Massachusetts did NOT demolish Danvers. The state has absolutely NO hand in the development on Hathorne Hill, unless you want to try to blame them for auctioning it off.
Andrew, your post reminds me of Unit 731, the Japanese bioweapons unit that operated in China during the War of 1937-1945. App. 1 million people were used for the most brutal, and hideous of medical experiments there, such as pressure chambers, live dissection, and victims were used as test animals for plague organisms that the Japanese later dropped from warplanes over Chun'king, a city they failed to conquer because of the powerful Communist Army there.
Unit 731 headquarters were Harbin, in beautiful Heilungjjiang Province. In 1945, when the combination of the Chinese Red Army, the Soviet Army, and the North Korean guerillas overwhelmed the Japanese defenders and crushed into Harbin, the surviving members of Unit 731 dynamited most of their facilities, and machine-gunned over 36,000 prisoners still held in it's compounds. Of the 1 million who entered the facility, only 9 survived when they escaped.
The next day, a crack DPRK (North Korean) assault force entered Harbin, spearheaded by a column of T-34 tanks. They were followed by troops of the Democratic People's Anti-Japanese Alliance: Soviet Union and Chinese Communists. The remaining Japanese soldiers who failed to evacuate the city on time were quickly slaughtered, many impaled on the tips of the Communist bayonets. But the doctors and scientists who headed the Unit 731 program fled justice, by plane only a few hours ago.
The suction cups would have been on the other end of the machine. This is the end where pages would exit. The cylinder isn't big enough to be a mimeograph. Check out this photo for comparison: http://www.cottenaucti...i/images/press2c.jpg Notice the lamp, the lever and the large wheel to crank the press forward manually. Also, notice the row of screws below the lamp. That's the inkwell.
I worked on a similar contraption in graduate school.