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By Richard, February 2, 2010 12:41 am

With our move only a couple weeks away, the last thing I should be doing is acquiring more printing equipment.  However, this fun little Edison Rotary Mimeograph from 1904 was too good to pass up (loads of info on the Edison Mimeograph and other historical copying machines available here).  In fact, I got it by trading a box of 1950’s Popular Mechanics to another dealer down at the Antique Market.  Ahhh, the good old barter system at its finest. 

While it needs a little cleaning up, it is fully functional and will be put to the test in my new print shop at the new house.  What’s even better, while looking up the history of my newly acquired prize I found this company, Repeat-O-Type,  in the U.S. that still sells the stencils and inks for mimeographs.  And here I was expecting to have to scrounge around for some supplies!

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By Richard, January 28, 2010 10:20 pm

JD Salinger, one of the most influential writers of the 20th century, passed away yesterday at his home in Cornish, New Hampshire at the age of 91.  I remember the impact of reading “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” as a teenager and then proceeding to devour everything else Salinger had to offer over the next couple of weeks.  His Glass family collection of short stories and novellas still remain as some of my favourite pieces of literature and have recommended them heavily to a number of friends and clients.  As Robert Fulford in his National Post article suggests, we can only hope that Salinger continued to write throughout his decades of seclusion and that there just may be a treasure trove of literature in his Cornish home waiting to be shared.

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By Richard,

The majority of the books we didn’t plan to keep for use at the Ottawa Antique Market or book shows was packed up and shipped off yesterday to a gentleman in Barry’s Bay who is starting up a huge secondhand store for that area.  400+ boxes packed with over 22,000 books and weighing nearly 16,000 pounds have now found a new home near Algonquin Park 2hrs west of Ottawa.  One of most daunting tasks I’ve undertaken (mostly the carrying 200+ boxes up from the basement), but very relieving all the same.  The house is definitely breathing a huge sigh of relief!

Now off to box-up our ABE stock and personal reference collections…

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By Richard, January 26, 2010 3:59 pm

Have recently picked up some more great vintage books over the past week giving us another 2 boxes of Ace Doubles and a box or two of other vintage sci-fi/fantasy, horror and mystery.  While there were plenty of great mid-range finds like old Ace Dean Koontz and Philip K. Dick titles, there were two exceptionally fun finds in the lot. 

The first was a very early Harlequin title (#192), Swamp Willow, by Edwina Elroy.  A very scarce title (only one rough looking copy Harlequin available online for $400 and an ex-library hard cover first for $900) of the fictitious “story of Holly Tanner and the five men who influenced her.”  Flush with detailed accounts of waterfront life on the New Jersey coast in Tannertown (including sailor brawls and rum-running), this is one of the only novels to use the “shabby” Jersey coast as it’s setting.  Managed to dig up the 1947 review from the NJ Red Bank Register (middle column, pg. 3) in which the locals seemed to find the book rather ”entertaining and enjoyable”.  The copy we have is in very good shape with only a bit of rubbing at the edges, so it will be interesting to see what we can get for it. 

The second fun find, while not nearly as pricey, is an early Arkham Sampler magazine from 1949 in fine shape.  The Arkham Sampler was a quarterly fantasy and horror fiction magazine first published in Winter 1948.  Edited by August Derleth and published by Arkham House, each issue had a print run of only 1,200 copies.  This issue is especially great (at least to me) as it has a wonderful short story by Clark Ashton Smith entitled The Root of Ampoi.

Finally, while not part of the above mentioned collection recently acquired, we did pick up a great piece of early science fiction by Otto Willi Gail called By Rocket to the Moon from 1931.  It’s one of the earliest science fiction tales of travel to the moon that was well researched and seemed plausible.  As Bleiler put it in his book Science-Fiction: The Early Years, “… fairly realistic in its description of the first flight into space. Despite Atlantis and life on the moon, the author has very carefully used the best scientific and technological data of his day, and much of what he says seems very modern.” 

The copy we picked up is even an advance reading copy no less, with a little tip in slip of paper from the publishing kindly asking that no reviews be published until the book is released April 25th, 1931. 

Now back to more packing as our move looms ever closer…

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By Richard, January 24, 2010 4:35 pm

A recent post (Books in Things & Things in Books) from one of our favourite sites, Bookride, is right up my alley being jam packed with fun anecdotes of glorious items found between the pages of book, inside bindings and the many odd places books themselves have been found.  Some interesting other anecdotes are popping up in the comments section as well.

