University of Virginia Library


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"ARMADILLOS OF INVENTION":A CENSUS OF MECHANICAL COLLATORS
by
Steven Escar Smith [*]

SINCE THE LATE 1940s literary scholars have developed and used optical devices, known popularly as mechanical collators, to aid in the comparison of printed documents from the same edition.[1] The first and most famous of these devices was invented by and named for the Shakespeare scholar Charlton Joseph Kadio Hinman. Its fame and widespread use inspired the invention of other collators over the years, the most successful being the Lindstrand Comparator, the McLeod Portable Collator, and the Hailey's Comet.[2] Charlton Hinman built his machine as an aid in his landmark


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study of the Shakespeare First Folio (Hinman, Printing and First). Though the scholarly climate in which he labored has changed considerably, the Hinman Collator and its successors are still enabling important work. Noteworthy among the more recent projects is David Vander Meulen's use of the Hinman in collating copies and examining running titles to resolve the old question of which of the two 1728 issues of Pope's Dunciad came first ("Printing"). He also machine-collated copies for his facsimile edition of the 1728 Dunciad, and even more recently he used the Hinman, the Lindstrand, and the Comet for a study of press variants in bibliographical classics by Fredson Bowers and R. B. McKerrow ("Revision"). Another ambitious project is currently being carried out by R. Carter Hailey, who has examined around sixty copies of the three 1550 editions of Piers Plowman on the Comet (Metzger [2]). Randall McLeod has conducted extensive studies of the Holinshed Chronicle, the 1591 edition of John Harrington's translation of Orlando Furioso, and other texts on his device ("From Tranceformations"). Conor Fahy has also used McLeod's invention for his study of Orlando Furioso (1989). The energy and resourcefulness behind these projects suggest that the practice of machine-aided optical collation is far from its end. Indeed, as long as literary scholars continue to rely on the close examination and comparison of printed materials, there will always be a place for the Hinman or one of its offshoots, if not their computerized equivalent, though practical electronic alternatives have only recently begun to emerge.[3] Whether for quick checks of points between a few copies or for larger projects, the "armadillos of invention," to quote McLeod, are still effective and in most cases the only viable tools (Zalewski 14). And as Peter Shillingsburg has observed: "The optical machines available to editors before the advent of computers remain necessary and useful in order to compare multiple copies of the same typesetting" (135).

This census seeks to document the history of these machines and is divided into six parts—the location lists of Hinmans, Lindstrands, McLeods, and Comets; a list of "One-off Spin-offs" (experimental devices that, for the most part, never developed beyond the prototype stage); and a cumulative index. I should caution that not all of the surviving machines are available to researchers. Anyone interested in using a particular collator is encouraged to make inquiries well in advance of traveling to one. In regard especially to the Hinman, I should also mention that, as with any other aging population, some of these devices have fared better through the years than others.


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The youngest Hinman Collator is now over twenty years old and the oldest over half a century. As would be expected, the newer models tend to be in better condition than the older ones.

The section on the Hinman is by far the most detailed. I have not consciously followed Falconer Madan's degressive principle of bibliography in constructing this census, though the Hinman is the most important and influential collator. As I have stated elsewhere, it has assumed an almost iconic status within bibliographical circles (Smith 2000). Because of this status and the fact that it is a large and fairly impressive piece of equipment, it has been easier to find people who remember it and to uncover records relating to its acquisition. The Lindstrand Comparator has been more difficult to follow. It is smaller, visually less impressive, and never made the splash that the Hinman did. On the other hand, it did generate a wave or two of its own and therefore attracted a certain amount of attention. And, despite being about four feet shorter in height and several hundred pounds lighter than its more famous forerunner, the comparator is not easily portable and therefore did not change hands or homes that often. The McLeod and the Comet are other matters altogether, however. Their affordability and portability make them moving targets. They also have not attracted anywhere near the publicity of their predecessors. For their locations I have relied almost exclusively on information provided by their respective inventors, Randall McLeod and R. Carter Hailey. I am grateful to them for this assistance. As these machines are still available for sale there will doubtless be additional locations in the future. The sections on the McLeod and the Comet are probably best regarded as general indications of how many machines have been manufactured to date and what kind of geographical distribution they have enjoyed rather than as a road map of current locations or a thorough historical tracing of their wanderings.

I have been unable to find and confirm some dates, prices, and other details. I hope that the publication of this list will flush out some of the more elusive facts. Corrections and additions are welcome.

A. HINMAN COLLATORS

The arrangement of this section is chronological by date of acquisition as near as can be established for each machine. I have been able to date many of them very precisely while others less so. Obviously the more imprecise the date, the more susceptible a particular machine's place in the chronology is to revision if more information comes to light, though I do not believe such information will result in more than the rearrangement of a few machines here and there.

In addition to surviving collators, the chronology also includes machines that have been lost. Anyone who has ever laid eyes on a Hinman, which stands nearly six feet tall and weighs over 400 pounds, knows that one cannot easily misplace such an object [plate 1]. Yet anyone who has ever worked in an organization of any size should also understand that such


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things happen—inventory is moved, records are purged and/or lost, staff changes, and soon no one remembers what happened to that hulking hunk of metal that used to sit in the corner. Over the years, a few Hinmans have also been officially de-accessioned, junked, gotten-rid-of, etc.

Charlton Hinman was involved in the business of making and selling mechanical collators for only a few years. After he built the machine for his use at the Folger, he sub-contracted the manufacturing to Arthur M. Johnson, a retired Navy engineer who had been an unofficial advisor earlier in the project. Sometime in 1955 or 1956, Hinman completely turned over the business to Johnson. Coincidentally, both Hinman and Johnson died in 1977. In the last five years of his life, Johnson built collators in partnership with a former employee, Robert Michel of MICO Engineering, Bladensburg, Maryland. Michel had worked for Johnson since the 1950s. Mr. Michel stayed in business a few years after Johnson's death, selling five machines on his own, the last one to Penn State in 1979. He retired and closed his business in the mid-1980s.

The sources for this section of the census are many and varied. They include letters, invoices, newspaper notices, newsletter announcements, bibliographical and textual studies, previous location lists, and the memories of individuals who used or were around particular machines. Perhaps the most important of these sources were the previous lists of Hinman locations. During the years when the Hinman Collator was being manufactured and widely used, three location lists were published in bibliographical journals, the final one in 1975, four years before the last machine was sold (Johnson, "Hinman Collators in Current Use"; "Hinman Collators: Present Locations"; "Locations of Hinman Collators"). Another list survives in typescript, and in 1979, after building what proved to be the last Hinman, Robert Michel compiled still another as part of an advertising flyer (Johnson, "Hinman Collators," 19 July 1970; Michel, Hinman Collator). Taken together, these documents provide a nearly complete record of the original purchasers. They do not, however, include dates of acquisition, sales prices, and other details, and they also contain a few errors that are corrected here. Some of the machines have also changed locations since the appearance of these lists.

No complete or even reasonably comprehensive archive of records relating to the buying and selling of collators resides in one location. Instead, papers and letters by and relating to Charlton Hinman and Arthur M. Johnson are located in the files of libraries, individuals, and the organizations with whom they dealt. These have also been important sources. Johnson especially was a prolific and chatty letter writer, and usually in the course of his correspondence with one customer he would mention others who had recently bought or ordered machines. Often, I was also able to obtain invoices, purchase orders, and other administrative documents. These were useful for dating machines and establishing details such as sales price. I am extremely grateful to those individuals who have made letters and other materials available to me.

In my search I also examined the published results of every research


Plate 1

Page Plate 1
illustration

PLATE 1. Charlton Hinman at the Hinman Collator. Courtesy of the Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas.


Plate 2

Page Plate 2
illustration

PLATE 2. The Lindstrand Comparator.


Plate 3

Page Plate 3
illustration

PLATE 3. Randall McLeod and the McLeod Portable Collator. Photograph by Pamela Harris.


Plate 4

Page Plate 4
illustration

PLATE 4. R. Carter Hailey and the Hailey's Comet. Photograph by Willis Turner.


Plate 5

Page Plate 5
illustration

PLATE 5. Design for Vinton Dearing's "Poor Man's Mark IV." Courtesy of the Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America.


Plate 6

Page Plate 6
illustration

PLATE 6. Design for Gerald Smith's "Poor Man's Mark VII." Courtesy of the Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America.


Plate 7

Page Plate 7
illustration

PLATE 7. Irving Rothman at the Houston Editing Desk working on octavo sheets with octavo frames. A frame for folio sheets is in the rack. Photograph by Ann Casperson.


Plate 8

Page Plate 8
illustration

PLATE 8. William P. Williams' "Bibliographical Twirlers." One twirler is set up one each side of his computer. Photograph by Professor Antonia Forster, English Department, University of Akron.


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project I had reason to believe made use of the Hinman for leads on additional machines and help in establishing dates on others. These research projects included most of the volumes published under the direction of the Center for Editions of American Authors (CEAA), many of those associated with the Center for Scholarly Editions and its successor the Committee on Scholarly Editions (CSE), and shorter projects published in bibliographical journals. A good deal of the history of the collator survives only as oral tradition. So, as an extra additional measure, I also sought out individuals who own, have used, work or worked at institutions that possess (or previously possessed) Hinmans or who were in some way otherwise associated with the machine. These individuals patiently answered my queries, and a few also sought me out to provide information that I would have otherwise missed.

I have not been able to inspect every machine personally. Traveling throughout the United States, Canada, England, Germany, and elsewhere to visit each one would be ideal but has not proven practical. I have, however, confirmed the presence (or absence) of machines and gathered details about them by corresponding with individuals at their various locations. I sent out a standard letter by e-mail or U.S. mail to institutions and individuals that I had reason to believe (because of a mention in a previous list or in the archival material, a reference in a published research project, a tip by someone who knew of the machine, or from another source) possessed a Hinman. This letter contained questions about the age, provenance, and certain physical features of the collator. I also asked about projects in which the collator in question may have been used. Answers to this letter frequently provoked more particular questions. I am grateful to all those who patiently answered my many queries, some of whom also graciously supplied me with photographs of their collators.

Over the years press releases and newspaper articles would sometimes claim that this or that machine was the fifth, thirty-first, fortieth, or some other number. This information undoubtedly originated from Johnson, for he sometimes made such statements in letters to customers. These numbers, however, do not necessarily coincide with the entry numbers in this list. This disparity stems mainly from the fact that I count machines that Johnson did not. For instance, the prototype, built more or less by Hinman, is A1 in this list whereas Johnson probably never thought of it as the first machine. It was neither designed nor built by him, and it was only the prototype after all. My interests are historical; Johnson's were commercial. When asked how many collators he had built, he would have had no reason to include an experimental model that was never put into operation.

