Pedel Press Cropper & Charlton

The proprietors of this firm’s business are Messrs. Soormpally Chinapapiah Chetty & Sons, who were well known in commercial circles in Madras, and as general and fine art colour printers, machine rulers, account-book makers, engravers, die-stampers, rubber-stamp makers and paper merchants. Papiah Chetty commenced business in or about the year 1869, but he did not take over the printing and other works at No 14 Francis Joseph Street until 1904. Immense improvements were made with regard to the machinery since that date. Electricity was installed for the motive power and for lighting purposes. Messrs. Payne & Co. were printers to many leading commercial firms and insurance and other corporations and companies. The firms had a very large connection throughout the whole of the mofussil and they are justly entitled to the high reputation, which they have acquired in the printing world of Southern India. This Crooper printing press was located in the Tanjore in the hands of a small time pressman who had acquired it through an auction at Payne & Co in 1935 and is currently exhibited at INDeco Hotels Swamimalai, India’s only winner of the Global Eco Tourism Award.



		his Cropper Charlton & Co Ltd Franklin, London & Nottingham produced manual pedal press is said to have bought in operational ease into mass printing. Though mechanical, this press was maintenance free and was the darling of small time printers. This originally belonged to the army of presses of Payne & Co established in 1869 in the Madras Presidency.
		The proprietors of this firm’s business are Messrs. Soormpally Chinapapiah Chetty & Sons, who were well known in commercial circles in Madras, and as general and fine art colour printers, machine rulers, account-book makers, engravers, die-stampers, rubber-stamp makers and paper merchants. Papiah Chetty commenced business in or about the year 1869, but he did not take over the printing and other works at No 14 Francis Joseph Street until 1904. Immense improvements were made with regard to the machinery since that date. Electricity was installed for the motive power and for lighting purposes. Messrs. Payne & Co. were printers to many leading commercial firms and insurance and other corporations and companies. The firms had a very large connection throughout the whole of the mofussil and they are justly entitled to the high reputation, which they have acquired in the printing world of Southern India. This Crooper printing press was located in the Tanjore in the hands of a small time pressman who had acquired it through an auction at Payne & Co in 1935 and is currently exhibited at INDeco Hotels Swamimalai, India’s only winner of the Global Eco Tourism Award.