5.1.3: 1910 - heden - Paper (incl. production, watermarks, paper trade)


No fundamental improvements to the production techniques were made in this period. Paper was still made using Fourdrinier machines, with wood-pulp and cellulose as the main raw materials. There were, however, improvements made to the different sections of the production process. At the beginning of the century, electricity replaced steam as the power source. Paper machines became wider and faster. Around 1850, depending on the quality of the paper, a Fourdrinier machine could make between 3 and 20 metres per minute, with a width of a metre and a half. Around the year 2000, some types of paper are produced at a rate of 1830 metres per minute. Beginning in the early twentieth century, new chemical processes were developed for a more efficient preparation of cellulose, which also reduced damage to the fibres, so that stronger paper could be produced. Since the seventies, computers have regulated the level of humidity and the chemical composition of the paper and registered the stocks. There was a growing differentation of paper as well as increased specialization of paper making machinery. Beginning in the 1920s, for instance, glossy paper was produced for magazines with photographs. In contrast to this diversification, the standardisation of paper formats was regulated in the Paper Decree of 1922. The so-called DIN sizes, which are still used, were derived from four standard sizes, A, B, C and D (the best-known is the A4 size).

The Dutch paper trade and industry profited greatly from the huge increase in the use of paper in this century. In 1920, 70 million kilos of paper were produced in the Netherlands, against 2.5 billion kilos in 1988. The two world wars, the economic crisis in the 1930s and the two oil crises in the seventies caused severe problems in the supply of power and raw materials, but after each crisis the production was increased. The paper industry was characterized by mergers and growth. Until c. 1960 businesses grew by increasing the number of machines; after that date they perfected their production processes and merged with other companies. As ever, the paper market was international. In 1939, 33% of the paper used in the Netherlands came from abroad and in 1990 77%. Newsprint paper, in particular, was imported to an increasing extent (from Canada, Finland). On the other hand, in 1939, 23% of the Dutch production was sold abroad and in 1990 74%. The recycling of old paper became an increasingly important means for reducing the dependence on foreign sources of wood pulp and, from the 1970s onward, to meet environmental legislation. Used paper accounted for 36% of the raw material in the 1970s; at the beginning of the 21st century, its use had grown to 77%.

Increasing production in the paper industry has usually been a matter of quantum leaps, because investments in large and expensive machinery were involved. As a consequence, there has been a strong fluctuation of under- and overcapacity. Together with the dependence on foreign sources of raw materials and a strongly cyclically sensitive international market, this has made the paper trade a risky one, despite the growing demand for paper. This explains the tendency among paper manufacturers throughout the twentieth century to cooperate in order to control sales and prices and to prevent too much competition. Initially, this was done by creating informal cartels; within the Vereniging van Nederlandse Papierfabrikanten (Association of Dutch Paper Manufacturers), founded in 1904, agreements were made in order to prevent competition. It was also a powerful government lobby, which played a vital role in the regulation of import and export. The paper wholesalers had an association as well: the Vereeniging van de Nederlandse Papiergroothandelaren (Association of Dutch Paper Wholesalers), founded in 1909 and renamed Nederlandsche Bond van Papiergroothandelaren (Dutch Union of Paper Wholesalers) in 1936.

Beginning in the 1970s the cooperation between paper manufacturers increasingly took the form of mergers. Initially, they were mostly takeovers of small Dutch companies by the 'big three': Van Gelder, Koninklijke Nederlandsche Papierfabriek and Bührmann-Tetterode. From the mid-eighties mergers became international. The most important Dutch paper companies were then taken over by large foreign concerns in wooded countries such as Canada, The United States and Finland, which were already producing a substantial amount of the pulp and cellulose, but gained an ever growing share in the production of paper from the 1960s onward.


author: D. van Lente
 
 


Paper (incl. production, watermarks, paper trade)



marbled paper

Definition: decorated paper with a marbling effect produced by placing drops of colour on a liquid surface (the marbling size), using a marbling trough.



brocade paper

Definition: kind of decorated paper: hand-made paper, coloured with a brush on one side on which a (imitation) gold leaf decorative pattern or picture is printed.



