Christine Curley, a first-year MLIS student, was once an art director for the “Silicon Valley Map” that provides a “Who’s Who” of major tech companies at a glance. Today, she says that she appreciates the hands-on experience of creating letterpress documents in Professor Johanna Drucker’s letterpress course.
“There’s something that gets lost in the digital [process], when you don’t have that actual type hitting the page,” says Curley. “You put your type down and you have to put it down backwards. Then you ink the rollers and turn the crank and that’s what applies the pressure to get a nice clean print.
“It’s very meditative. While you’re picking out the type, once you get into a rhythm, you kind of lose yourself in the process. I think there’s something very magical about it.”
On Jan. 19, Curley and other IS students unveiled a permanent home for two cast-iron standing printing presses that were built around 1899. UCLA’s University Librarian Virginia Steel was on hand to cut the ribbon on two newly created displays that house the presses, respectively in the Powell Library and in the Charles E. Young Research Library (YRL) on campus.
Drucker, who is the Bernard and Martin Breslauer Professor of Bibliography at UCLA Ed & IS, says that the installation of the presses aligns with the UCLA Library’s goal to engage students in learning about the library and its collections. Students from her Special Collections Exhibitions course created the interpretive materials that are now on view with one of the presses in Powell Library.
The presses were purchased by Andrew Horn who co-founded the UCLA School of Library Service with Lawrence Clark Powell in 1959. At that time, courses for librarians were conducted in Powell Library, and learning to use the presses was an important part of the curriculum. Today, the experience of using the antique presses provides an invaluable insight for students.
“As these printing technologies have become obsolete, understanding their operation provides a glimpse into book and print production up through the 19 century,” says Professor Drucker.
When the library program moved out of Powell Library, the two presses were stored in the gatehouse at UCLA’s Clark Library in the West Adams district for nearly 20 years. The structure was recently yellow-tagged and Drucker was contacted by the Clark to see if there was a home for the antique tools of the printer’s art on the UCLA campus.
Robert Montoya, former head of public services in UCLA Special Collections, assisted with the planning and preparing of new permanent displays of the vintage presses in YRL and Powell Library. He credits Professor Drucker’s expertise with the successful restoration of the vintage presses.
“To see [the presses] dusty and on pallets in a corner of this building and then to coordinate and see the process of rejuvenating them, restoring them, and getting them to the campus has been pretty impressive,” he says. “It was primarily Johanna who cleaned them up and restored them – there is nobody better [at this].”
Steel says that having the antique printing presses in the UCLA Library will “enable students and other library users to get a sense of the effort that used to be required to publish a book. Being able to see the presses in Powell and the Young Research Library will add another dimension to the understanding of books as tangible objects designed and created by dedicated artisans.”
Above: IS Professor Johanna Drucker (fourth from left) and students from her letterpress production class celebrate the installation of two cast-iron antique presses in UCLA’s Powell Library and Charles E. Young Research Library.