Johnson's numbers are also inconsistent, or at least they appear so. When Johnson went into partnership with Robert Michel in 1972 he began putting a four-digit serial number on the front of each machine. These numbers begin with "10" followed by two numbers that indicate the particular machine's place in the manufacturing line, "45," "46," "47," etc. While these numbers are accurate indicators of sequence ("1046" came after "1045" and


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so on), they seem less reliable as exact statements of quantity. For example, the collator at the American Antiquarian Society, purchased in the summer of 1972, was the first to carry a serial number—"1045." The next machine, the University of Houston collator, is numbered "1046," and so on until the Wolfenbüttel collator, "1054." Without more information, however, I cannot say for sure whether the AAS machine was, as was assumed at the time of its purchase and is suggested by its serial number, the "45th edition" (McCorison, Letter). My suspicion is that it was not, as the numbers that other institutions reported as well as many statements made by Johnson do not square with it, or even with one another. The New Brunswick collator, acquired in September of 1971, was announced as the "36th" Hinman ("A First at a Canadian University"). The Florida machine, which showed up over a year earlier in June of 1970, was described as "one of only 40" ("University Libraries Get Hinman Collator"). If the AAS machine was really the 45th edition, then why are there at least seven machines between it and Florida's, supposedly the latest? Given these discrepancies, it seems wiser to admit uncertainty and to caution against being too literal about the serial numbers as well as about the numbers that turn up in newspapers and elsewhere. The machines sold by Michel after Johnson's death did not carry numbers.

I have been unable to account for two machines that should have been produced within the sequence—machines that should carry the numbers "1048" and "1050." I believe that these machines were sold to pharmaceutical companies, as the timing of their production coincides with the period when these companies were acquiring Hinmans. In 1971 Bristol-Myers purchased a machine to proofread prescription labels. Seven additional machines were sold to other pharmaceutical companies, though the Bristol-Myers collator (A36) is the only one I have been able to date or to trace to a current location. Despite the fact that I have not been able to precisely date the other machines, I have chosen to list them after the Bristol-Myers collator, alphabetically by location, each with its own entry number. They were probably all built fairly close together, and so listing them this way seems the best way to document and facilitate access to them within the list.

I have also been unable to locate up to three other machines that may have been produced. I have it from two sources that the Treasury Department used a collator. It is well known that the CIA owned a Hinman. If the Treasury Department had one, they could have borrowed or inherited it from the CIA. On the other hand, they could have owned an entirely separate machine. I do not have enough information to say if either, or neither, of these scenarios is true, or which is more likely. So for now rather than give the Treasury Department a separate listing, I discuss the sources and everything else I know about it in the entry for the CIA machine (A11). As for the other two mystery collators, Johnson stated in his first location list, published in 1963, that two "modified machines" were in "industrial use." I have no other references to these but suspect they may be the table model and a twin. I discuss this possibility in A6.


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Each entry is also annotated with information such as sales price, some of the projects the particular machine has been used for, why it was purchased in the first place, previous locations for those few machines that have had multiple owners or have been used at different institutions, current disposition, and other matters of interest. However, I have not been able to establish all of these details in every case. Furthermore, the annotations make no pretense toward completeness in regard to projects associated with particular machines. Most institutions have not kept records of how their collator has been used, and many projects that did utilize the machine do not announce that fact in their published prefaces and introductions. It should be remembered, though, that for many collators their most frequent usage was not for long-term editorial projects but for quick checks to confirm points between copies. This kind of traffic is very difficult to quantify, save to say that it has been substantial. My purpose for including details about projects is not to provide a complete catalog but merely to give a sense of how particular machines have been employed and what kind of lives they have led. Moreover, some collators have done double (and in a few cases their only) duty as demonstration pieces, mostly in introductory research classes for graduate students in English but in other venues as well. Since the early 1990s, Rare Book School at the University of Virginia, for example, has regularly conducted a lunchtime collator demonstration as part of its summer workshop in descriptive bibliography. Arthur Johnson gave a public lecture on the device as part of his standard delivery package. Some institutions, especially in the early days, used their machines for publicity purposes (see my aforementioned article on the invention of the Hinman for examples). Generations of English professors, librarians, curators, and others, most of who never went on to machine-collate a book or even a single page, have been introduced to the field of bibliographical and textual studies via the Hinman. This is another kind of usage that though impossible to quantify has been substantial.

So how many Hinmans were produced? Given the scattered and incomplete nature of the records, I cannot say with absolute certainty. I can, however, offer an estimate that I believe is accurate within a machine or two. By my count, which as will be remembered includes machines that Johnson probably never counted or counted inconsistently, there were around fifty eight. This estimate includes the fifty-seven machines given separate entries here, plus an additional table model. It also assumes that serial numbers 1048 and 1050 are among the seven undated pharmaceutical machines. If the Treasury Department did own a machine, and if it was not the same machine as the CIA collator, then the number would rise to fifty-nine.

For anyone engaged in editorial or bibliographical work, however, the number of surviving machines is probably far more important than how many were ultimately manufactured. The census locates forty-one survivors, all but two of which appear to be in reasonably good condition. The two inoperable machines (Iowa, A14, and Colorado, A56) no longer possess their optics. As for the few lost collators—though in most cases I suspect these


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are gone for good, I cannot rule out the possibility of one or two being rediscovered, perhaps as the result of the publication of this list.

  • A1. Folger Shakespeare Library

    Built sometime in 1946 or 1947, this is the prototype that Hinman demonstrated to the Modern Language Association and the Bibliographical Society of America in 1947. Its primary components were a "pair of ordinary microfilm projectors (borrowed from the Navy), some pieces of wooden apple box (abstracted from a trash pile), some heavy cardboard (begged from the Folger bindery), and parts of a rusty Erector set (more or less hi-jacked from the small son of a close personal friend)" (Hinman, "Mechanized Collation: A Preliminary Report" 102). The editor of PBSA was careful to put the word "machine" in quotation marks when referring to this device, perhaps underscoring its provisional state and still imprecise performance. This device was probably cannibalized and scrapped in the process of building the next machine.

  • A2. Folger Shakespeare Library

    Built by Charlton Hinman with assistance primarily from the Institute for Co-operative Research at Johns Hopkins University (Johnson, Letter to William P. Barlow; Rich). It was at the Folger as early as July 1949. Hinman declared it more or less "perfected" in late 1951 (Altick 188; Hinman, "Mark III" 150). This machine was traded back to Arthur Johnson in 1973 when the Folger purchased a new collator. Currently owned by William P. Barlow, the machine was repaired and slightly renovated before Johnson sold it to him in October of 1973 (Johnson, Letter to William P. Barlow).

  • A3. James Ford Bell, Minneapolis, Minnesota

    Purchased around 1953 for the private library of James Ford Bell, founder of General Mills and namesake of the James Ford Bell Special Collections at Minnesota (Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 23 Feb. 1957). Part of Bell's library consisted of a collection of books on the Jesuit Relations of New France. There was some thought of using the machine to examine these books but the project never developed (Parker). Johnson's 1963 PBSAlist incorrectly locates this machine at the University of Minnesota. He may have assumed that this machine was given to Minnesota in 1953 when Bell donated his library to the University. The machine was never at Minnesota and its current location is unknown.

  • A4. Harvard University

    Purchased by the Houghton Library in 1954 (Hinman, "Mechanized Collation at the Houghton Library" 132; and Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 23 Feb. 1957). It was first used by W. H. Bond for a study of the illustrations in the 1865 and 1866 editions of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Bond, "Publication"). Jacob Blanck and William Jackson also tried the machine but never used it for any project (Bond, Letter to the author). The collator was transferred to Harvard's Collections of Historical Scientific instruments in early 1986 (Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments).

  • A5. Lessing J. Rosenwald, Jenkintown, Pennsylvania

    Purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald around 1954 or 1955 (Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 23 Feb. 1957), loaned for some time to the University of Pennsylvania, and located at the Library of Congress by the early 1980s. William Proctor Williams remembers repairing it at the Library around


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    1982 or 1983 (E-mail to the author). In 1969 it was "on loan at the University of Pennsylvania" (Johnson, "Hinman Collators: Present Locations"), and according to the last list Johnson published it was still there in 1975. It was not at the Library of Congress in the mid-1970s. When Frederick R. Goff, who at the time was Honorary Consultant in Early Printed Books at the Library, undertook his study of the Declaration of Independence in the summer of 1975, he had copies of the Declaration that were loaned to him deposited at the Folger for examination on its machine (Goff 7). It seems likely that the machine came to the Library with Rosenwald's book collection in 1979, but according to records and the memories of those associated with the transfer this was not the case (Fine; Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress). Again, however, the collator was there in 1983 when Williams repaired it. Its current location is unknown.

  • A6. Arthur M. Johnson, Silver Spring, Maryland

    Built by Johnson in 1955, probably early in the year, to work with small, unbound items such as checks, small photographs, stamps, etc. Johnson called it the table model and built it in an effort to find applications other than the field of bibliography and textual studies. It measured 20 inches high, 23 inches long, and seven inches wide. It had a single eyepiece instead of a binocular set of optics. The blinking mechanism was provided by a button that the operator pushed up and down with his finger, rather than by the knee switch on the large machines (Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 26 Dec. 1957). Johnson demonstrated it to a group of Wall Street bankers, and he also loaned it for a short time to the Aeronautical and Information Center, United States Air Force, St. Louis, Missouri (Johnson, Letter to Ross J. Foster). Neither group purchased the machine. It was on loan for a brief period to the Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, while they awaited delivery of their full-size Hinman (Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 27 Jan. 1958). The current location of this machine is unknown.

    In the 1963 location list, Johnson stated the two "modified machines" were in "industrial use." I have found no other reference to these machines, which is strange given Johnson's eagerness to expand his market and his penchant for chatting up the fact when he did. The only modified machine that I know of prior to 1963 is the table model, and the last mention I have of it occurs in 1958, in a letter to Joseph Rubinstein at the University of Kansas (11 Aug. 1958). That correspondence leaves the clear impression that of those to whom he had shown the machine, no one was interested. Nevertheless, if there were modified machines in industrial use prior to 1963, the table model and perhaps a twin seem the most likely candidates.

  • A7. British Museum

    Purchased sometime in late 1955. In announcing the acquisition, the British Museum Quarterly stated that this was the "fifth such instrument to be produced and the first to come into operation outside America" ("Collating Machine," British Museum Quarterly). The announcement in the Times Literary Supplement repeats this claim and also adds that its purchase was made possible with funds from the bequest of the late Dr. Arthur Watson ("Mechanized Collation"). The machine passed to the British Library in 1973 and was disposed of around 1985 (Williams, "Smith"). In the mid 1970s, the Library developed a hybrid machine that combined features of the Hinman Collator and the Lindstrand Comparator (E6).


