Missale Romanum Media Page

MISSALE ROMANUM PRODUCTION IMAGES

Click on a thumbnail to see a production image:

	Pre-press proofing The reprint manager (on right) and pre-press technician (on left) examine one of 74 signatures (1 double-sided signature is 16 pages, or 8 per side) that the former has already proofed for proper color-separation (red and black texts). Any original color errors (e.g., black for red) made by Benziger (which were not corrected due to the labor-intensive method of resetting 2-color linotype plates) were amended, while scanning and original printing deficiencies (marks, spots, light ink coverage or bleed-throughs) were fixed digitally via the computer to ensure a pristine copy.
	Printing of first batch of signatures An historic moment: at 9:00 am CST on January 11, 2008, for the first time since its original printing by Benziger in 1963, the 1962 Missale Romanum reprint begins to come off the press!
	First batch of signatures completed! The proud project manager stands next to the first stack of signatures printed (just the first side); total running time: 20 minutes.
	Finished signatures awaiting to be folded Shown here are skids of completely printed signatures (both sides) awaiting to be folded. 74 of these skids will make up the whole project.
	Folding in progress The batch of the first missal signature (the first 16 pages) are folded. The lady furthest away feeds the folding machine, while the lady in the front removes the folded signatures and places them in a box for shipment to the bindery. Meanwhile, the folding machine manager periodically checks folded signatures to ensure their accuracy.
	Folded signatures boxed A shot into the box (skid) holding the folded signatures (also referred to as "forms" as seen by the note).
	Finished skids ready for the bindery A shot showing some of the 26 skids of folded signatures before being sent to the bindery to be sewn into book blocks.
	Sewing the collated signatures At the bindery, 2 sets of signatures (each one containing 16 pages) are sewn together to form a 32-page signature. Eventually, all of these 32-page signatures will be sewn together into a single book block, which will then be sent to the gilder's to have the edges sanded and gilded.
	Sewing endsheets onto front and rear signatures Part of the process described above, includes the sewing of the precut endsheets to either the immediate front or final rear set of signatures. Stitched to these signatures and heavily glued to the insides of the cover boards, these endsheets bridge the book block to the inside of the cover and are an essential component to any high-quality binding project. Constructed of durable, thick paper-cover stock, the endsheets' color will match the missal's cover, so here we see a batch of endsheets intended for the red-covered missals.
	Gilding of book blocks After the individual signatures were sewn into a block to comprise a book, the endsheets were applied and then the compiled book blocks were sent to the gilder. A long-time reputable, family-owned company was used for this task, which vigorously guards its trade secret of gilding by hand, hence the lack of pictures of the actual process. The top image shows some of the crates of newly-gilded missals that were shipped back to the bindery, with two samples opened to reveal the beautiful gilding (with green endsheets for the green covered missals). The second image shows the signature markings that aided the collators to ensure that all of the signatures for each book block were placed in proper order. While the third images demonstrates the beautiful gold foil luster on the page ends and the heavy, high-quality, vellum finish endsheet material employed.


	Manufacturing of Spines At the bindery, the wide spines had to be specially reinforced to ensure that it remains stiff and does not sag or crumple when opening and closing the book repeated. Also added were the thin plastic pieces that form the decorative hubs on the spine, thereby matching the original missal sample. In the first picture we see the thin plastic pieces being cut out. In the second, the spine reinforcement sheets (with two of several of the plastic hub pieces) being centered on the back side of the bonded leather cover material and the extra thick cover boards. The inset picture of the missal highlights two of the hubs on a completed sample of the reprinted missal.

	Manufacturing Covers After the spines have been made, the bonded leather sheets are formed over and glued to the extra thick cover boards. < shown here is a pallet of the raw bonded leather sheets, in red and green.
	<The bonded leather sheets is carefully cut, formed and adhered to the cover boards and spine reinforcement material.
	<A group of partially complete covers await their turn for the mechanized process of inserting and adhering the book block (the paper) via the endsheets to the covers.
	<The gold foil embossing (stamping) process underway. Circled in red can be seen the outline left in the gold foil sheet after it has been applied to the cover.
	<A group of fully completed red missal covers awaiting to the adhesion of the book block.
	Manufacturing Tabs Meanwhile the special page bonded leather tabs were being custom cut and applied to the reinforced cambric tape.
	Then the tabs are individually applied to specific missal pages which had to be done manually, as there is no mechanized way to do this task. Missals with red covers get red regular tabs and black special tabs, and green covered missals get green regular tabs and black special tabs. As a matter of interest, Benziger Brothers' 1962 edition of the altar missal had more specialty tabs than any other missal.