Typographical Union
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a society of compositors banded together for mutual protection, for the regulation of wages, fixing the number of apprentices allowed to each establishment, the length of time each apprentice must serve in order to become a master workman, and for extending general aid to the members of such association. With the extension of the printing business in the United States, and especially with the development of newspapers, there arose a necessity for mutual protective associations among compositors and other cognate trades conassociations were at first local in their nected with the art of printing. These jurisdiction. But the migratory habits of journeymen printers suggested the necessity for an organization that would secure for these nomads the comity and extension of favor and protection which the members of a common craft should always receive from each other. From this necessity arose the International Union, which is composed of delegates from subordinate unions in the United States and Canada. While the International Union is the supreme body, the management of the internal affairs of each union is left almost entirely to the subordinate divisions. Thus each local union may regulate the number of apprentices, the scale of wages for composition, time work, etc. Whenever a member of one local union comes within the jurisdiction of another local body, he at is subject to the once by-laws of the lat ter. Traveling cards are granted to members, but these cards must be de posited with the local union within the jurisdiction of which its holder proposes to remain for a given length of time, and dues must be paid into the local union with which the card is deposited. There are numerous local unions in the United States, that of New York City being the largest, having a membership of some thousands-followed by delphia, Boston, St. Louis, and other Chicago, Philalarge cities of the country. The International Union meets once every year, at different places in the United States or Canada, while the local unions usually hold a meeting each month to transact regular business.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Collier's wrote this in 1921, the International Typographical Union was one of the strongest craft unions in North America, and hand and Linotype compositors set nearly every page printed. Photocomposition and then computer typesetting destroyed the trade itself: New York's Local 6 struck the city's papers for 114 days in 1962-63 over automation, and in 1974 the union traded its control of the composing room at the New York Times for lifetime job guarantees for existing members. Weakened by the disappearance of the work it existed to protect, the ITU merged into the Communications Workers of America in 1987, ending 135 years of independent existence. The apprentice quotas and travelling cards described here now belong to labour history rather than to any working trade.
Written for this edition, 2026.