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  • A8. University of Virginia

    Purchased in January or February of 1956 for $1500. The Charlottesville Daily Progress and the Richmond Times-Dispatch both covered the arrival of the Hinman, and a special demonstration was offered for members of the Bibliographical Society (Vander Meulen, Bibliographical Society 23-25). John Cook Wyllie was the driving force behind the acquisition of the machine. He had shown an interest in Hinman's experiments as early as 1946 (Wyllie) and played an important role in encouraging its use. Matthew J. Bruccoli credited Wyllie with suggesting his collation projects on F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sinclair Lewis ("A Collation This Side of Paradise" 263; "Textual Variants" 264). The collator has also been used by David Vander Meulen for work on Pope, by David Gants on the Workes of Ben Jonson, and for many of the numerous editorial projects undertaken by Fredson Bowers. The machine is currently located in the Department of Special Collections, Alderman Library.

  • A9. University of Kansas

    Purchased and delivered in July 1958 for about $5000 (Johnson, letters to Joseph Rubinstein, 11 Aug. 1958 and 23 Apr. 1957). Johnson later visited the University to demonstrate the machine (Johnson, Letter to Joseph Rubinstein, 22 Sept. 1958). Charlton Hinman himself used it to collate photocopies of Shakespeare quartos. It has also been used for work on William Dean Howells. Almost annually for the last forty years the staff of the Spencer Library have given demonstrations on it using their variant Jonson folios. In the 1960s a graduate student used it for a complete collation of the Jonson folios (Mason). This was the first machine to feature a gray rather than a black exterior and cabinets beneath the book stands (Johnson, letters to Joseph Rubinstein, 10 Mar. and 9 June 1958). It is currently located in the Spencer Research Library.

  • A10. University of Illinois

    Purchased in November 1959 for around $5000 at the recommendation of Bruce Harkness and G. Blakemore Evans, both of the English faculty, and Robert B. Downs, Dean of Library Administration. Johnson delivered this machine himself ("Hinman Collating Machine Installed in Rare Book Library"). It is currently located in the Rare Books and Special Collections Library of the University Library.

  • A11. Central Intelligence Agency

    Probably purchased in 1959 or 1960. It was almost certainly in place before 1963. In the PBSA list that Johnson published that year, he describes a collator as being owned by an "agency of the Federal Government." Despite numerous attempts, I have been unable to extract any information, or even a response, from the CIA. Perhaps such matters are classified. There is a possibility that this machine was inherited or that an additional one was purchased by another U.S. government agency. John F. Andrews, in his obituary of Hinman in the Shakespeare Quarterly, stated that among the "non-bibliographical uses to which the Hinman Collator has been applied. . . is the detection of counterfeit currency by the United States Treasury Department" (Andrews 275-276). Hinman's daughter, Barbara Hinman, has told me that at the time of her father's death "the Treasury people were still using the collator or some variation in their day-to-day efforts to spot bogus bills" (Barbara Hinman). Neither source remembers where this information came from, and despite numerous queries I have been unable to confirm their reports with the Treasury Department. Johnson never


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    mentioned the Treasury Department in any of the letters or his lists. Nevertheless, given independent reports from two witnesses, I am reluctant to dismiss the possibility that the Treasury Department either bought a machine of its own or borrowed the one from the CIA.

    There is an interesting story regarding the delivery of this machine. Apparently the CIA instructed Johnson to deliver it to an inconspicuous loading dock where an anonymous individual paid him in cash. He was also instructed to detach and leave the U-haul trailer on which the machine was still loaded. U-haul never asked Johnson to return the trailer or settle the bill (Michel, Telephone interview, 28 Sept. 2000). According to Johnson's relatives, a few years later he heard from the CIA again. As Johnson told the story, they were inquiring about the purchase of a new machine because the first one had been stored in a location so secret that even the CIA could not find it. Perhaps they had lent it to the Treasury Department and forgotten (Arthur Juniewicz).

  • A12. Ohio State University

    Purchased in August of 1961 for $5000 and delivered by Johnson (Charvat). The funding was provided by the Council on Research, Department of English, and the University Libraries. The machine was purchased for use on the Ohio State Centenary Edition of Nathaniel Hawthorne (Hecht 1). It is currently located in the Rare Books and Manuscripts Department of the Ohio State University Libraries.

  • A.13 Yale University

    Delivered by Johnson in June 1962, this machine was purchased with funding from the Old Dominion Foundation (Brooks). Library officials had intended to purchase the machine after the opening of the Beinecke Library in 1963. However, in early 1962, Herman Liebert, Curator of Rare Books, advised James Babb, University Librarian, to go ahead with the purchase as several people were already anxious to use it (Liebert). One faculty member was making weekly trips to Harvard for the Houghton machine (Ottemiller). The Yale collator was disposed of sometime in the late 1890s during renovations of the room where it resided.

  • A14. University of Iowa

    Purchased in 1963 prior to October for work on the Berkeley Twain edition (Johnson, Letter to William B. Todd, 18 Oct. 1963). Warner Barnes found upwards of five thousand variants in the so-called "Royal Edition" of Twain's works on this collator, a number far in excess of anything ever uncovered in any other editorial project (Barnes, Personal interview; Todd, 203). Sidney Berger, who was a graduate student at Iowa and later on the faculty of the English Department at the University of California, Davis, worked as a research assistant on many editorial projects, among them Smollett, Twain, and Shaw, and he used this machine as well as the one at Davis (A46) on them (Berger). At some point the optics on this machine went missing, and it is now effectively inoperable.

  • A15. University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee

    Purchased sometime prior to October of 1964 (Johnson, Letter to Dorothy M. Lawrence). It has been used by Robert K. Turner for research on October of 1964 (Johnson, Letter to Dorothy M. Lawrence). It has been used by Robert K. Turner for research on Fletcher and Beaumont and is currently located in the Shakespeare Research Collection, Golda Meir Library. Johnson may have delivered this machine. He visited later to make minor adjustments (Turner, Telephone interview, 13 June 2000).


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  • A.16. University of Texas, Austin

    Purchased in mid-January, 1965, and originally installed by Johnson in the Miriam Lutcher Stark Library (Brewer). It is currently located in the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center. The price, including delivery, was $6205. William B. Todd played a leading role in its acquisition (Johnson, letters to William B. Todd, 13 Sept. 1962 and 18 Oct. 1963). Warner Barnes used it for his bibliography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. It was also used for various projects by Todd and more recently by Joseph J. Moldenhauer on the Riverside edition of Thoreau. The 1969 census lists a second machine as being on order, but the University of Texas at Austin never acquired a second one (Barnes, Letter to the author). Johnson probably confused this location with the University of Texas at Arlington, for which he was building a machine at the time of the 1969 census.

  • A17. Southern Illinois University

    Probably purchased in 1965 for the Southern Illinois Dewey edition. In 1964, Jo Ann Boydston, textual editor for the Dewey project, began working with Fredson Bowers, who probably first told her about the Hinman. On learning of it, she "pushed the administration very hard to purchase one" (Boydston). The collator has been used extensively, and perhaps exclusively, for the Dewey edition. It is currently located in the Special Collections Department of the Morris Library.

  • A18. Northwestern University

    Purchased by Northwestern in the summer of 1965 for the Newberry/Northwestern edition of Melville (Hayford, Letter to G. Thomas Tanselle; Newberry Library, E-mail to the author). Originally located in the Deering Library, it was moved to the Newberry as early as May, 1966, but may have been moved back to Northwestern temporarily (Hayford, Letter to Jens Nyholm). The collator was again at the Newberry by the spring of 1969 (Johnson, Letter to Virginia Heiseman).

    At the Newberry, the machine was placed in a glass-fronted room near the main entrance and was thus one of the first things visitors saw on entering the Library. The spectacle of the machine in operation was frequently made all the more interesting by one of the editorial assistants who used it—a nun in full habit (Farren; Krummel).

  • A19. Miami University, Oxford, Ohio

    Purchased in January of 1966 for $5,997.86. David Vander Meulen of Charlottesville, Virginia, acquired it from Miami in early 1993 (Special Collections, Miami University Library).

  • A20. Kent State University

    Probably purchased in February 1966 (Krause) for the Kent State edition of Charles Brockden Brown and later used on the Cambridge Joseph Conrad and the Ohio University edition of Robert Browning (Reid). This machine is currently located in the Institute for Bibliography and Editing at Kent State.

  • A21. University of California, Los Angeles

    Purchased by the Clark Library in June of 1966 and used primarily for the Dryden edition (Guffey, "Hinman Collator Acquired by the Clark Library"). It was the first machine on the West Coast and was personally delivered by Johnson (Johnson, Letter to Paul M. Miles). In justifying its purchase, Robert


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    Vosper, University Librarian, stated that in addition to work on Dryden the collator would also be used to train "graduate students in bibliography" (Vosper). It is still located in the Clark Library.

  • A22. Indiana University

    Purchased in the summer or early fall of 1966. The English Department announced its availability in November ("Howells Edition Center"). Originally located in the Lilly Library and later moved to the English Department, the machine was purchased for the William Dean Howells edition (Nordloh). It is currently located in its original home, the Lilly Library.

  • A23. University of Wisconsin, Madison

    Purchased around December 1966 for about $6000 by the Graduate School for the University of Wisconsin edition of Washington Irving (Pochmann). Also used by Standish Henning for work on Thomas Middleton's A Mad World, My Masters and for several other projects carried out under Henning's direction (Special Collections, Memorial Library, University of Wisconsin, Madison). It is currently housed in the Department of Special Collections, Memorial Library.

  • A24. University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

    Purchased around 1966 or 1967 at the behest of Dennis Donovan, assistant chairman of English, with National Defense Education Act funds (Rust). It was moved from the English Department to the Rare Book Collection of the Wilson Library in 1986 (Rare Books, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina). The collator also spent some time in the Microform Reading Room of the Library before reaching its current destination (Boone). It was utilized primarily on the University of Wisconsin edition of Washington Irving.

  • A25. University of South Carolina

    Purchased in 1966 or 1967 for work on the South Carolina William Gilmore Simms project. It was originally located in the McKissick Library, then moved to the English Department, and finally to the Thomas Cooper Library. The machine was also used on various projects directed by Matthew J. Bruccoli (Special Collections, Thomas Cooper Library). It was sold to McMaster University, Ontario, Canada, in September 1981 for $2100 for work on the McMaster University edition of Bertrand Russell. It was never used for this project, however, as the editors found it "was simply not applicable to their work" (Research Collections, Mills Memorial Library). David Gants acquired the machine in 1992 or 1993 while he was a graduate student at the University of Virginia. He later took it with him when he joined the faculty of the English Department at the University of Georgia. The collator is now at the University of New Brunswick, where Gants holds a joint appointment with the Department of English and the Etext Centre. He has used it extensively for his study of Ben Jon son's Ores and other projects (Gants, E-mail to the author, 9 Feb. 1999). The University of South Carolina purchased another machine in 1973 (see entry A50).