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By Richard, January 21, 2010 12:56 pm

  Our good friend George Walker just released his new book A is for Alice via the Porcupine’s Quill and it is absolutely wonderful (we were lucky enough to get a sneak preview copy).   It’s a playful alphabet book comprised of a quote and accompanying wood engraving (done by the Mad Hatter himself, George) for each letter of the alphabet.  The engravings were selected from the nearly 200 engravings used in the Chesire Cat fine press editions, limited to 177 copies each, of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass that George, Bill Poole and Joseph Brabant designed and printed in the 80’s & 90’s.  I count myself fortunate to have a copy of Through the Looking-Glass and show it off every chance I get  

We’ve ordered a dozen copies directly from the source, so if you are interested just drop us a note.  Here is a sneak peek at the book.

Also, to celebrate the release of A is for Alice, a video following the book through the intensive production process, which takes place in-house at The Porcupine’s Quill shop on the Main Street of Erin Village, has been made available here. Enjoy!

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By Richard, January 20, 2010 8:56 am

The original Stukeley manuscript containing Sir Isaac Newton’s famous falling apple anecdote is now available for the first time online as part of The Royal Society’s Turning the Pages project.   The Stukeley Manuscript, along with other digitized original works by the likes of Paine, Locke & Henry James, are wonderful to flip through and enjoy passages and ideas as they were first put to paper.

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By Richard, January 19, 2010 3:02 pm

A few months ago I was interviewed by Nigel Beale for his literary blog Nota Bene on the history of the private press and more specifically the collecting and Canadian aspects of fine press editions and letterpress printed works.  The interview lasts about 40mins and was quite fun to do, so hope you enjoy!

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By Richard, January 18, 2010 11:08 pm

  While most years start off with so much promise, unfortunately the first couple weeks of 2010 have seen two great Canadians in the field of literature and book arts pass away.

Poet, author and artist P.K. Page passed away on the 14th well into her 93rd year.  One of Canada’s great poets and an major influence on woman writers, Page had won numerous literary awards and honours as well as being named a Companion to the Order of Canada.  A wonderful article is on the CBC website with a link to her reading from Planet Earth.

Passing away just the week before on the 8th was typographic genius Jim Rimmer. A marvellous graphic artist, typeface designer and letterpress printer (being the proprietor of the Pie Tree Press), Jim has created some of Canada’s greatest typefaces and fine books over the years only to just recently add a shining star to his accomplishments by finishing his letterpress edition of Tom Sawyer using Hannibal Oldstyle, a font design by Rimmer for the printing of the book.   In fact, the first ever piece of letterpress printing I did was used his beautiful uncial style Fellowship font.  A very nice little write-up was done in the recent issue of The Printer Letterpress Monthly*.  His brilliance and eagerness to teach and guide fellowing designers and printers will be greatly missed among the letterpress community.  There is a wonderful video trailer for Making Faces (documentary with Jim Rimmer on typeface design) on Youtube here.

* E-mail me if you are interesting in a copy of the PDF as it is too large to post.

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By Richard, January 17, 2010 11:53 pm

   After being heavily admonished by members of our Ottawa Press Gang at this morning’s Wayzbrunch, here goes a quick catch-up on events of the past few weeks to be followed by a flurry of posts over the next few days to tick off all the items on the “To Post” list that has been growing far too quickly in 2010.

First off, a quick reminder to all that the Arlington location is now closed and we are in full flight at the Ottawa Antique Market which has been an excellent venue for us so far.   Also, don’t forget our phone number has changed and we can now be reached at 613-302-4718.

Second, we have been boxing furiously (hence the lack of posts) to ship off the excess books that we can’t bring to the Antique Market and pack up the good stuff for storage to ensure the shelves in our booth stay packed for years to come. 

Third, just because we’re moving and downsizing doesn’t mean we’ve stopped buying.  Over the past couple of weeks we’ve acquired a great modern Sci-fi/Fantasy collection in sparkling condition that will be hitting the shelves of the booth shortly.  We’ve also picked up a great collection of vintage paperbacks with plenty of Ace doubles, hard crime, racy covers and a few top knotch hard cover early Sci-fi by some great presses like the Fantasy Press, Gnome Press and Greenberg.

Finally, this mornings Wayzbrunch displayed once again how quickly the Ottawa Press Gang has continued to grow and produce wonderful work from invitations and greating cards to booklets and engraving portfolios.  This was clearly evident by the beautiful presswork passed around and shared by the group this morning.   Plenty of printing on the horizon for the group too as a group joint project is in the works, the OPG Letterpress Gazette (below) had its inaugural issue come off the press, and a number of members have personal projects in the wings.  Will be sure to highlight all the great work the group is doing as they come to fruition.

That’s it for now, but plenty more to come over the next few days…….honestly!!!