THE SIMPSONS: THE PRINTERS OF SOUTH SHIELDS

by DONALD SIMPSON and ALAN D. CRAXFORD

Robert Simpson

Robert Simpson was born in South Shields as far as we can tell in 1832. So far no information has been discovered about his parents and nothing survives of his early family life. He married a local girl, Hannah Elliott – who was also born around 1832 – in the Summer of 1859 (1).

The census return of 1861 (2) shows that the young Simpson family had moved to the All Saints district of Newcastle upon Tyne. The 28 year old Robert was working as a printer and compositor (probably) for the company that printed and published the “Newcastle Weekly Chronicle”. (3) Hannah was busy as the homemaker and looking after her infant son, Robert Anthony, at their house at Back Ingham Lane.

South Shields, 1895

Over the course of the next ten years Robert Simpson prospered. He and Hannah had a second son, Joseph Austin Simpson, also born in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1866 and by the time of the next census he had moved the family back to South Shields. (4) Their address was given as 80 King Street in the centre of the town and was also listed as the “Printing Office of North & South Shields Gazette”.

Both sons followed their father into the printing trade. In 1881 they were still living in the family home at Baring Street, just around the corner from Ocean Road (marked ‘A’ on the map) (5). Robert was now a foreman printer; Robert Anthony a Letterpress printer and Joseph a compositor printer.

A REVOLUTION IN PRINTING

The Linotype Machine

"Ottmar, you've done it again! A line o' type!" Whitelaw Reid, publisher of the New York Tribune, exclaimed on July 3, 1886, when Ottmar Mergenthaler demonstrated his new Linotype machine. The Linotype quickly brought about a revolution in the printing industry.

More than 400 years after Johann Gutenberg invented moveable type, a process that allowed printers to set type by hand a letter at a time, the Linotype allowed printers to set a complete line of type, using the Linotype's 90-character keyboard. Because the Gutenberg process was so slow, most large newspapers consisted of no more than eight pages. But with the advent of the Linotype, that was to change quickly, and within 20 years Linotypes were in use in every state.

Mergenthaler's invention measured 7 feet tall, 6 feet wide and 6 feet deep. It allowed newspapers to compose pages four to five times faster and caused thousands of hand compositors to lose their jobs. A skilled Linotype operator could cast four to seven lines of type a minute. The Linotype operator's key strokes told the machine which letter molds to retrieve from the magazines and the machine assembled a row of metal molds, or matrices, that contained imprints of those characters. Then, the machine poured molten lead into the matrices and the result was a complete line of newspaper type, but in reverse, so that it would read properly when it transferred ink to the page. The machine automatically restored the matrices to the magazines after the lead was poured.

The Tyneside Review: December 1887

In 1882, Mergenthaler began designing the early versions of the Linotype. Mergenthaler reportedly got the idea for the brass matrices that would serve as molds for the letters from wooden molds used to make "Springerle," which are German Christmas cookies. As a boy he had carved a Springerle mold for his stepmother. Even though the Blower Linotype functioned effectively, Mergenthaler continued to refine the design. In 1892, he developed the Simplex Linotype Model 1, which became the prototype for more than 100,000 Linotype machines.” (6)

LINOTYPE IN SHIELDS

During this time Robert Simpson acquired a linotype printing press which was one of the first to be commissioned in the North East of England and with it started the publication of his own periodicals from the company’s registered offices at 4 Dean Street, South Shields (C on the map).

The Editorial from December 1887

The first of these was the monthly “The Tyneside Review” which initially appeared on October 1st 1887 with a cover price of sixpence. It carried a weighty diet of articles ranging from (in Volume 1 Number 3) “Hamlet: A Character Study” and “Philosophy and Philosophers: Plato” to “A Geological Ramble Through Tyneside”. There were also a selection of poems and a chess puzzle. There was no news or current affairs as such although one article “A Moot Point: Free Education” contained some eerily familiar arguments that would haunt present day politicians.