  • A26. Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität, Münster, Germany

    Purchased under the direction of Dieter Kranz and installed in 1967 by Johnson. In the 1970s a team of scholars from Hamburg editing Klopstock's dramas also made use of it (Kranz). The machine has also been used for demonstration purposes for classes in analytical bibliography. It is currently located in the Forschungs institut für Buchwissenschaft und Bibliographie.


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  • A27. University of Edinburgh

    Purchased in 1967 or 1968. It seems to have been little used and now resides "gathering dust and unloved outside the Strong Room in the Main Library basement" (Special Collections, Edinburgh University Library).

  • A28. Oxford University

    Purchased sometime in late 1969 or early 1970. The 1969 PBSA census lists this machine as being "on order." It is listed without qualification on the July 1970 typescript Folger list. According to the Bodleian Library Recordit was purchased with a grant from the Higher Studies Fund ("The Hinman Collator"). The collator is currently located in the Johnson Reading Room, Department of Western Manuscripts, Bodleian Library.

  • A29. Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas

    Purchased in late 1968 or early 1969 (Johnson, Letter to Charlton Hinman, 19 Feb. 1970). Kenneth W. Staggs used it on the James Fenimore Cooper edition (Baird). The current location of this machine is unknown.

  • A30. Northern Illinois University

    Purchased in 1969. It is currently located in the Department of Special Collections, University Library.

  • A31. Syracuse University

    Purchased in late 1969 (Johnson, Letter to Charlton Hinman, 19 Feb. 1970). Cornell purchased it from Syracuse in the mid-1970s for around $5000 (Eddy). Currently located in the Division of Rare Books and Manuscript Collections, Kroch Library, Cornell University.

  • A32. University of Florida

    Purchased in June of 1970 with funds provided by the Vice President for Academic Affairs ("University Libraries Get Hinman Collator"). The machine was delivered by Johnson and probably cost around $6000 or $7000 (New). It was acquired for Melvyn New's work on the Florida edition of Tristram Shandy and used extensively for this project. The collator is currently located in the Rare Books and Special Collections Department, Smathers Library East.

  • A33. University of Texas, Arlington

    Purchased in August or September of 1970. The first listing of this machine is on the 1970 unpublished list, where Johnson notes it will be delivered "in 30 days." The 1969 PBSA census lists a machine for Brown University as being "on order." In setting up for a definitive edition of the novels of Harold Frederic, Stanton Garner, who was on the Brown faculty at the time, apparently ordered a collator. Before the order was filled, he moved to the University of Texas, Arlington, where the project and eventually the collator followed him (Shroeder). In 1982, the Frederic project moved to the University of Nebraska, and with it went the machine. Since that time the machine has also been used for the Nebraska Willa Cather edition. It is currently located in the offices of the Willa Cather edition, 215 Andrews Hall, University of Nebraska, Lincoln (Mignon).

  • A34. New York Public Library

    Purchased in August or September of 1970 with support from the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation (Ames; "Hinman Collator," Bulletin of the


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    New York Public Library). The machine was disposed of sometime in 1996. Apparently the optics had gone missing before then (Rare Books Division, New York Public Library).

  • A35. Texas Tech University

    Evidence for dating this machine is contradictory. An inventory tag on the machine reads "Texas Tech College," which would indicate that it showed up before September 1969 as that is the date the school's name was changed to Texas Tech University. However, neither the 1969 PBSA list nor the July, 1970, unpublished list mentions this machine. It is possible that the old nametags were used for a time after the name change. It was there at the time of David Leon Higdon's arrival in August, 1971. Higdon used the collator extensively for the Joseph Conrad edition, especially for work on Almayer's Folly and Under Western Eyes (Higdon). Donald Rude also used it for work on Conrad and asked graduate students to use it for projects in his introductory bibliography course (Rude). The collator is currently located in the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library.

  • A36. Bristol-Myers Laboratories, Syracuse, New York

    Purchased sometime before September of 1971 ("A First at Canadian University"). Bristol-Myers learned of the machine when Syracuse University purchased one (A31) in late 1969 or early 1970. Bristol-Myers used the machine to proofread labels. The company had had a scare when the hyphen was inadvertently dropped from a prescription label, so that the instructions directed patients to take "12" rather than "1-2" tablets. The machine was also used on packing inserts and carton instructions. It was not fitted with book cradles since the various texts compared on it were unbound or easily flattened. Ted Bertella used this machine almost every day from 1973 until his retirement in 1992 (Joann Bertella). He believes that the Bristol-Myers collator was probably the first sold for this application, as he remembers giving demonstrations to several other pharmaceutical firms and none of them ever indicated seeing one before. After Mr. Bertella's retirement the machine was not used so he offered to find a new home for it. The company agreed, and in 1993 Bertella placed it at Scheuler Communications (now Liberty Business Development), a printing company in Syracuse, where it is used to run final quality checks on printed documents (Ted Bertella).

    In the 1975 list, Johnson stated that he had placed collators at "seven pharmaceutical firms," though he did not name the firms. As mentioned in the introduction, the machines carrying serial numbers 1048 and 1050 have not been located. It seems likely that these were pharmaceutical collators as the serial numbers coincide with the time when these companies were buying Hinmans. The collators bearing these numbers should have been produced by 1975.

    Robert Michel listed eight pharmaceutical machines in his 1979 flyer. Again, the Bristol-Myers machine is the only one I have been able to track down. The others are listed alphabetically by location with individual entry numbers below. My search has been complicated by the fact that each of the companies in question has been bought, sold, merged, expanded, contracted, or relocated at least once since 1979.

  • A37. Abbott Labs, Illinois

  • A38. Mile Laboratories, Indiana

  • A39. Elonco Corporation, Minnesota


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  • A40. Hoffman-LaRoche, New Jersey

  • A41. Ortho Pharmaceuticals, New Jersey

  • A42. Burroughs and Wellcome, North Carolina

  • A43. William H. Rohrer, Inc., Pennsylvania

  • A44. University of New Brunswick

    Purchased in late September of 1971 ("A First at a Canadian University") at the urging of Reavley Gair, who used it for work on Marston's Antonio's Revenge. The machine proved something of a disappointment to Gair, however. He had expected it to work equally well with microfilm and photocopy reproductions. While photocopies worked fine, the microfilm reproductions never registered well enough to be useful. The machine was personally delivered by Johnson and his wife, who were accommodated in a local hotel, taken out to dinner by Gair and a small committee, and generally "given a holiday in eastern Canada" (Gair). Gair trained graduate students on the machine, and on a few occasions scholars from other universities used the collator. Gair also had hopes of using it on a more substantial project in seventeenth-century editing, but the funding never materialized. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police used the machine and found it "very helpful in detecting forged banknotes" (Gair). In March of 1994, the machine was given to the National Library of Canada in Ottawa, where it is currently housed in the Rare Book Division ("Hinman Collator," Bulletin of the National Library of Canada; University Archives, University of New Brunswick). Ironically, another Hinman has made its way to New Brunswick. David Gants, who owns one of the two South Carolina machines (A25), is on the faculty of the Department of English and the Etext Centre at the University of New Brunswick.

  • A45. Cambridge University

    Purchased in late 1971 or very early 1972, as the first recorded use of the machine was on January 26, 1972 ("Hinman Collator Log"). It has been used for many projects over the years, including work on the Brontës, eighteenth-century periodicals, Shakespeare quartos, and Orlando Furioso.It is currently housed in the Rare Books Department of the University Library.

  • A46. University of California, Davis

    Purchased at the recommendation of Sid Berger through the English Department in 1972 and delivered by Johnson. Berger, who was on the English faculty, got to work on it immediately and "didn't stop for years" (Berger). As a graduate student he had also used the machine at Iowa (A14). For a time in the 1980s, the machine was on loan to the University of California, Santa Cruz, for work on Thomas Carlyle (Baumgarten). It is currently housed in the Special Collections Department of the University Library.

  • A47. American Antiquarian Society

    Purchased in the late summer of 1972. Serial number 1045. The machine was delivered by Johnson and his wife and probably cost around $7,500 (McCorison, "Re: Hinman"). It has been used recently for work on the Colonial Williamsburg Imprints Project (Charbeneau). The editors of the Cooper edition also used the machine extensively (McCorison, "Re:Hinman").


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  • A48. University of Houston

    Purchased at the behest of Irving Rothman, a faculty member in the English Department, probably very early in 1973 (Rothman). Serial number 1046. Funding was partially provided by the Biology Department, where there was some thought of using it to compare before and after shots of sediment and plants, but these plans never materialized. Rothman used the collator on several of his eighteenth-century projects as well as for demonstration purposes in the graduate bibliography course. In 1972, Kevin Mac Donnell used the machine for a study of Sinclair Lewis' The Jungle. Mac Donnell collated some 40 copies of the Doubleday, Page edition. The results of his research have never been published, however. Mac Donnell also used it for an unpublished study of the 1967 Doubleday revised edition of John Barth's Sot Weed Factor (Mac Donnell). The machine is housed in the Department of Special Collections, M. D. Anderson Library, University of Houston.

  • A49. Folger Shakespeare Library

    Purchased with funds from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in the spring of 1973 as a replacement for the machine Hinman built and used. Serial number 1047. The editors of the Variorum Edition of Shakespeare have used it to collate quarto texts of Shakespeare plays (Folger Shakespeare Library). Frederick R. Goff used this machine for his study of the Declaration of Independence (Goff 7). More recent users include David Gants and Peter Blayney (Folger Shakespeare Library).

  • A50. University of South Carolina

    Purchased in the summer of 1973 (Johnson, Letter to Don Kunitz). Serial number 1049. This is the second machine owned by the University (see A25). According to the 1975 list, it was located in the editorial office of the journal Proof (Johnson, "Locations"). In addition to publishing the journal, the Proof offices served as a "facility for teaching, research, and public service in bibliographical and textual studies" (English at South Carolina, 19741975[11-12]). The Proof offices also hosted the graduate course in bibliography. The machine is currently located in the Department of Special Collections, Thomas Cooper Library.

  • A51. Baylor University

    Purchased in April of 1974 for work on the Ohio University edition of Robert Browning ("Hinman Collator," The Armstrong Browning Library Newsletter). Serial number 1051. The price of the machine, including delivery, was $7565 (Johnson, Letter to Jack Herring, 23 Nov. 1973). Johnson and his wife personally delivered this collator, and Johnson also gave a brief lecture on the "history of the machine, how it came into being" and "what makes it do what it does" (Johnson, Letter to Jack Herring, 20 Mar. 1974). Jack Herring, who was then Director of the Armstrong Browning Library, was a member of the Browning variorum editorial board. Warner Barnes also used it on his bibliography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. This machine is currently in storage.

