Monthly Archives: December 2013

An Albion Press

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Yesterday, December 6, 2013, an Albion Press no. 6551 made by Hopkinson & Cope and used by William Morris (1834-1896) was sold at Christies for $233,000. The buyer was the Rochester Institute of Technology’s Cary Graphic Arts Collection. Happily, Princeton’s Graphic Arts Collection is already the proud owner of its own Albion, currently on view inside the temporary Graphic Arts rooms in Firestone Library.

The press sold in New York on Friday was purchased by Morris in 1894 for £52.10s and became one of the three full-sized Albions he was to own at the Kelmscott Press. According to Christies, “Morris chose this Albion for the formidable task of printing the Kelmscott Chaucer and had the press reinforced with iron bands to keep the staple from cracking under the extra pressure required to print the heavy forms of this monumental book. After Morris’ death, the Albion was owned first by C.R. Ashbee’s Essex House Press, and then subsequently by the Old Bourne and Pear Tree Presses, before it was purchased by Bertha and Frederic Goudy in 1924. The Goudys brought the Albion to America where it joined the typecasters and other foundry equipment of the Village Press and their Press of the Woolly Whale. In 1960, Elizabeth and Ben Lieberman acquired the press after it had resided with several additional printers.”

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Princeton’s Albion has equally interesting provenance, as the last working press owned and used by the great American printer Carl Purington Rollins (1880-1960). Made in England in 1840, Rollins used the press in his New Haven shop until it was packed and shipped south by the Friends of the Princeton University Library, in honor of Graphic Arts curator Elmer Adler’s retirement. Pictured above is Rollins with one of several Albions in his shop.

One of the greatest graphic designers (working with only one eye) Rollins joined the staff of the Yale University Press in 1918 and was appointed Printer to the University in 1920. At Yale he designed and printed all university publications and ephemera. Rollins also taught a course in bibliography and established the Bibliographical Press in the University library for student use.

At the same time, he established a private press, At the Sign of the Chorobates, and with our Albion printed numerous award winning publications. In 1940, Rollins received the highest award of the American Institute of Graphic Arts. He retired in 1948 and the last sheet he printed on his beautiful Albion press was the broadside announcing the Adler gift to Princeton.

Another Lew Ney (Looney) post

allen tate7In May 1936, the printer Lew Ney (aka Luther Widen) wrote to the poet Allen Tate (1899-1979) to let him know why the publication of Tate’s book, The Mediterranean and Other Poems had been delayed. Commissioned by Ronald Latimer, the publisher of Alcestis Press, Lew Ney had already printed five fine press poetry books for Latimer, including work by Wallace Stevens, Willard Mass, William Carlos William, Robert Penn Warren, and John Peale Bishop. Tate was to have been third on Alcestis’ list but Latimer pushed Warren and Bishop ahead.

allen tate6In the midst of the Great Depression, Latimer owed Lew Ney $1,000 for his work but was refusing to pay. Instead, he pulled Tate’s manuscript and sent it to Vrest Orton, a Vermont printer who was unaware of Latimer’s under-handed business dealings. Although Orton’s name is not on the volume, it looks decidedly different from the other Alcestis books.

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Back at Lew Ney’s Parnassus Press in Brooklyn, the pages for Mediterranean were still locked and ready for printing. He wrote to Tate to say that he would hate to redistribute his famous “Inkunabula” type without printing at least a few copies. According to the colophon Tate’s brother, a financially successful businessman, funded the printing of twelve copies designated a “Benfolly” edition printed solely for Benjamin Ethan Tate.

Princeton University Library is fortunate to hold two very rare copies of these twelve. One is signed by both the author and the printer with his special mark, Caveat emptor! (Let the buyer beware!) and Sursum corda! (Lift up your hearts!). While both of Tate’s books are “first editions,” Lew Ney added “first issue” to let us know his book actually came first.

 

Allen Tate (1899-1979), The Mediterranean and Other Poems (New York: Alcestis Press, 1936). “This first edition … is strictly limited to 165 numbered copies, signed by the author … 135 copies are for sale and 30 copies are reserved for presentation and review purposes”–Colophon. Rare Books (Ex) 3952.88.362.11
Allen Tate (1899-1979), The Mediterranean and Other Poems ([New York]: Privately printed, 1936). “This special edition … is strictly limited to twelve copies numbered I-XII and printed solely for Benjamin Ethan Tate on Duca de Modena, an Italian handmade paper. No copies for sale. Designed and printed by Lew Ney with inkunabula type set by hand and the type has been distributed”–Colophon. First edition, first issue. Rare Books (Ex) 3952.88.362

 

Vignettes and Fleurons

didot broadside4didot broadside3didot broadside2The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired an unrecorded broadsheet type specimen from the Firmin Didot foundry dating from April 1818 and presenting printers with a new selection of vignettes and fleurons. 71 borders, rules and vignettes are advertised, including 14 large vignettes of lamps, urns, lyres, grotesque heads, a cornucopia etc. This specimen is no. 4 from the series simply called Feuille d’Epreuve (proof sheet).

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The Didot foundry was established around 1775 by François-Ambroise Didot (1730-1804), the inventor of the point system of type sizes. Continued by several generations of typefounders, printers and publishers, the Firmin Didot firm had an enormous influence on French typography before being absorbed into the Fonderie Générale in the mid-nineteenth century.

François-Ambroise’s son, Firmin Didot (1764-1836) is credited with designing and establishing the classification of typefaces we use today and many contemporary fonts are actually based on Firmin Didot’s typefaces. When Firmin retired from the business in 1827, his son Ambroise-Firmin Didot (1790-1876) took over the management of the publishing business. Note that it is Ambroise-Firmin who is credited with the engraving on this broadsheet.

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