printeress

English

Alternative forms

• printress

Etymology

From printer +‎ -ess.

Noun

printeress (plural printeresses)

1. (dated) A female printer.
   • 1835, The American Journal of the Medical Sciences, Philadelphia, Pa.: Carey, Lea & Blanchard, page 550:

     The “Historia Economico-politica y Estadistica de la Isla de Cuba,” (printed by the Widows of Arazoza y Soler, Printeresses of the Government, & c. Havana, 1831,) […].

   • 1867 February 1, Printers’ Circular, volume I, number 12, page 164:

     Our Union is very small, only two offices, but we are hopeful of the future. No discontent. All harmony. We have one office in town that is anti-Union all over; it employs a lot of fair unfair printeresses. We hope they will repent before a century expires.

   • 1872 April 25, “Local Miscellany”, in Nemaha Valley Journal‎^[1], volume V, number 14; number 222, Falls City, Neb.:

     The new millinery establishment evidently means business. It patronizes the painter and the printer The painteresses and the printeresses will, no doubt, return the compliment.

   • 1874 November 27, Missouri Republican; quoted in Autumn Stanley, “St. Louis Revisited”, in Raising More Hell and Fewer Dahlias: The Public Life of Charlotte Smith, 1840–1917, Bethlehem: Lehigh University Press, 2009, →ISBN, page 88:

     […] a pleasant little reunion yesterday afternoon at the residence of Charlotte Smith, No. 1004 Olive Street., to celebrate the formation of the Women’s Printing company. This has long been a favorite project with Mrs. Smith, and with her usual pluck she resolved to constitute herself a nucleus around whom should gather all the competent, able-minded, and able-bodied printeresses who felt disposed to unite in the enterprise.

   • 1875 October 20, Topeka Daily Blade‎^[2], number 406, Topeka, Kan.:

     One of our printeresses has got the dead wood on any jail, if she should ever be so unfortunate as to ever be locked up in one.

   • 1876 March 3, The Osage City Free Press‎^[3], number 51, Osage City, Kan.:

     ABOUT PRINTERESSES. Some unsophisticated editor in the southern portion of the State advertises for two girls to learn the printer’s trade.

   • 1882 October, The Printers’ Circular and Stationers and Publishers Gazette, volume XVII, number 8, Philadelphia, Pa.: R. S. Menamin, page 161:

     Typographical Union, No. 2, expects to “take the cake” in the Bi-Centennial parade of Tuesday, October 24. The Sixth New Jersey Band, about four hundred printers in line, a corps of apprentices, and two elegant banners—the gift of fair printeresses—are expected to accomplish the object.

   • 1888 July 12, “Editorial Jaunt. Emporia Visited by a Cyclone of Prohibition.”, in The Leader, volume 1, number 19, Topeka, Kan., Wichita, Kan., page 2:

     At noon on Saturday last, with stream-eyes and perspiring brow, The Leader man bade farewell to printers and the printeresses and the printers devil and rushed frantically to the Santa Fe depot and got there just in time to jump on the platform of a car of the fast out-going train, westward bound.

   • 1889 May 2, “A Few Base Ball Suggestions”, in Democratic Times‎^[4], volume 2, number 14, Hays City, Kan.:

     —What’s the motter with a game of base ball between the printers and clerks?—Sentinel. Let’s see now. By actual count there are just seven printers and two printeresses in town: but of course the two latter could not be depended upon as able-bodied base ballists.

   • 1889 May 31, “Moved with the Terminus”, in Santa Cruz Daily Surf, volume XI, number 187, Santa Cruz, Calif., page 2:

     The plant of the Templeton Times is moved to Santa Margarita. With it have gone the stream power press, the job press, type, printers, printeresses, Editor, and all but the old original office which stands as a land mark.

   • 1891 April 15, The Typographical Journal, Official Paper of the International Typographical Union of North America, volume II, number 17, Indianapolis, Ind., page 1:

     They reasoned and pleaded and wheedled and coaxed, he says, and yesterday all of his printeresses were gone but one, “and she’s wavering,” Mr. Darby added.

   • 1892 December 30, “Local News”, in Bureau County Tribune, volume XXI, number 22, Princeton, Ill., page 8:

     We have published this paper under some difficulties, as printers and “printeresses,” like other mortals, want to take vacations and visit friends during the holidays.

   • 1895 June 1, San Francisco News Letter, volume L, number 22, San Francisco, Calif., page 13:

     Five years from now, as we walk down Market street, we shall be greeted with such signs as “Groceress,” “Lady Undertakers,” “Tailoress,” “Saloon For Ladies Only,” and so forth, but the men will have a bitter revenge in running the candy stores and ice cream saloons, to say nothing of the vast area of employment left open to them in the housemaid, chambermaid and governess fields. Let us accept the inevitable! We are learning personally to baste, sew, cook and make baby clothes, mend stockings, and after this month we will discharge our present help and hire an editress, a bookkeeperess, a forewoman, a female devil, and a raft of printeresses. We must keep abreast of the times.

   • 1909, The Typographical Journal, page 289:

     There were about 200 printers and printeresses in the party, hailing from New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Pittsburg and Washington.

   • 1912 December 27, Lebanon Courier and Semi-Weekly Report, old series—volume XCIV, number 4; new series—volume V, issue 64, Lebanon, Pa., page 2:

     This new kind of profit shar[e] with employes cost the Sowers Co[m]pany over $600. The Sowers e[m]ployes are deeply grateful and if a[ny]one were to talk about a “soul[?] corporation” while any of the co[m]pany’s employes are around, printers and “printeresses” t[?] made happy this week would [be] quick to point to an example of [an]other kind.

   • 1915 July 1, “We Will Celebrate”, in The Albany Ledger‎^[5], volume 48, number 3, Albany, Mo.:

     The Ledger office will be closed on Monday, July 5th, during the celebration of the nation’s birthday and the printers and printeresses will take a day of well deserved rest and recreation.

   • 1919 January 30, The Border Sentinel‎^[6], volume 31, number 33, Mound City, Kan.:

     The Sun has lost in a little over four months three lady compositors by marriage and has about reached the end of the rope. We have only one helper left and in justice to ourself herewith give fair warning that from now on we shall protect our rights of property to the full extent of the law and our own physical prowess.—The Sun. Is the above a sly way of starting a procession of unmarried printeresses toward the Sun office?

   • 1964, Joan Lindsay, Facts Soft and Hard, F. W. Cheshire, page 56:

     While the printers were locked in conference, the printeresses appeared to be engaged on a full scale shopping spree, judging by the outcrop of flower-trimmed hats on newly waved heads in the lobbies and mountains of parcels in the lifts.