  • A52. Stirling University

    Purchased in October or November of 1974. Serial number 1052. Johnson did not personally deliver this machine, though he sent extensive instructions for unpacking and assembling along with it (Johnson, Letter to P. G. Peacock, 21 Oct. 1974). The Library was new at the time, and its basement hosted a center for bibliographical study, equipped with a printing and papermaking lab (Stirling University Library). The collator was purchased


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    as part of the equipment for this center and is currently located in the University Library.

  • A53. Texas A&M University

    Purchased in 1975 by the English Department and shortly thereafter transferred to the Department of Special Collections, Sterling C. Evans Library (King). Serial number 1053. It is currently located in the Cushing Memorial Library and Archives.

  • A54. Herzog August Bibliothek. Wolfenbüttel, Germany

    Purchased in July of 1977. Serial number 1054. The cost, including shipping, was $8265 (Invoice Number 6570). Martin Boghardt was the force behind its acquisition (Herzog August Bibliothek). Boghardt and others used the machine extensively for work on the Klopstock dramas as well as on editorial projects such as the work of Philipp Melanchthon, Martin Luther, Giordano Bruno, and Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (Needham; Boghardt). This machine has been kept one of the busiest in the history of mechanical collation and is still located at the Herzog August Bibliothek.

  • A55. University of Kentucky

    Purchased in late August or early September of 1978 for work on Cooper's Lionel Lincoln by Donald A. and Lucy B. Ringe (Alexander Juniewicz; Special Collections, University of Kentucky). No serial number. It is currently located in the Department of Special Collections and Archives, Margaret I. King Library, University of Kentucky.

  • A56. University of Colorado, Boulder

    Purchased in September 1978 for $10,107 (Purchase Order). No serial number. The machine was purchased with funds provided by Milt Lipetz, then Vice Chancellor for Faculty Affairs, for work on a project by Michael Preston involving traditional British folk plays in chapbooks and broadsides. The optics disappeared before Preston could begin his study, however (Preston;Special Collections, University of Colorado Library). The machine is currently located in the Special Collections Department of the main library.

  • A57. Penn State University

    Purchased in March 1979 by the Institute for Arts and Humanistic Study at Penn State for around $7500. No serial number. It has been used for work on W. B. Yeats and the eighteenth-century author Edward Young (Special Collections, Penn State University). R. Carter Hailey, who now teaches at the College of William and Mary, acquired the machine from Penn State in July of 1999.

B. LINDSTRAND COMPARATORS

1971 Gordon Lindstrand, an assistant professor of English at the University of South Carolina, announced the first viable alternative to the Hinman Collator (Lindstrand, "Mechanized Textual Collation") [plate 2]. He had developed his device in the 1960s while a graduate student at the University of Illinois, where his dissertation concerned textual matters in Conrad's Nostromo. His invention, dubbed the Lindstrand Comparator (and also known as the Mark I), was offered in two models—the Comparator Criterion and the Comparator Library Custom. The Comparator Criterion,


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designed to accommodate copies or original images with text pages no larger than 8½ inches tall and 7 inches wide, was the basic model. The Comparator Library Custom was designed for larger documents, depending on the needs of the purchaser. Though he seems to have built a prototype of the Custom, I do not know that he actually sold one. A third model, which apparently never left the drawing board, was called the Comparator Portable, designed, as the name indicates, to travel more easily than the other two versions. Lindstrand also proposed a device for cross-edition collation—the Mark II—though, like the portable version, it does not appear to have ever gotten beyond the planning stages.

The Lindstrand Comparator utilizes stereoscopic principles to detect typographical and other printed variations in nearly identical printed documents, usually those descending from the same edition. Stereoscopes have been utilized for everything from parlor entertainment to astronomical work since at least the early part of the nineteenth century ("Stereoscope"). Rather than relying on lights and shutters to present alternate images as with the Hinman, the Lindstrand was built to take advantage of the central nervous system's capacity to "fuse" images of two identical or nearly identical objects together when said objects are presented in a manner conducive to such fusion. Gordon Lindstrand's device was simply an "environmental apparatus" designed to facilitate this process (Lindstrand, The Lindstrand Comparator[1]). The researcher views two texts set up in separate cradles and positioned beneath a set of binocular optics. The optics, a set of mirrors, and a prism help overlay the texts in a kind of virtual superimposition. When this effect is achieved, small discrepancies between the texts seem to stand above the similarities in 3D. Big differences (for example, several reset lines) appear as areas of "total confusion" (Lindstrand, "Mechanized" 209). In contrast to its predecessor, however, the Lindstrand requires two good eyes on the part of the viewer. The Hinman is the only collator that can be used by individuals lacking good vision in one eye.

Lindstrand got the idea for the comparator from a mapmaker in Champagne, Illinois (Roberta Lindstrand). He noted in a promotional pamphlet that stereoscopic view "has in the past been particularly appropriate for mapmaking from aerial photographic surveys" (The Lindstrand Comparator). He also remarked in his 1971 Studies in Bibliography article that similar devices had been used in the military, though "for an entirely different purpose" from the one he was proposing (209).[4] As I have mentioned elsewhere, Charlton Hinman apparently experimented with a stereoscope just after WWII, and there is also evidence that before the war other bibliographers


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had attempted to use the stereoscope or a similar device for textual collation (Smith 134-135). Lindstrand does not appear to have known about any bibliographical applications or experiments other than his own, however.

In 1976, the Comparator Criterion cost $940. The two lamps, which again were optional features, cost an extra $48.00, and a dust cover could be purchased for $24.00 (Lindstrand, Comparator Research Associates [1]). The price of the Library Custom model varied upward according to the requested specifications, though again I do not know if he ever sold one of these larger models. At this time, the Hinman Collator was selling for around $8000. Lindstrand built his machine under the company name Comparator Research Associates, and over the course of about six years sold around thirty-eight devices to people and organizations (universities, libraries, research centers, etc.) throughout the United States and in Canada, England, South Africa, and Australia.

Lindstrand published one location list in a bibliographical journal and issued updates with his promotional material ("Lindstrand Comparators: A Summary Report;" The Lindstrand Comparator).[5] These have been the primary sources in compiling the list below, though I have also interviewed people who knew Lindstrand and/or used his machine. Additionally, I have recovered a few documents and letters that have also provided useful information. These interviews and documents have led me to two machines (or, rather, one machine and a "ghost"—more about the latter in a moment) that were not included in the list and updates. I have confirmed at least the original location (or lack thereof—again, more in a moment) of every Comparator recorded by Lindstrand. Information on his invention, however, has been generally harder to track down and verify than for the Hinman. The arrival of a Lindstrand did not attract the same level of attention. The comparator was much less visually striking and much more easily disassembled, stowed away, and forgotten or lost than its predecessor. Moreover, its inventor did not leave nearly the paper trail that Arthur Johnson did.

There is a longstanding rumor that Gordon Lindstrand reneged on the delivery of several machines after accepting payment for them. In some versions of the story he is said to have absconded with the funds and lived the rest of his life on the run, more or less. In another version he did jail time. The truth is less sensational. He was considering going out of business as early as 1975 (Lindstrand, Letter to William L. Mitchell). In 1976 or 1977, he appears to have stopped making comparators and failed to follow through on the delivery of at least three. These were machines promised to Trinity College, Cambridge; the University of Leeds; and Trinity College, Dublin. Records referring to the non-delivery of these machines are located in the archives of the latter. They indicate that he accepted at least partial


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if not complete payments on these orders.[6] A fourth may have also been promised but never delivered to the University of Calgary. He listed a Calgary machine in an update he distributed with other promotional material in 1976 or 1977, just as he was shutting the business down. I have been unable to locate anyone who remembers this device—hence the "ghost" I mentioned earlier. Cambridge and Dublin were also listed for the first and only time in the same update (Leeds never appears in any of his lists.) His failure to deliver devices to Cambridge, Dublin, Leeds, and possibly Calgary coincides with his going out of business. At the time he was suffering severely from the effects of alcoholism. Two years earlier, in 1975, he had lost his bid for tenure and his first marriage had ended in divorce (Roberta Lindstrand). Despite these difficulties, however, he was never in jail, and neither was he ever hard to find. Except for a short stay in a treatment facility in Charleston, South Carolina, and another brief relocation to Ohio, he continued to live in Columbia, the town from which he had always marketed and sold the comparator, until his passing in March of 2000 (Obituary). He was eventually able to control his drinking problem, though its effects left him legally blind. At his death he was working on a memoir about his battle with alcoholism.

Were there more machines, either built and sold or sold and never delivered?I do not think so, though all I can say with certainty is that I have not found evidence of others. Despite my doubts as to its existence, I have chosen to give the Calgary machine a separate entry below, as I have for the devices I know Lindstrand did not deliver. Except for Leeds, these were all claimed by Lindstrand in print and so listing them with an appropriate note not only makes them easier to index but also facilitates correcting the record. The machines in this section are listed alphabetically by the last known location. As mentioned above, the machines that were never delivered are listed where they were supposed to have gone. A chronological arrangement is not possible because of the lack of records. Furthermore, since the Lindstrand was sold over a much shorter time period than the Hinman (five or six years as opposed to nearly thirty), sorting out the dates would not only be more difficult but probably less valuable. When the original location is known and differs from the current, that fact is noted in parentheses along with other potentially useful information.

    ARIZONA

  • B1. Arizona State University, University Library, Department of Special Collections


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    FLORIDA

  • B2. Florida State University, English Department

    ILLINOIS

  • B3. Northern Illinois University, English Department

  • B4. Southern Illinois University

    Purchased for work on the Dewey edition and originally located in the John Dewey Studies Center. According to Jo Ann Boydston, editor of the Dewey edition, it was passed on to the Morris Library fairly soon after its arrival because the editors of the edition found the Hinman much easier and more efficient to use. It is currently located in the Special Collections Department of the Morris Library.

    INDIANA

  • B5. Ball State University, English Department
    Surplused around 1960.

    KANSAS

  • B6. Kansas State University, English Department
    Current disposition unknown.

    KENTUCKY

  • B7. Eastern Kentucky University, John Crabbe Grant Library

    MASSACHUSETTS

  • B8. Harvard University, Houghton Library

  • B9. University of Massachusetts at Boston, University Library
    Current disposition unknown.

    MISSISSIPPI

  • B10. Mississippi State University, English Department

  • B11. University of Southern Mississippi, English Department
    Purchased in 1977. Lindstrand told Noel Polk that this was his last machine.

    NEBRASKA

  • B12. University of Nebraska, Willa Cather edition
    Originally purchased for the Harold Frederic edition at the University of Texas, Arlington.

    NEW JERSEY

  • B13. Princeton University, Firestone Library
    Originally purchased for the Henry David Thoreau edition.

