Something pretty impressive happened on October 28, 1886. A completely spontaneous act started a tradition (and, presumably, a nightmare for sanitation workers and cleanup crews). New York City office workers we so very moved by the dedication of the Statue of Liberty that they threw ticker tape out of their office windows, creating the first ticker tape parade.
Ever wonder what, exactly, is meant by the “ticker tape” part of that equation? We did, too. Ticker tapes were the earliest form of digital communications and enabled folks to read stock market information as it was transmitted via telegraph lines. The name itself came from the sound the machines made when printing out continuously updated information. And it was a technology that remained in use well into the twentieth century; the notion of ticker tapes were obsolete by the 1960’s (replaced by TV & radio) but only after a 90-year run as a useful method of financial information transmission.
While the ticker tape may be a thing of the past, the ticker tape parade is not. Nowadays, however, either shredded paper or confetti is used. And while we’re always tempted to have a little ticker tape parade of our own whenever someone sells their item, we restrain ourselves. In fact, we recycle all used issues of Paper Shop. And even better? We print every book on paper that’s FSC certified.