On a December day in 1885, Bill Barnes, a journeyman from the New York World, and Joe McCann, representing the New York Herald, faced off in a match race of Swifts, compositors who set type by hand, individually, letter by letter, with incredible accuracy and speed. McCann got off to a slow start, but at the end of the four-hour race, he joined shopfloor legends Clinton -The Kid- DeJarnatt and the -Velocipede- George Arensberg as a working-class hero. It was not the last race of its kind between Swifts, but already looming were changes both social and technological that would cause these...
On a December day in 1885, Bill Barnes, a journeyman from the New York World, and Joe McCann, representing the New York Herald, faced off in a matc...
