When Adequate Was the Best

Rubber Soul Survivor? (E. 28 St.)

The high water mark of mid-20th century business technology? The IBM Selectric II typewriter, a classic to be sure. The Xerox photocopier--I suppose we all remember the first time we enlarged something on its glass plate. But what of the humble rubber stamp? New York City used to be awash in businesses that specialized in making rubber stamps of any size, with any rubric or motto (fit or unfit) to print. And to think, they would do it within two or three business days!

I suppose the crowning glory of my editorial career in the mid-eighties, at one of the last family owned publishing houses in midtown Manhattan, was the stamp I had made for tracking the zillions of pieces of manuscript paper through the editing, proofreading, cross-referencing, and indexing stages. I went to Adequate Rubber Stamp Co., somewhere in the west 30s (there were a few stamp makers on the block). I was so pleased with the result that I went back and ordered one as a gift for my senior editor, who was notoriously territorial about her books: "HANDS OFF, A.W." A year or so later, we bought our first PCs (Kaypros!) under my direction. The future of the rubber stamp industry was, well, stamped on the wall.