    NEW YORK

  • B14. Cornell University, Kroch Library

  • B15. State University of New York at Fredonia, University Library

    OHIO

  • B16. Bowling Green University, University Library, Rare Books and Special Collections Department

    Originally purchased for the George Washington Cable edition.

  • B17. Kent State University, University Library, Institute for Bibliography and Editing


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  • B18. Ohio University

    Current disposition unknown. Originally purchased for the Robert Browning edition.

    PENNSYLVANIA

  • B19. State College, James L. W. West

    West purchased this machine when he was on the faculty at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, and moved it with him when he joined the faculty of Penn State University.

  • B20. University of Pennsylvania, Van Pelt Library

    RHODE ISLAND

  • B21. Brown University, John Hay Library

    SOUTH CAROLINA

  • B22. University of South Carolina, Thomas Cooper Library, Special Collections Department

    Originally purchased by and located in the office of the Center for Editions of American Authors.

    TEXAS

  • B23. Texas A&M University, Cushing Memorial Library and Archives
    Originally purchased by the Department of English and later transferred to the Library. Surplused around 1992.

  • B24. Texas A&M University, Cushing Memorial Library and Archives
    Originally purchased by Joseph Katz, Columbia, South Carolina. Acquired by Texas A&M in 2003.

  • B25. Texas Tech University, Southwest Collection/Special Collections
    Originally purchased for the Joseph Conrad edition.

  • B26. University of Houston, M. D. Anderson Library, Department of Special Collections

  • B27. University of Texas at Austin, Humanities Research Center

    VIRGINIA

  • B28. Nellysford, Catherine Rodriguez

    Originally purchased by Matthew Bruccoli, Columbia, South Carolina.

  • B29. University of Virginia, Alderman Library, Department of Special Collections

    AUSTRALIA

  • B30. Monash University, University Library

    CANADA

  • B31. Simon Fraser University

    Current disposition unknown.

  • B32. University of Calgary

    I have been unable to confirm whether this device was ever delivered.

  • B33. University of Toronto, Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library

    ENGLAND

  • B34. Cambridge University, Trinity Library

    This machine was ordered and paid for in part or whole but never delivered.


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  • B35. Oxford University, Bodleian Library, Department of Western Manuscripts, Johnson Reading Room

  • B36. University of Leeds

    This machine was ordered and paid for in part or whole but never delivered.

    IRELAND

  • B37. University of Dublin, Trinity College Library

    This machine was ordered and paid for in part or whole but never delivered.

    SOUTH AFRICA

  • B38. Rhodes University, Institute for the Study of English in Africa

    Current disposition unknown.

 
[4]

Stereoscopes have indeed been used in the interpretation of aerial photographs, which, when taken from directly overhead, present a very unnatural view—because the objects pictured appear flat they are difficult for a viewer to recognize. Military photoanalysts and mapmakers use the stereoscope to view two photographs, slightly offset from one another, taken consecutively along the line of flight or simultaneously from different cameras in the same plane. This creates a 3-D effect that gives the images contour and thus makes them easier to interpret (Stanley 265-270).

[5]

Announcements and descriptions of the machine were also published in PMLA 89 (1974): 1338, and BiN: Bibliography Newsletter 2.6 (June 1974): 2.

[6]

Unfortunately I have not been able to examine these records, though their contents have been summarized for me. They date from 1975 to 1982 and range from internal discussion before ordering to Lindstrand's acknowledgement of money to correspondence with Leeds and Cambridge, who also ordered but never received machines. I am grateful to Charles Benson, Keeper of Early Printed Books, for providing me this information. By library policy the file will remain closed until 2012, thirty years from the date of the creation of the last item in the file.

C. THE McLEOD PORTABLE COLLATOR

About 1983, Randall McLeod (a.k.a. Random Cloud, Random Clod, Randalino, Sir Greg Walters, etc.) began developing the device now known as the McLeod Portable Collator (Belanger) or the "McPortable Collator" (McLeod, E-mail to the author, 5 Feb. 2002) [plate 3]. Like the Lindstrand, this collator is based on stereoscopy. However, McLeod "has eliminated one of the symmetrical optical trains typical of stereo instruments: thus one eye looks directly at the farther book, and the other looks through two mirrors at the closer. Because the books are displayed in different depths, one can slide the more remote one part-way behind the front one on a two-tiered reading stand, so that just the two pages being compared appear adjacent directly in front of the viewer and, because of the reduction of size of the front image, as it passes through the mirror train, they appear at the same angular height and width, and they are readily accessible there for comparison and manipulation" (E-mail to the author, 5 Feb. 2002). Variants between the two books can display themselves "by one or more of four effects: 1) variantly spaced parts of otherwise identical settings of type appear in relative depth (that is, in 3D); 2) different settings in the same place (for example, `dog' in one copy and `cat' in the other) shimmer or alternate; 3)an image in one copy matched by blankness in the other appears `hollow' or insubstantial relative to the solid image formed by the combined stimulae of the invariant parts of the two copies; and 4) non-register of part of the superimposed image" (McLeod, The McLeod Portable Collator 2, and E-mail to the author, 9 Mar. 2002). As with the Lindstrand, the McLeod requires two good eyes on the part of the viewer.

The McLeod, unlike either of its predecessors, has the virtue of portability. In fact, it is the first collator really capable of being easily transported—when disassembled, the device weighs about thirty pounds and can fit in a carry-on bag. Randall McLeod has used it "in over a score of major university and research libraries in Great Britain, Canada and the United States" (The McLeod Portable Collator 5). His first customer was a Philosophy professor


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at McGill University (Zalewski 15), about whom he relates an interesting anecdote: "I showed him how the collator worked, and offered to setup his own copy of Hume (which he was editing) with the University of Toronto's Fisher Library copy, but he was adamant that he do it himself, and proceeded to set up for a comparison of the titles pages. He struggled to get the adjustments right, but finally gave up and asked me to do it for him. Well, I realized right away that I couldn't get it adjusted right either:it was impossible to get everything aligned, since the two copies were different states of the same setting. So, in his first go he had hit the jackpot!" (E-mail to the author, 5 Feb. 2002).

Though adjustable, the collator has no parts that move in the performance of collation. It requires no lights or electricity and generates no noise. The price is around $2500 US, not including shipping. I am grateful to McLeod for generously contributing to the foregoing description and providing the location information given below.

    LOUISIANA

  • C1. Baton Rouge, private scholar

    NEW YORK

  • C2. New York Public Library

  • C3. Pierpont Morgan Library

    PENNSYLVANIA

  • C4. Lafayette College, Skillman Library

  • C5. Philadelphia, private scholar

    AUSTRALIA

  • C6. Monash University, Department of English

  • C7. University of New South Wales, School of Language, Literature, and Communication

    CANADA

  • C8. New Brunswick, David Gants

  • C9. Toronto, Randall McLeod

  • C10. Victoria, British Columbia, David Fate Norton

    Originally purchased when Norton was on the faculty at McGill University.

  • C11. University of Guelph, University Library, Department of Archives and Special Collections

    ENGLAND

  • C12. Cambridge University, University Library

  • C13. University of London, School of English and Drama.

    Originally purchased by Graham Rees when he was on the faculty of the Department of English at the University of Wolverhampton.

    ITALY

  • C14. Universita di Udine, Dipartimento di Scienze Storiche e Documentaire

    WALES

  • C15. National Library of Wales


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D. THE HAILEY'S COMET

R. Carter Hailey has built the simplest and most portable collator yet, the Hailey's Comet (Vander Meulen, "Revision" 223) [plate 4]. His device is available with book stands in two sizes—14″ × 10″ for $750, 19″ × 10″ for$825, and both for $975. He has replaced the frame of the McLeod with two freestanding arms to hold the mirrors. The Comet weighs about fifteen pounds and packs easily in a small gym bag. Like McLeod, Hailey has eliminated one of the symmetrical optical trains—one eye looks directly at the farther book while the other looks through two mirrors at the nearer book. The absence of the frame accounts for the reduction in weight. As with the Lindstrand and the McLeod, the Comet requires two good eyes on the part of the viewer.

Another bibliographer, David Gants, has given new meaning to the phrase "machine-aided collation" via the Comet. He has developed a method of collating an actual copy of a book on the Comet with a computer-generated image of another copy of the same book. Gants positions the physical book in relation to a digitized version of another copy on a laptop screen so that their images, after adjusting the freestanding mirrors, appear to superimpose in the eyes of the viewer. Since the digitized image serves as his control copy, Gants does not need to carry a potentially valuable and bulky book with him when he travels to a distant library. The ever-increasing number of books available in this format greatly expands the number of texts now available for collation. A single CD can hold hundreds of volumes—a virtual portable library ready to collate at the press of a button. Since the size of the digitized image on the laptop screen is adjustable, the problem of controlling the standards under which the original book was scanned is not as acute as it has been for scholars who have attempted to collate from microfilm-based images in the past.[7] Gants further reports that since "the laptop display can move along all three axes," it is very easy "to adjust yaw-pitch-roll image alignment as well as relative size" (E-mail to the author). This method also has the advantage of dispensing with the book stands. The computer cannot fit in a stand, obviously. The book is carefully propped open against a soft, felt-covered support of the kind typically found in special collections libraries. Not having to strap a book into a stand or cradle also tends to calm the nerves of wary rare book custodians.

Hailey built the device for his study of the three editions of Piers Plowmanprinted by Robert Crowley in 1550. He has used the Comet to collate over sixty copies at libraries in the United States and Great Britain (Metzger). I am grateful to him for generously providing the location information given below.


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    CALIFORNIA

  • D1. Los Angeles, Joseph Dane

    KENTUCKY

  • D2. Lexington, David Miller

    NEW YORK

  • D3. Pierpont Morgan Library

    MISSOURI

  • D4. Washington University, Olin Library, Department of Special Collections

  • D5. St. Louis, Joseph Lowenstein

    PENNSYLVANIA

  • D6. State College, Patrick Cheyney

    VIRGINIA

  • D7. University of Virginia, English Department

  • D8. Charlottesville, David Vander Meulen

  • D9. Williamsburg, Brett Charboneau

  • D10. Williamsburg, R. Carter Hailey

    CANADA

  • D11. New Brunswick, David Gants

    Purchased while Gants was on the faculty at the University of Georgia. It now resides with him at the University of New Brunswick, where he holds a joint appointment in the English Department and the Etext Centre.

    NORWAY

  • D12. Oslo, Jon Gunnar Jorgensen

 
[7]

George Guffey first addressed this problem in 1968. He also suggested a set of standards for the reproduction of texts on microfilm (Guffey, "Standardization").

