Perhaps the Earliest Photograph of a Hoe Four Cylinder Type-Revolving Printing Machine

I have not seen another photograph of one of these huge printing machines from the period. The woman wearing a long skirt shown in the photograph seems to be in a costume typical for women working with printing machines at the time. See the image of a woman in a hoop skirt operating an Adams Power Press in this database entry for the Harper Establishment dated 1855. During this period women were often employed as paper feeders for printing machines, such as this Hoe Type-Revolving Printing Machine, that required manual feeding of paper. Sometimes women may also have performed other tasks in the operation of printing machines that did not require the brute strength that was often needed to operate manual presses.