When the first writers began inscribing their thoughts or facts on stone tablets, they probably never envisioned the printing processes that we all have available to us today. When we look at the ancient tablets of stone, scrolls of sheepskin, and parchment paper, we can realize how desperately people wanted to have these words last.

Once writing became wide spread, it also became fashionable to be able to read. For many years only scholars or the very rich and noble were extended this privilege. In our society today it is almost unheard of to not know how to read. We have to be able to read in order to function well in our daily lives. The things that we read are everywhere. We get up in the morning and read the paper, we drive to work and read road signs, we get to work and usually have to read some more.

It would be almost impossible to get along without being able to read, although there are some people who can manage somehow to go all through school and still not be able to read adequately by the time they graduate. If you just stopped to think about all the times we are faced with having to read something, it can be quite astounding. Every time we go to a store and buy something, we are given a receipt to read about the purchases we made. When we go to a video store we get a pamphlet containing the upcoming movies.

When we check the mail everyday we are getting items that we have to be able to read. When we go to a restaurant we have to be able to read a menu. The reading situations we find ourselves in are never ending. We have come along way since the development of the simple paper we use for printing that we usually get from trees. Today we can print on almost anything. We print on fabrics, metals, plastics, ceramics, glass, and so much more.

Printing on many items such as plastic ink pens is used largely for advertising. Advertising is a vast area for printing. The proper words printed in the proper places on the right article can make or break a business sometimes. Businesses advertise in newspapers, magazines, through mail pamphlets, on buildings, on road signs, every where.

It might be entertaining to just try and keep count one day the numbers of times you find you have to read something that has been printed some where. Printing is a large part of out life that we take for granted, but when you stop and really think about it, how would we function with one another if printing had never been invented?