Non-javascript links at bottom of page

GBW Library

• Link to the GBW Library Catalogue at the University of Iowa Library
  Attention: This download is a very long file...
• GBW Library Lending Policy
• History of the Guild Library
• Descriptions of the Standards of Excellence videos available to borrow (or purchase) from the GBW Library

For more information about the Guild of Book Workers Library, please contact Jane Meggers, Guild Librarian at library@guildofbookworkers.allmail.net.

History of the Guild Library

The Guild of Book Workers is an organization founded in 1906 to "maintain a feeling of kinship and mutual interest among the workers in the several hand book crafts." Ninety years later the Guild is still going strong with more activities and members than it has ever had in its history. The organization, since its beginning, has been run by volunteers to further knowledge and enjoyment of the art of the book.

Fifty-two years after the Guild's inception, the Guild Library was created with a single gift from out-going President Kathryn Gerlach, who suggested a library would be useful to its members. The very first book was the landmark catalog from the Baltimore Museum of Art show - The History of Bookbinding. At a subsequent meeting, after a request had gone out to the membership, 15 more books and $20.00 were contributed. As the Library grew the Guild had to find a home for it, a permanent spot among the shifting volunteers who ran the Guild through fat and lean times. A location was found at the newly created library of the American Craftmen's Council (now the American Crafts Council) in New York City. Guild members had access to the ACC Library which in 1960 had received the Edith Diehl collection of approximately 300 items related to bookbinding. This was a good arrangement for the Guild as they had only one quarter the number of books as the Diehl collection. Diehl was a New York binder and the author of Bookbinding, Its Background and Technique which is still available today as a Dover paperback. Access and lending policies limited the use of the ACC and hence the Guild collection so after a few years the GBW board withdrew its library from the ACC Library and found a new home for it in that of Library Chairman, Jane Greenfield in New Haven. Mail order circulation was instituted as it continues today. The ACC closed its own library and the then resourceful Guild President, Laura Young, managed to get the ACC holdings on bookbinding including Edith Diehl's collection donated to the Guild. No home is forever and the roving library needed a new one in 1972. The Conservation Department of the Boston Athenaeum housed the collection until 1986 when yet another move was necessary. But here is where Iowa comes into the picture. William Anthony, first University of Iowa book conservator, was also the Guild Standards Chairman and newly settled in Iowa. He smoothed the way for the collection to come to Iowa's Special Collections Department where it now occupies about 19 shelves and numbers over 700 items.

The agreement between the Guild and the University stipulates that Guild members may continue to borrow items via the mail, but also allows anyone access in the Special Collections' Reading Room. Pamela Spitzmueller took over the Librarian duties when she assumed the position of Book Conservator at Iowa in 1989.

The 1979 catalog and supplement are out of date and limit access. A hard paper and on-line catalog is near completion, but is currently held-up by a technology glitch which it is hoped can be solved shortly. Part of the impasse has been caused by the recent 100 odd items donated by retiring binder Stella Patri. As always, the Guild continues to work through its volunteers and a cataloging project such as this can take a long time. Now that the story of the collection has been detailed, one could well ask what is in the collection besides the very first book the History of Bookbinding.

It is true the collection does focus on bookbinding including manuals, the history of binding, and bookbinders. Exhibition catalogs are another strong feature of the Guild collection. There are also volumes pertaining to calligraphy, printing, papermaking and decorated papers, and conservation. Through trading of newsletters and journals produced by the Guild, we receive current binding periodicals from similar organizations in England, France, Spain, the Netherlands, and Australia. Also part of the collection are videotapes produced by the Guild as an effort to raise the standards of bookbinding craftsmanship in the U.S. These are perhaps the most frequently borrowed items as they demonstrate techniques that no book can describe verbally. Though they are not professionally made, they record in a documentary fashion the annual Guild Standards Seminars (begun in 1982 and taped beginning in 1984).

This collection has proved to be an invaluable aid to the book conservation apprenticeship program at Iowa. Mainly built up in the middle of the century, before Iowa collected many books on binding, the collection complements the University's collections which currently acquires many items in this category. Older items in the Guild collection are not easy to find on the market these days, so we have the best of both worlds. The Guild Library rarely buys books and has to rely on donations and review copies for the growth of its collection. The Guild Archives will become part of the Guild Library eventually. However there is no archivist and no assessment yet as to what is exactly included in the archives.

GBW Site Stats     visitors since January 1995.

Last updated on 22-Jun-06 by Eric Alstrom

This site hosted by Conservation OnLine, a project of the Preservation Department of Stanford University Libraries. All content is the responsibility of the Guild of Book Workers.