We take paper so much for granted that I’m tempted to say: Where would be without it?!
Okay, being a printer, I would say that.
But this got me thinking about the history of papermaking, so here’s a quick trip through time to where it all started.
The word paper is derived from the name of the reedy plant papyrus, which grows abundantly along the Nile River in Egypt. However, true paper is made of pulped cellulose fibres like wood, cotton or flax.
First there was Papyrus
Papyrus is made from the sliced sections of the flower stem of the papyrus plant, pressed together and dried, and then used for writing or drawing. Papyrus appeared in Egypt around 2400 B.C.
Then there was Paper
A courtier named Ts’ai-Lun, from Lei-yang in China, was the first recorded inventor of paper circa 105 A.D. Ts’ai-Lun presented paper and a papermaking process to the Chinese Emperor and that was noted in the imperial court records.
Chinese Papermaking
The ancient Chinese first made paper in the following fashion:
- Plant fibres such as hemp were soaked and beaten into a sludge
- The sludge was then strained through a cloth sieve attached to a frame that also served as a drying platform for the resulting paper.
Newsprint
Charles Fenerty of Halifax made the first paper from wood pulp (newsprint) in 1838.
Fenerty was helping a local paper mill maintain an adequate supply if rags to make paper, when he succeeded in making paper from wood pulp.
And, as I said at the outset … where would we be without paper?
Answers please, of course, on a postcard!!
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