Aug. 8, 1876: Edison Patents Mimeograph ...

[cmeisenzahl]

If I never hear the term 'ditto-packet' again, it will be too soon. ;-)

Aug. 8, 1876: Edison Patents Mimeograph
"Before the inkjet printer, before the laser printer, before the dot-matrix printer, before the photocopier, there came the mimeograph machine. They were everywhere — in schools, offices and the military. If you needed just a few copies of a document, you used carbon paper. If you needed thousands (and had the time and the budget), you could send it to a print shop for typesetting and publication. But if you needed something in between, say 30 copies for a classroom handout (or test!) or 500 or 1,000 for a church bulletin or incendiary revolutionary poster, you had the mimeograph."
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/08/dayintech_0808

 

[PhotonBoy]

Shades of grade school. When I was in grades 1 thru 3, the teachers would send out information using a big Ditto machine - this was in about 1951-1953 or so. The ink had a pale blue look but oh the smell! I used to smell the surface of the paper to smell the ink. I don't know what it is precisely, but it had a strong, pleasant odor, something like a combination of alcohol or chloroform.

From wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_duplicator

"...Both the isopropanol and the methanol found in ditto solvents are toxic substances....

The aroma of pages fresh off the Ditto machine was a memorable feature of school life for those who attended in the ditto machine era. A pop culture reference to this is to be found in the film Fast Times At Ridgemont High. At one point a teacher hands out a dittoed exam paper and every student in the class immediately lifts it to his or her nose and inhales...."

 

[Marduke]

I know of one instructor at my old highschool who still uses his own personal machine to this day to make his own exams. He got fed up with the rules about using the copy machine, and the copy limits set in place with tightening school budgets.