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Making history every week Edgefielddaily.com web posted August 10, 2005  Lisa
McGee running the press at The Edgefield AdvertiserEdgefield Daily.com photo EDGEFIELD - Everyone knows how historical Edgefield County is with the home of Ten Governors, Senators, Congressmen, and the oldest newspaper in South Carolina. The Edgefield Advertiser has been published and printed in the Town of Edgefield since February 11, 1836, or 165 years. Each day the paper continues, history continues to be made. Present owner Suzanne Derrick, who took over for her father Walter Mims in 2003, has built the paper’s popularity to its former position in local media against rival The Citizen News. Walter Mims, who owned the paper since 1937, let it slip as his age increased and as his health decreased as his ability to manage thepaper the way he did in his prime showed. The Mims family has owned the paper for over 100 years. The addition of Clint Bowie as Editor has also proven to be contributing to the gaining popularity of the newspaper. Mr. Bowie is an Edgefield County native and after graduating from the University of Chicago he returned home and joined the staff in June of 2003. Mr. Bowie said the best part of working for The Edgefield Advertiser is, “it makes me feel like part of the community.” With a staff of seven, and a host of community columnists, the Advertiser, as it is known by many, has created a true community feel within its pages. The Edgefield Advertiser covers current news to peach cobblers. However, all the hard work the reporters, staff, and Editor do, without the heart of the paper showing up on Tuesday night not much else would matter.  Left: The large camera used to make negitivesLisa McGee takes everything created and turns it into the paper that is found throughout the county in its printed form. Once the paper is laid out and pasted together Lisa takes those sheets and takes a picture of them. Once she has created negatives of all the pages she develops them into negatives, “our processor is down right now so I am having to do it by hand,” she said. Once the negatives have been hung and dried the negatives are then transferred to metal plates and the images are “burned” onto the plates with intense light. “If this machine was to go down I could take them out in the sun for about five minutes and do the same thing,” McGee said. From there the metal plates are placed on the press drums. The ink only sticks to the words and images. Each set of drums of the press prints two full pages and they are then run together into a folder which folds and cuts the pages.  Left: The plate burnerBells ring when the press is started to warn the press is about to begin. Sounding much like the old steam engine trains it begins its rhythmic clacking very slowly and increases until full speed is reached. At that point Lisa McGee said, “right now we could print about 5000 copies in an hour.” McGee said not many places still do hand developing anymore, even though she’d prefer their processor was fixed, “I still do things the old fashioned way,” saying most paper use a “register” system where a series of pins keeps all the plates aligned, “I just do it by hand.” “When we start doing color, we are going to have to go to the register system,” McGee said, “everything has to be perfect then.” She said she learned her skills by graduating from Augusta Tech for printing and graphics. McGee has been with the Edgefield Advertiser for about a year.  Left: Lisa keeping a watchful eye on the press in case
adjustments need to be madeWhen not printing the paper she joins the staff doing computer work or, “just about anything else they need done,” she said. Together the staff of The Edgefield Advertiser continues to make history one week at a time with over 8500 continuous weeks of printing, right here in Edgefield.  The finished productEdgefield Daily.com photo Return to Main Page
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