Interesting stuff. Here's a few thoughts.
The E91s would have been in sheets while being made. It's possible they were issued as strips, but wouldn't have been printed as strips. Especially if you go with a 19" press, I can't imagine the challenge of running a 19 wide by 2-5 inch high strip into a press.
Do we know the E91s were done at ALC?
Which is related to
ALC is known to have used several hoe #5 presses, which were 19 inch. But that comes from a Scientific American article about their converting to electric power and is from a shop floor layout drawing showing only one floor and possibly only one room of the overall shop.
They would have had several different size presses, anywhere from small proofing presses that would fit on an end table to really large ones much larger than 19 inches wide.
The strips shown, even the 16 card strip have no right margin. Typically a margin is used all around the printed area because the press usually doesn't print well towards the edges of the sheet. So it's not certain the sheet was only 16 cards wide. It's certain it was at least 16 wide. A fine but important distinction.
I have seen a couple cards that might indicate ALC running without a margin on one side, the one that comes to mind right off is a T201 with a diamond miscut and showing part of the left margin.
The 16 card strip doesn't preclude a 19 inch press, as it would be possible to run a sheet about 19 x 24+ the long way. That's not typical, but could be done. Modern presses aren't set up to feed a sheet in narrow end first unless you're using a larger press than the width. (It's all about the diameter of the blanket cylinder) But the old ones have a very large cylinder.
That's actually a fairly close fit for the set. it would be a 16x6 card sheet, or 96 cards -2.9 sets/sheet with one card slightly short printed. That would also work on a press a bit larger, around 25-26 wide.
Steve B
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