The Press that Cotton Built: Printing in Mobile, Alabama, 1850-1865

The decade of the 1850s and the four devastating years of the Civil War witnessed a surge in publishing and printing activity in Mobile. Before the War, this was stimulated by a 30 percent increase in the population and a thriving commercial climate that, by 1860, made the Cotton City the third-largest port in the United States. During the War, Mobile suffered a scarcity of printing materials, especially paper and ink, but, despite this, a few enterprising, though part-time publishers, especially W. G. Clark & Co. and S. H. Goetzel & Co., increased the production of printed matter to serve the needs of the city's literature-hungry citizens and the Confederate Army. The history of the publication of many kinds of printed matter produced during this time period—newspapers, books, pamphlets, and jobs (business forms, etc.)—is augmented by information about the materials, equipment, and technology used to bring the words and images of editors, authors, and artists into tangible forms. The materials covered include paper, type, stereotyping, electrotyping, illustrative printing techniques, e.g., wood engraving and lithography, and ink. Four types of printing presses in use in Mobile are described, as well as the techniques employed in the city's binderies. A few of the printers and pressmen who “got up” the newspapers and books are identified, and their daily activities are described in detail. Two extensive appendices provide descriptive bibliographies of a number of Mobile imprints from this period and illustrative material to supplement both the bibliographies and the technical information presented throughout the study.