Last week, I found myself recording a newspaper press and typewriter as I was allowed once again to visit the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s printing facility in Cleveland, Ohio. My primary reason for the visit was to capture the sound of a Remington model 6 standard desktop typewriter made in 1896 (serial number 22,587) with contact microphones.
Much like a Sholes and Glidden – the kind allegedly used by Mark Twain to write Life on the Mississippi – it too is an under-strike machine, or ‘blind’ typewriter. This means that to see what you have typed, you have to lift the platen as the type bars come at it, or strike it, from below.
Compared to the front-strike machines that came later, the Remington 6 delivers a slow typing experience. Despite its shortcomings, it was quite fun to type on the machine. I was able to fly on it just as fast as with my old Remington Portable Number 3 machine. Expect to hear this machine in part two of my Typewriters sound effects library.
Recording the sound of an antique Remington 2 standard bottom-strike typewriter with a pair of contact microphones. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon 
Recording the sound of an antique Remington 2 standard bottom-strike typewriter with a pair of contact microphones. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Watch the short YouTube video below to see how the Remington 6’s platen lifts out of the way to expose what a typist prints on the page. Video courtesy Aaron Phipps.
My second reason for visiting the paper was to say hello once again to Aaron Phipps, Advance Local’s director of production. Aaron’s knowledge of the history of paper making runs as thick as an unabridged dictionary. Last time, we chatted about his vast understanding of newspaper printing techniques throughout history. This time, we examined old books. Fun stuff, really.
My third and final reason for coming to the massive concrete Plain Dealer printing facility building was to record, once again, the sound of their Goss Colorliner web offset presses. This time, I was armed with only a Zoom F3 recorder and a pair of Barcus Berry contact microphones.
In my opinion, as I’m not a press operator, the loudest and most sonically interesting part of the press emanates from its knife box. This is part of the folder unit at the end stage of the run, where the web is folded and then cut into individual newspapers. Using Blu Tack, I secured two contact mics onto what I hoped would be the most sonically interesting part of the box. It would have been nice to place a mic on each side of the unit, but I didn’t bring enough cable for that. Plus, long cables present tripping hazards in facilities like these. And, I’d wind up with a cable full of ink, as you can’t escape it inside the building.
The result of the recording is what you hear in the YouTube video below. This is a time-compressed recording of a relatively short 15-minute press run of the October 16, 2025, edition of the Flint (Michigan) Journal. It is one of many titles printed at the Cleveland facility. To reach its subscribers, 3,228 copies were trucked 220 miles.
The recording is strikingly different than what you hear with your naked ears. It’s not nearly as full or as loud. Much of that likely has to do with the thickness of the steel surrounding the knife box. Refer to the photograph below, which graphically reveals how thick the steel is on a typical modern newspaper press. Secondly, these presses are securely anchored into the ground. As much as I’d like them to, they’re not supposed to shake and rattle. Instead, they just roar. That is until sadly, one day, they are sold for scrap. A fate which will no doubt the Plain Dealer’s presses will succumb to as well.
Further Reading
- Read my blog post here to visit my Typewriters sound effect libraries, part one, with a link to purchase it via A Sound Effect.
- Read my blog post here to read and purchase my Printing Presses sound effects library, recorded before I used contact microphones.
- Find out more about the Remington 2 at typewriter collector Martin Howard’s site here. It’s quite similar to the model 6 above.
- See what Mark Twain cranked out on his Sholes and Glidden here at Type-Writer.org.
- Would you like your computer-written letters to look like they’re from a Sholes and Glidden machine? Of course you would. Take a look at this .ttf downloadable font on The Classic Typewriter page.