Printers are still the last vital link in the news chain, even though faster, cheaper digital technology has replaced many traditional skills. At the Mirror, Len Walledge worked as a compositor, setting the hacks’ words and snappers’ shots into newspaper pages, while Barry Waterton sweated in the Mirror foundry, moulding those pages into metal printing plates. Today, their roles have disappeared. Automatic processes turn digital newspaper pages into metal plates that roll on the presses throughout the night.   Click here to watch the video Click here to play the game		Len explains why the unions controlled the printing industry for most of the twentieth century.           Barry talks about the death of the ‘hot metal’ process and how this led to the demise of traditional ‘teamworking’ practices.
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