See APPENDIX below

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Simpson's advertising

During the same decade Robert set up the local newspaper “The Free Press and Advertiser” Its inaugural issue was In December 1895 and it was published regularly until 1904. The paper is celebrated in a limited edition volume “The Linotype”. The page is a reproduction of the front page of the newspaper. Superimposed on this are the portrait photographs of the three printers (father and two sons) and their signatures.

Copies of the newspaper can still be found in the Public Library in South Shields and in the archives of the British Library, Colindale. Competition and the introduction of new technologies contrived to make the Free Press uneconomic and later that year it was absorbed into the Shields Gazette.

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A TRAGEDY AT THE END

The Free Press and Advertiser: Page from The Lithographer. 1901

Robert Anthony married Mary Ann Liddell in Newcastle upon Tyne in March 1886. He moved to 4 Ravensbourne Terrace, South Shields and between 1887 and 1901 had five children (one of whom – Thomas Liddell Simpson – became a hero of the first World War and earned a Military Cross). About 1895 Joseph married Dorothy Anderson and moved to Salmon Street, South Shields (B on the map) where they had four children by the time of the 1901 census. Although the publishing business has been subsumed they continued to operate the printing concern.

The Family grave

As the new century flowered Joseph became distracted from the business. He spent more time with a M. Luliette (a frenchman) after whom he named one of his sons. One day at home he met with an accident and fell several feet from a ladder. He subsequently succumbed to his injuries. The business passed to the control of Robert Anthony Simpson - the heirs of Joseph looked to the sea and the merchant marine for their careers.

Members of the family are commemorated by the inscriptions carved on an obelisk at the Westoe Cemetery in South Shields. Although it is now closed to further burials the grave site can be accessed from Erskine Road. There is still, we believe, a Simpson printing firm in South Shields to this day

APPENDIX: A MOOT POINT- FREE EDUCATION

“Up to that period (Prior to 1869) educational facilities here were inferior to those of continental nations. Dr Lyon Playfair said in a speech in Newcastle upon Tyne: ‘While other nations in Europe have spread primary and secondary education in well-organised systems throughout their lands, England has not even laid the foundation stone of a national system till the present year and so we have the disgrace of being the worst educated people as a whole of any country which professes a high civilisation’.

According to statistics the sum of £4,755,299 was paid out of local rates throughout the United Kingdom towards the cost of education in 1881; and no doubt since that time this amount has increased. A considerable part of this is paid for by small property owners who comprise thrifty working men, tradesmen and the middle classes generally. The question is how are we to obviate this evil? It is evident however from the facts that Free Education is not to be dealt with in the simple manner suggested by Mr Chamberlain viz; the payment of school pence by the addition of three farthings in the pound Tax. This would be taxing one part of the community for the good of the another; and would be increasing an admittedly iniquitous tax, created to meet special war expenditure, and still considered by many only a temporary source of revenue.

Mr Chamberlain’s idea of a Graduated Income Tax seems a more equitable method of exacting this revenue and by its adoption the £15,900,000 now derived from this source might be increased to an extent sufficient to meet the increased cost of primary education.”

REFERENCES:

1. England and Wales Civil Registration Index (1837-1984): South Shields 10a 622
2. 1861 England Census: All Saints Newcastle RG9/3828 14f 54 1
3. Walter Scott, Printers, Newcastle upon Tyne. Publishers for the Proprietor of the “Newcastle Weekly Chronicle” 1887
4. 1871 England Census: South Shields RG10/5037 19 31
5. 1881 England Census: South Shields RG11/5011 65 15
6. University of Richmond: Department of Journalism: http://oncampus.richmond.edu/academics/journalism/lino.html
7. South Shields Public Library: http://text.southtyneside.info/learningandleisure/libraries/cultureheritage/newspaper.asp.text

Added 10 May 2005
Updated July 24th 2007

AUTHORS' NOTE

Donald Simpson is Judith Craxford's Uncle (Alan's wife). You can find other members of the Simpson line by exploring the Extended Craxford Tree