E. ONE-OFF SPIN-OFFS

Gordon Lindstrand, Randall McLeod, and R. Carter Hailey are not the only individuals to have followed Hinman's lead. Over the years other scholars and bibliographers have tried to improve upon, replace, or supplement his invention. This section documents these efforts, which largely resulted in one-offs—that is, experimental devices that were never developed beyond the prototype and for the most part were never used on projects beyond those associated with their own inventors. I have not listed efforts to use the computer for collation purposes. Such attempts began very early (in 1962 Vinton Dearing introduced a program that ran on the IBM 7090) and continue to the present (as mentioned in note 3). Various applications (Peter Shillingsburg's CASE program, for example) have achieved some currency, but no effective system has yet been produced to compare efficiently a large number of original images (as the Hinman does) instead of comparing texts that must first be converted to digital text files. Readers who wish to know more about computer-assisted collation should consult Shillingsburg's Scholarly Editing in the Computer Age (3rd ed., 1996). The arrangement of this section


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is chronological by date of manufacture or development as near as can be determined.

  • E1. The Poor Man's Mark IV

    In 1966, Vinton Dearing introduced the first second-generation mechanical collator (Dearing, "Poor Man's"). The "Poor Man's Mark IV" [plate 5] was created as a less expensive alternative to the Hinman. From 1953 to 1957, the price of a Hinman rose from $1500 to $5000. The very last machines sold for $8000 to $10,000. These were not inconsequential sums of money for scholars working in the humanities. Most Hinmans were bought with grants from public and private sources. If a researcher did not have access to such funds, chances were unlikely he or she could afford one. Dearing estimated his machine cost $100 in materials. There were no labor costs because he envisioned it as a do-it-yourself project, his intent being not to go into business but to show other researchers how to build a machine. This was not anew idea. Early in his work Charlton Hinman considered making mechanical drawings available for non-commercial projects. Any bibliographer or editor with access to a "standard machine shop," so the idea went, could build his or her own device ("Variant Readings" 281). The Hinman, however, was simply too complicated to construct for all but the most mechanically adept bibliographers, witness the professionally produced set of specifications required to build one. And even if one were able, the collator would still have been a significant investment. In 1953, Hinman estimated the cost of materials at $1000 (281).

    Dearing's inspiration was Hinman's prototype (A1), which was a much simpler and less expensive device to construct than its later incarnation (Dearing, Methods 20). Like the Hinman prototype, the Mark IV was designed to work with microfilm reproductions rather than the original documents. Dearing positioned two microfilm projectors side by side inside a box. The images were projected through an occulting disc onto a mirror in the far end of the box. The mirror then reflected the images back onto a ground glass screen above the projectors. The projectors, microfilm, mirror, and screen, along with the light and noise, were all contained within the box. This setup gave the Mark IV an advantage or two over Hinman's prototype. First, it could be used in a lighted rather than a darkened room. Second, any noise generated by the projectors or the motor turning the disc was somewhat insulated from the outside by the walls of the box. The disadvantage was that one had to rely on microfilm reproductions, and so one also had to deal with all the problems inherent in working from copies, not to mention the cost and trouble of making the microfilm. Dearing and a few of his fellow editors at the University of California used his device for work on their edition of Dryden, but it did not catch on elsewhere.

    Dearing also proposed another means of collation, one that was completely non-mechanical. This technique, dubbed the "poor, poor man's collator," was really just a variation on the old Wimblelon method with help from a photocopy machine. In the old-fashioned, unassisted manner, one opens two copies of the same book and proceeds to read from each. Using the "poor, poor" method, one first photocopies the pages in question and then, in Dearing's words, rolls a "Xerox copy of the pages . . . over the fingers so as to bring line after line to the top edge of the visible surface and just under the corresponding line in another copy (if one eye is closed, both lines will appear to be equidistant and so will be easier to read simultaneously, which is the whole purpose of the method)." Dearing earlier proposed a wooden frame with a system of rotating, "closely set rods" to accomplish the same thing but


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    with practice evidently found his fingers and thumbs more portable and less cumbersome (Methods 15).

  • E2. Another Poor Man's Collating Machine

    Richard Levin proposed a photocopy-assisted method in 1966. His idea was simply to photocopy the pages in question and overlay them on a light table or, in the absence of a table, merely hold them up to the light. As he admitted, this procedure was so simple he could hardly have been the first to think of it. And, he further suggested, it was easier on "one's purse, eyesight, and patience" than the Hinman (Levin 25-26). Levin did mention one drawback, however. If one page has a character placed where the other has a blank space, or if on one page there is a character that completely covers a character on the other (like for example a comma over a period), these variations will not show up. To avoid this problem, he recommended going through the process a second time, only with the pages in the reverse position.

  • E3. The Poor Man's Mark VII

    In 1967, Gerald A. Smith, a former graduate student of Hinman's, proposed the next mechanical device—the "Poor Man's Mark VII," another machine in the poverty-stricken tradition (Smith 1967) [plate 6]. He utilized two Dagmar Super microfilm readers placed on their backs so that the mirrors faced oneanother. A screen was erected where the images were superimposed. Each reader contained its own shutter, operated either by a motor or a hand crank to create the alternate flashing effect. An advantage of this adaptation was that it required a minimum of assembly from non-ready made components. One merely turned the microfilm readers on their backs and erected a screen. The only materials that had to be fashioned from scratch were the alternating shutters. Another advantage of this device was that the viewers, because they were designed to zoom in and out, could in theory be adjusted to compensate for images photographed at different magnifications. In practice Smith indicated this was somewhat difficult to achieve. Nevertheless, the feature was a novel proposal for a common collation problem. The disadvantage with Smith's collator was that it worked only with copies. Smith also indicated that exact register was often difficult, even with the help of the zoom feature. At the time of his description, the machine was still in development.

  • 54. A Portable, Cheaper Collator

    In 1968, Johan Gerritsen announced a technique that utilized one portable tabletop projector, one negative microfilm of the book to be collated, and one original copy of the book. Gerritsen arranged the projector so as to cast the negative microfilm image on to the actual book itself. When the white or negative image was brought into exact superimposition with the black print of the page, variants were revealed by white spots where there was an impression of type in the filmed copy, dark spots in the opposite instance, or a combination of the two. As Gerritsen wrote, "If one can beg, borrow, or steal one physical copy, the method enables one to collect microfiches from all over the world and do one's collating at home. If one cannot, once one is the proud possessor of a single film, one can travel to the copies" (Gerritsen 29-30). Gerritsen stated that he had never tried this method with photographs in place of the original but imagined it would have worked well enough to have at least identified which formes needed closer examination.

  • E5. The Televised Collator

    In 1972, John Horden described an application using two small industrial television cameras synchronized to feed to a single television monitor (Horden).


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    The cameras broadcast images of two books from the same edition, and an automatic changeover switch alternated the images on the screen. At high speed any differences between the two texts appeared as a blur. Slowed down, the operator could more closely examine any discrepancies. The potential advantages of this system were significant. First, the actual collation process could be recorded on tape, allowing the act of collation itself to be preserved and stored for review at a later date, thereby avoiding the trouble and wear of consulting the original texts. The recorded collation could also be sent for examination to researchers at other locations. Second, the cameras could each conceivably be set up at separate libraries, alleviating the need and avoiding the risk of bringing the books together from distant locations. Horden also claimed this method was cheaper than other techniques (by which he presumably meant the Hinman, for at this time all the other methods, though ineffective except for the Lindstrand, were far cheaper than their more famous predecessor) as well as easier to operate and less tiring to use. Like most of the other methods and machines, the television collator was never used for projects other than those associated with its own development. Robin Alston, who worked with Horden at the time, states that the collator was "never more than an idea," though he was convinced "that it could be made to work" (Alston).

  • E6. The British Library's Homemade Hybrid

    This machine was built sometime in the mid to late 1970s. Library staff members first tried to buy a Lindstrand Comparator and when that effort proved unsuccessful (Lindstrand had either gone out of business or proven himself unreliable) decided to build a machine of their own which combined features of the Lindstrand and the Hinman. They gathered specifications for the Lindstrand-like features from known users of the Comparator. They presumably based the Hinman features on their own machine (A7). William Proctor Williams was one of the individuals asked for advice on the Lindstrand (E-mail). He collated extensively with this hybrid machine in 1983 and found it a satisfactory, if uncomfortable, device. Its optics were on par with the Lindstrand. The blinking effect of the Hinman was created by a central rotating plate that alternately obstructed the right and left image. The collator moved with the rest of the British Library from Bloomsbury to Euston Road in 1998, and shortly thereafter technicians disabled the power cords because they felt the machine's electrical system was unsafe. Since that time Williams has tried to repair it twice. As of 2002, it was located in the Humanities 2 (Rare Books) reading room behind the Enquiries Desk. The stereoscopic effect of the Lindstrand can still be achieved, but without electrical power the blinking effect of the Hinman is not possible (Williams, E-mail and "Smith").

  • E7. The Houston Editing Desk and the Editing Frame

    In 1978, Irving Rothman introduced a device that occupied a middle ground between the replacement or alternative collators and the old-fashioned methods of collation by "eye-and-hand" (Rothman 130). Rothman felt that despite the successes of the Hinman and a few of its descendants, collation by sight was still by far the most common method of comparing texts. The chief impediment to mechanical collation, according to Rothman, was simply that there were very few places where one could find multiple copies of any text from the same edition. Most editors were therefore forced to work primarily from copies, and Rothman felt that when copies were involved sight collation was more effective. He built two devices designed to work in concert that accommodated and facilitated the old-fashioned method rather than replaced it. He named these devices the Houston Editing Desk (HED) and the Editing


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    Frame (EDFRAME) [plate 7]. The HED was a portable, multi-layered Plexiglas box that allowed the bibliographer to organize more effectively the work of textual collation and editing. The HED was fitted with various compartments for the storage of copies as well as paper, pens, rulers, erasers, and other paraphernalia. The EDFRAME was a frame constructed to the precise dimensions of the type page in question, including head and direction lines. The text under investigation was placed on the top of the HED and then the EDFRAME over the text. A transparent rule was fitted to the width of the frame to assist in line-by-line referral. If an editor was performing collation within the same edition, two frames of the same dimension, each with its own independent rule, were used. If one was performing collation across editions, the frames could be manufactured to different sizes, say the left frame for a large folio page and the right for a smaller one, or even for different formats. Rothman also suggested various means by which the desk and frame could be customized to meet the needs of a particular project. Rothman's devices grew out of his research as a textual editor on The Stoke Newington Daniel Defoe Edition, currently being published by the AMS Press, Inc. Though he patented these two devices for commercial production, he never sold them or built any beyond the ones used in his own research.