laid paper

Definition: hand-made paper or (mostly) imitation hand-made paper with a fine screen of water lines.



glossy coated paper

Definition: highly-glossed paper.



hand-made paper

Definition: hand-made paper, laid or not, made with a mould, usually with watermark and deckle edges.



wood-pulp paper

Definition: paper containing ground wood-pulp with many small impurities, usually easily torn; cheap but not durable.



wood-free paper

Definition: paper that does not contain wood-pulp, but which is made from pure cellulose and/or cotton or linen rags. It has a beautiful colour and is durable.



paper boys

Definition: person who daily delivers a paper in the letterbox of readers with a subscription.



lignin-rich paper

Definition: kind of ligneous paper: lignin is an element of wood. It causes a rapid ageing of paper whose fibrous composition consists partly of lignin.



Lombardy paper

Definition: name for imported paper of Italian origin, common until the end of the 17th century.



rag paper

Definition: kinds of paper that have been made entirely of rags. As soon as rags are only partly used in a kind of paper, then this is rag-content paper.



machine-made paper

Definition: paper made using a paper machine



marbled paper

Definition: kind of paper used inter alia for bindings: paper on which - by a special process - a decorative pattern, which sometimes resembles marble, is created by applying a thin layer of paint of two or more colours, or paper printed with an imitation resemblingit.



bulky paper

Definition: paper which combines great thickness with a relatively light weight (used by publishers to make small books look more voluminous).



acid-free paper

Definition: paper with a neutral pH value (about pH 7), mainly used in conservation and restoration.



paper

Definition: general term for a material produced in the form of reels or sheets, formed by draining a suspension of vegetable fibres (rags, straw, wood, etc.) on a sieve and usually used, after sizing, for writing, drawing or printing; the name 'paper' is used for aweight of up to about 165 g/m2, 'cardboard' or 'board' for a higher weight.



permanent paper

Definition: alkaline paper which satisfies international standards as regards composition and physical properties, so that a durability of at least 150 years is guaranteed.



Troy paper

Definition: name for imported paper of French origin, used until the end of the 17th century.



paper finishers

Definition: workmen in a printing office who hang the damp paper up to dry on a line after it has been printed.



paper conservation

Definition: the restoring, stopping or preventing paper decay caused by acidification and wear and tear.



paper mills

Definition: industrial concern in which paper is produced on a large scale.



paper manufacturers

Definition: 1. owner, employer of a papermill. 2. producer of hand-made paper.



paper formats

Definition: dimensions of a sheet of paper.



paper wholesale businesses

Definition: company that resells large quantities of paper, supplied by producers, to printing offices and other businesses.



paper trade

Definition: economic activity of trading paper, i.e. the buying and selling of paper, as intermediary between production and consumption.



paper traders

Definition: someone whose profession is trading paper.



paper industry

Definition: collective name for all branches of industry concerned with the production of paper.



paper machines

Definition: machine with which paper is formed, pressed, dried and smoothed, from cellulose fibres and other paper ingredients. The result is turned into rolls or cut into sheets.



paper mills

Definition: water mills or windmills where the production of handmade rag paper took place. The drive mechanism of the mill was used to move the beaters loosening the rag fibres.



paper research

Definition: 1. testing paper to judge its appropriateness for a certain use. 2. analysis of paper to determine age or origin.



paper production

Definition: 1. the total of paper produced. 2. paper making.



kinds of paper

Definition: collective name for variants in paper, originating in the use of different raw materials, sizes and production methods.



paper splitting

Definition: in book restoration: the splitting of paper into two layers which are pasted together again after a support layer has been placed in between.



paper treaters

Definition: labourers in a printing office who wet the paper before printing, so that the ink is absorbed better.



decorated paper

Definition: collective name for all sorts of decorated paper whose decoration has come into being either during the manufacturing process or by graphic or other final processing of the sheet of paper.



woodblock paper

Definition: kind of decorated paper printed by means of wooden blocks, which are frequentlyderived from cotton print-works, with a decorative pattern in one or more colours; used especially in the 18th and 19th centuries for covers, endpapers and as pasting materialfor the boards of books.



wove paper

Definition: non-laid hand-made paper, sometimes with a watermark in the bottom edge of the paper