I'm old enough to remember when mimeos were still used in schools. I can still recall that odd shade of purple ink, and the peculiar (and possibly carcinogenic) smell that the printed sheets had. Photocopiers made things so much easier.

That was likely a Ditto machine or spirit duplicator, another way schools, churches and offices commonly reproduced copies before the Xerox. The difference is that a mimeo prints with ink (usually black). A sprit duplicator printed with a dye that was on the master copy. The dye was purple. It was dissolved with alcohol, the source of the pungeant odour you recall.

That device is so obscure to me that I had to look it up!

SF fans still do use them, though they're a vanishing breed. I still have a working mimeo -- built in the 1930s -- and sufficient ink, absorbant paper and stencils that I could publish one last zine if I wanted to go to the trouble. The last time I did, was around 1986, I think.

Holy crap! I haven't seen a mimeograph machine since I was a kid. The teachers at my school used to run our assignment sheets off on one.

Nice.

I can only echo what Patcat and Expandranon said.
I recall the smell and dodgy purple print.

That would be a Ditto machine, or spirit dupliator. The did resemble each other, but a mimeo uses real ink, an a spirit dupliator presses dye onto paper from a master.

Of course, a spirit duplicator, that was the thing.

I've a fanwork of filk songs around here somewhere printed that way. Faded purple ink on yellow construction paper. Must find it some time and transfer the information. I've a 'post card' mimeograph machine sitting on a bookshelf. Its missing a few minor pieces, mainly the rubber ones, but fun to show to people. Like my sons friends who bitch about photocopy costs. Just like my slide rule and two cans of "1 megabyte memory, loose" (its unstrung core.)

Again, faded purple "ink" means it was probably a spirit duplicator. Ditto dyes were notorious for fading over time, though I know of instances where fanzines that were Ditto'ed are stil easily legible 70 years later.

Never even heard about those up till this post.

I remember the really fancy jobs that would print in two colors...

Sigh... another spirit duplicator. You could print in any number of colours. When you wanted a separate colour on the master, you could just remove the back sheet and replace it with one of another colour, and just go on typing. It was all the same to the alcohol that dissolved the dyes.

You can do multi-colour mimeography too, but each colour requires a separate pass through the machine. The mimeo has to be thoroughly cleaned of ink as well, before you add a new colour ink.

"You know I am Count the count. Because I really like to ******* Sometimes I sit and ****** all day. But, uh, sometimes I get carried away. I ******* slowly, slowyly, slowly getting faster. Once I get to ***ing it is very hard to stop. Faster, faster it is so exciting..." Sorry, it reminded me of unnecessary censorship...:3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD6Efggk5s8

I remember the term 'mimeograph', but hitting up Wikipedia reveals that the device that was used when I was in elementary school was a (name I never heard) Spirit Duplicator, known by some (not in my school) as a "ditto machine". The output: purple-colored printing that smelled of alcohol.

I was just about to mention that I thought of ditto machines and purple ink and the smell. Funny how powerful memory can be, huh?

Well, that odor was usually the only pleasant part of the assignment

It was alcohol. Though wood alcohol, and poison.

YES!!!

Ditto was a brand name, like Gestetner and Roneo were for mimeographs. The names on the mimeos I illustrated are fictional -- mainly compounded from real names.

The little postcard sized one I have was branded TOWER and sold by SEARS ROEBUCKS AND COMPANY. That should give you some idea as to the age. SEARS dropped the name ROEBUCKS a long time ago. Long before K-Mart bought the company. This unit is probably from the 1950's though. Its fun to look at, and to think about how people used to make multiple copies at home 'on the cheap.'

Ditto was a brand name, like Kleenix, Coke or Asprin.

"...AH! AH! AH! AH! AH! AH! AH! AH! Ahhhhhhhh!"</C. v. C.>

I don't remember any mimos in my childhood, but I do remember the spirit duplicator. And the nummy smell of a fresh copy. The had on in the graphics arts class at Nathan Hale High. A clever person could make a multicolor master by using different color backings.

Uh-huh. Basically, if you could type, you could use a Ditto machine. Mimeography was more like a pocket offset plant, and took skill to do right.

Was that the system where you typed on a wax sheet, knocking holes in the heet in the shape of letters?

That's the system. You plaster the wax sheet on a silk screen stretched between two drums on the machine. Ink is spread on the top roller and is distributed evenly by two rollers inside that you don't see. As you crank, the paper is squeezed between the was sheet, called the stencil, and a third, rubber roller. It's fairly simple, but can be surprisingly finicky. The skill comes in when you learn to predict a problem before it developes, and know how to deal with it. Underinking or overinkng are the chief worries, but you can also rip a stencil, or the stencil can creep upward, wrinkle, or twist sideways, distorting the page in novel ways.

So thats what the heck that obscure machine was that nobody dared touch was all about. We had one in the corner of our 'copy-shop' at school. Everyone said it was a copy machine but hadn't the knowledge to use it. We had it along with several Ab Dick standard mono offset printers, (the small upright models). We feared the shop gremlins wrath from fiddling with that machine. We had enough problems with shop-gremlins as it was for our Ab Dick printers, so we dared not make them angry. In particular the most recognizable machine was the one right next to the top most 'five' it was mounted on this heavy (extremely heavy-duty) cast-iron and heavy steel 'mobile-cart' with heavy step-lock down wheels. Took two people to move the contraption as it was a well built piece of work, Pea green paneling with steel sides, cast crank, and lacquered wood on the handle. Couldn't tell you who made that one, but looks almost exactly like that.

Most professional copy shops must have had mimeograph machines at one time... and most schools and churches. But most have long gone the way of all obsolete technology. One time outside a church I found a brand new light table, made by the Gestetner company to lay wax stencils on. The light from below made them more or less transparent, so that you could trade art onto the stencil with special tools. I never used it for that, but you could use it for tracing art onto another sheet of paper just as well.

Did you get a new scanner? You're posting pics that seem to be showing a lot more detail of the inks and paper texture! :)

Yes. The old one died.