extra pages were pre-preprinted with the webs rewound and inset using a novel device which registered a triangular punch hole using air pressure and eight pins (four to advance or accelerate the drive and four to retard it).
Another Printing Museum committee member, Terry Foster recalls seeing a Cossar in production at the Hawera Star "some time up to the late 1980s - later scrapped except for its motor - while his brother Ken, a retired printer, recalls machines in the Morrinsville/Matamata area, around the same time. "They were a truly magnificent machine to see in operation," he says.
At the 140-year-old Gisborne Herald, managing director Michael Muir recalled two Cossars, used between 1906 and 1943. The second - this time with a 15 hp electric motor - was installed in March 1924, and printed up to 4500 copies an hour. This had 'double-decked' stationary type formes, and a rewinding apparatus enabling it to have three reels of newsprint running through the press simultaneously.
Graeme How at the Wairoa Star recalls helping run the 18-ton Cossar B16 acquired from Auckland and later sold to the Opotiki News: "I was 16 years old when I first started operating the press, and as a small country newspaper, we did everything.
"I had to operate the press, work as a compositor and an Intertype operator, and I'm still here 45 years later operating the latest Adobe prepress systems."
How - also a contributor to the www.metaltype.co.uk website - says the most-hated job on the Cossar was walking round with an oil can trying to find a squeak.
"There must have been at least 200 oil holes and I used to climb all over that press while it was printing," he says.
"What would the OH&S people say today if they saw that?
"Loading the newsprint reels and threading the web through to the folder was a job everyone avoided, so being the youngest, I got the job.
"The formes of metal type containing two tabloid pages were carried to the press by hand from the stone (no trolley) and I was not very popular when I dropped one once, spilling type all over the floor.
"It was quicker to reset those two pages than try to sort out the mess, but needless to say the paper was late that day."
Graeme How recalls stopping the press when his first son was born to go to the hospital, again making the paper late.
Expecting to get fired when he returned and was called into his office, "the manager instead produced a bottle of whisky, poured two glasses and offered me his congratulations".
"I enjoyed operating the press to get a nice clean paper, and working on the process from Intertype to printing the paper was interesting and challenging ... I try to explain it to my grandchildren, but they show no interest."
Anyone interested in making a financial contribution or an offer of help in any way to preserve this piece of New Zealand heritage can contact Steve Carle on 021 153 1917 or email steve.carle@bushtele.co.nz
