A spirit duplicator (also referred to as a Rexograph or Ditto machine in North America, Banda machine in the UK) is a printing method invented in 1923 by Wilhelm Ritzerfeld that was commonly used for much of the rest of the 20th century.

When was the duplicating machine invented?

The first true mechanical copier was manufactured in 1780, when James Watt, who is better known as the inventor of the modern steam engine, created the copying press. Few people today know what a copying press was, but you may have seen one in an antiques store, where it was perhaps called a book press.

What were old copiers called?

A mimeograph is an old-fashioned copy machine. Mimeographs were often used for making classroom copies in schools before photocopying became inexpensive in the mid- to late-twentieth century.