  • E8. Rotating Vertical Collation Aids, or Twirler

    Developed by William Proctor Williams around 1998, this device [plate 8]was built specifically for "vertical" or cross-edition collation. Williams has kindly provided the following information on the origin and operation of his device:

    While working on the New Variorum Shakespeare edition of Titus AndronicusI have devised a collating tool that, although it does not do away with the old Wimbledon method of collation, does improve its efficiency. Tit Q1 (1594, the copy-text) exists in only one copy. Of Q2 (1600) there are only two copies; Q3 (1611) exists in 17 copies. These were all collated (Q3 regularly using optical collation) several years ago. However, now I was faced with the daunting task of the vertical collation all those editions from F1 (1623) on. I had seen illuminations and woodcuts of various sorts of book wheels and dimly wondered how they would work. Slowly this drifted around in my mind until one day in a DIY shop (I believe it was Home Depot, but any such shop can supply these things) I saw those pre-cut round wooden items sold as small table tops . . . and the light dawned. I first built one and then a second one (one for each side of the centrally located computer).

    Now when collating by the Wimbledon method using two Twirlers. . . I have 8 copies in front of me, plus the copy-text on paper and the historical collation on the computer screen, instead of just one or two other texts. I use the larger size of rectangular post-its as line holders. Although the collation takes slightly longer per line this way, when I am finished I have done 8 texts not just one. I have also found in practice that the accuracy of all the collations is improved because of the ability to spin back and forth between copies on the Twirlers and, since all previously completed copies are kept on shelves to the side of the worktable, it has also been the case that some errors and omissions from previous collations are also corrected in this manner.

    (Williams, Letter)

    So essentially what Williams has constructed are two revolving book stands, each capable of holding multiple texts. With his computer between the stands, he can look across several editions of the same text, checking and recording differences between them, spinning each twirler as he moves from edition to edition.


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INDEX OF PAST, PRESENT, AND "GHOST" OWNERS OR LOCATIONS

The index identifies all former and current owners of the four collators. In two cases (C1 and C5) I have been unable to obtain permission from the owners to list them in the census. In these two cases the city where the machine is located has been indexed instead. The index also includes "ghosts"—machines that have been mistakenly attributed or that were ordered but never delivered.

  • Abbott Labs, A37

  • American Antiquarian Society, A47

  • Arizona State University, B1

  • Ball State University, B5

  • Barlow, William P., A2

  • Baton Rouge, C1

  • Baylor University, A51

  • Bell, James Ford, A3

  • Bowling Green University, B16

  • British Museum/Library, A7, E6

  • Bristol-Myers, A36

  • Brown University, A33, B21

  • Bruccoli, Matthew, B28

  • Burroughs and Wellcome, A42

  • Cambridge University, A45, B34, C12

  • Central Intelligence Agency, A11

  • Charboneau, Brett, D9

  • Cheyney, Patrick, D6

  • Cornell University, A31, B14

  • Dane, Joseph, D1

  • Dearing, Vinton, E1

  • Eastern Kentucky University, B7

  • Elconco Corporation, A39

  • Florida State University, B2

  • Folger Shakespeare Library, A1, A2, A49

  • Gants, David, A25, C8, D11

  • Gerritsen, John, E4

  • Hailey, R. Carter, A49, D10

  • Harvard University, A4, B8

  • Herzog August Bibliothek, A54

  • Hoffman-LaRoche, A40

  • Horden, John, E5

  • Indiana University, A22

  • Johnson, Arthur M., A6

  • Jorgensen, Jon Gunnar, D12

  • Kansas State University, B6

  • Katz, Joseph, B24

  • Kent State University, A20, B17

  • Lafayette College, C4

  • Levin, Richard, E2

  • Liberty Business Development, A36

  • Library of Congress, A5

  • Louisiana State University, C2

  • Lowenstein, Joseph, D5

  • McLeod, Randall, C9

  • McGill University, C10

  • McMaster University, A26

  • Miami University, A19

  • Miles Laboratories, A38

  • Miller, David, D2

  • Mississippi State University, B10

  • Monash University, B30, C6

  • National Library of Canada, A44

  • National Library of Wales, C15

  • Newberry Library, A18

  • New York Public Library, A34, C2

  • Northern Illinois University, A30, B3

  • Northwestern University, A18

  • Norton, David Fate, C10

  • Ohio State University, A12

  • Ohio University, B18

  • Ortho Pharmaceuticals, A41

  • Oxford University, A28, B35

  • Penn State University, A57

  • Pierpont Morgan Library, C3, D3

  • Philadelphia, C5

  • Princeton University, B13

  • Rhodes University, B38

  • Rodriguez, Catherine, B28

  • Rosenwald, Lessing J., A5

  • Rothman, Irving, E7

  • Scheuler Communications, A36

  • Simon Fraser University, B31

  • Smith, Gerald A., E3

  • Southern Illinois University, A17, B4

  • State University of New York at Fredonia, B15

  • Stirling University, A52

  • Syracuse University, A31

  • Texas A&M University, A53, B23, B24

  • Texas Tech University, A35, B25

  • Trinity University, A29

  • United States Air Force, A6

  • United States Treasury Department, A11

  • Univerista di Udine, C14

  • University of Calgary, B32


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  • University of California, Davis, A46

  • University of California, Los Angeles, A21

  • University of California, Santa Cruz, A39

  • University of Colorado, Boulder, A56

  • University of Dublin, B37

  • University of Edinburgh, A27

  • University of Florida, A32

  • University of Guelph, C9

  • University of Houston, A41, B26

  • University of Illinois, A10

  • University of Iowa, A14

  • University of Kansas, A9

  • University of Kentucky, A48

  • University of Leeds, B36

  • University of London, C13

  • University of Massachusetts at Boston, B8

  • University of Minnesota, A3

  • University of Nebraska, A33, B12

  • University of New Brunswick, A25

  • University of New South Wales, C7

  • University of North Carolina, A24

  • University of Pennsylvania, A5, B20

  • University of South Carolina, A25, A44, A50, B22

  • University of Southern Mississippi, B11

  • University of Texas, Arlington, A33, B12

  • University of Texas, Austin, A16, B27

  • University of Toronto, B33

  • University of Wolverhampton, C11

  • University of Virginia, A8, B29, D7

  • University of Wisconsin, Madison, A23

  • University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, A15

  • Vander Meulen, David, A19, D8

  • Washington University, D4

  • West, James L. W., B19

  • Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität, A26

  • William H. Rohrer, Inc., A43

  • Williams, William Proctor, E8

  • Yale University, A13

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—. Letter to Jens Nyholm. 9 May 1966. Series 9/1/1, Box 31, Northwestern University Archives, Evanston, Illinois.

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—. Letter to Charlton Hinman. 19 Feb. 1970. Courtesy of Alexander Juniewicz.

—. Letter to Charlton Hinman. 21 Apr. 1972. Courtesy of Alexander Juniewicz.

—. Letter to Don Kunitz. 15 June 1973. Special Collections, University of California, Davis, California.

—. Letter to Dorothy M. Lawrence. 5 Oct. 1964. Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin, Texas.

—. Letter to E. F. Newland. 20 Dec. 1973. Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University, Waco, Texas.

—. Letter to Herzog August Bibliothek. 18 Aug. 1977. Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel, Germany.

—. Letter to Jack Herring. 23 Nov. 1973. Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University, Waco, Texas.

—. Letter to Don Kunitz. 15 June 1973. Special Collections, University of California, Davis, California.

—. Letter to Dorothy M. Lawrence. 5 Oct. 1964. Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin, Texas.

—. Letter to E. F. Newland. 20 Dec. 1973. Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University, Waco, Texas.

—. Letter to Herzog August Bibliothek. 18 Aug. 1977. Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel, Germany.

—. Letter to Jack Herring. 23 Nov. 1973. Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University, Waco, Texas.

—. Letter to Jack Herring. 20 Mar. 1974. Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University, Waco, Texas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 23 Feb. 1957. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 23 Apr. 1957. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 26 Dec. 1957. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 27 Jan. 1958. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 10 Mar. 1958. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 9 June 1958. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 24 June 1958. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

—. Letter to Joseph Rubinstein. 11 Aug. 1958. Uncataloged Hinman Papers, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

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—. Letter to William B. Todd. 13 Sept. 1962. Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin, Texas.

—. Letter to William B. Todd. 18 Oct. 1963. Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin, Texas.

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—. "Locations of Hinman Collators." Editorial Quarterly 1 (1975): 12.

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[*]

I am grateful to Larry Mitchell, James Harner, Mauri Ives, Douglas Brooks, David Vander Meulen, William Proctor Williams, and others for their encouragement, guidance, and advice throughout this project. I was fortunate to have the support of a Big XII Faculty Fellowship from Texas A&M University for early and critical research at the Kenneth Spencer Research Library at the University of Kansas. I am grateful to Bill Crowe, Alexandra Mason, Richard Clements, and the rest of the staff of the Spencer Library for their highly professional and always courteous assistance during the term of my Fellowship. My research on the Hinman, and to a much lesser extent the other devices aswell, has depended heavily on correspondence and other records relating to the sale, purchase, and manufacture of collators. For the most part I found these items in the administrative files of libraries and other institutions but many private individuals have also been generous in this regard. Chief among them is William P. Barlow, owner of the first Folger Hinman (A2 below). Very early on in my research he provided me with copies of letters from Arthur M. Johnson, manufacturer of the Hinman Collator, that were written to him when he acquired his machine. It was this act of generosity that inspired me to look elsewhere for like material, and though I am grateful to all those who provided access to such records I am especially indebted to Mr. Barlow. Many others have also given invaluable assistance, as the footnotes and the list of works cited amply attest. Responsibility for any mistakes, however, rests solely with me. And finally, I owe a special debt to Robert Michel, who supplied invaluable information on the last few Hinmans to be manufactured as well as his memories of and insights into the building of these machines back to the 1950s. Mr. Michel passed away in late 2002. This article is dedicated to his memory.

[1]

The use of the term "machine collation," and hence "mechanical collator," is a bit of a misnomer as the principles behind this activity and the devices that carry it out are more optical than mechanical in nature. The Hinman is the most machine-like of the four main devices treated here as it requires an independent power source and has both electronic and mechanical components. The others require no electricity and have no mechanically driven moving parts. Nevertheless, "machine collation" is the most popular term, and herein I use it interchangeably with "optical collation."

[2]

For a more detailed account of the invention and manufacturing of the Hinman, see my article " `The Eternal Verities Verified': Charlton Hinman and the Roots of Mechanical Collation," Studies in Bibliography 53 (2000): 129-161.

[3]

For an example of a recent and fruitful computer application, see Mari Agata, "Stop-press Variants in the Gutenberg Bible: The First Report of the Collation." Another example of the use of digital technology is described by Blaise Agüera y Arcas in "Temporary Matrices and Elemental Punches in Gutenberg's DK Type." In contrast to Agata, who is using digital technology for the same purpose as Hinman (i.e. the identification of stop press variants as a means of understanding the printing process), Agüera y Arcas uses digital technology to analyze and discover differences in letter forms as a means of illuminating the typefounding process. (Full publication details for these items appear in the list of Works Cited, below.)