of The Book Club of California
Online Library Catalog
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About
The Library of the Book Club of California forwards the mission of the BCC which is to promote and support fine printing related to the history and literature of California and the West. It collects books, pamphlets, and ephemera in three areas:
- Fine press books and ephemera printed in California and the West.
- Books on printing history and the book arts that serve as reference material in support of the fine press collection.
- Books on California history and literature, including reference works on authors of California and the West.
The collection contains approximately 3,500 books and pamphlets on these subjects.
History
The Club’s historically small library was acquired mainly through gifts that reflect the interests and generosity of a long succession of donors. For several decades, it was shaped by Albert Sperisen. Recently, it has been managed by Barbara Land, his colleague and successor as librarian.
The Library’s present size was largely dictated by the limits of clubrooms at a succession of previous locations. The move into new quarters at 312 Sutter Street, in 2010, permitted welcome expansion.
Management
The Library Committee is responsible to the board of directors for managing the Library, in cooperation with the executive director. The committee sets policies, recruits volunteers, organizes Library programs, works with prospective donors and supervises Library volunteers.
Development
The splendid new rooms at Suite 500 give us a golden opportunity to increase both the scope and depth of the Library. The Library Committee is actively soliciting both individual books and whole collections, in order to build a library truly representative of the Book Club’s aims.
Once the Club’s online catalog is completed, an ambitious educational program will be launched through the library.
In addition to books, pamphlets, and ephemera in all three of its collection areas the Club welcomes your gift of funds, to support the purchase and processing of new acquisitions and for library maintenance.
Please contact us at library@bccbooks.org to discuss possible donations, or to arrange for a meeting or pickup.
Library Hours
The Library is maintained by volunteers. We are pleased to provide access to the collections to Club members, guests and interested readers, by appointment during regular Club hours. Club opening hours are: Monday, 10 a.m.–7 p.m.; and Tuesday–Friday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. To request an appointment, or for information or requests regarding the Library, please e-mail Henry Snyder, Chair, Library Committee, at library@bccbooks.org.
New Acquisitions
We've greeted several newcomers to our shelves over these last months. Prominently displayed in the Hand Bookbinders' vitrine in the Library is the Club's recent splendid acquisition, The Ephemera of Adrian Wilson (1994). It is one of thirteen boxed copies with the bound bibliography and two drawers of choice ephemera, including original sketches by Wilson. It belonged to the printer of the project, James Wehlage, being inscribed to him by author Joyce Lancaster Wilson and publisher James Linden. The bindery model and extra photographs supplement the set.
Mining engineer Noel Kirschenbaum has generously donated a steady stream of books, magazines and ephemera. Much is the remaining working library assembled by his late and beloved wife Sandra, the editor and publisher of the journal, Fine Print. Indeed, Fine Print (1975-1990) is an intensive guide to the fine printing of those years, and will help to define the collection as it fills out the latter decades of the twentieth century.
At beginning of 2010, we acquired at auction, from the collection of the late Donald Fleming (who has been very generous to the Club), a long run of Typophile chapbooks and keepsakes dating back to the 1940s; materials on Bruce Rogers; a batch of type specimen books, including an extremely rare Palmer & Rey catalog (1892); and a full run of Matrix—several in the special bindings with extra ephemera.
John Windle recently donated two items by Edward Bosqui, nineteenth-century master printer: Grapes and Grapevines of California (Windle's 1980 facsimile), and a fine original of Illustrations of West American Oaks (1889).
Clifford Burke/Virginia Mudd Collection
Poet, printer and publisher Clifford Burke has added some two dozen items to our already deep Wilson collection. Particularly dear is Burke's well-read and battered cloth copy of The Design of Books that Adrian inscribed to him as "printer extraordinary" at Christmas 1968.
Over the next months, Burke and his partner Virginia Mudd will send over seven hundred books, one-half being their working typographic library, the other half a collection of Cranium Press books and colleagues' printing from the last forty years. We most recently received a complete run of Tangram, the choice chapbooks, published and printed by Jerry Reddan, a fine pressman long in the service of The Arion Press. .
Carol Cunningham & The Sunflower Press Collection
Carol Cunningham has been printing for over a half-century under the ægis of her Sunflower Press; most notably, miniature books. She began in Japan in 1959, where her husband, Bruce, an Air Force pilot, was stationed. Her first effort, limited to a single copy, was printed with Alphabits, her children’s cereal! The type didn’t hold up!
From Japan, the Cunninghams moved to San Diego, where she acquired a press and took instruction in printing. Her first work, The Puffin, was published in 1962. It was quickly followed by three works the following year. In 1964, she and her husband moved to Mill Valley.
She sold her first press to a classmate and bought an "8x12 Gordon," which she installed in the garage of her new home. Two years later, after her husband had built her a new shop, she acquired a press with power to replace the foot-pedaled Gordon. With her new press installed, she began a steady printing schedule which continues to the present day. She became the second woman to be invited to join the Moxon Chapel. She was a founding member of The Small Press Club of Marin (1968) and the Miniature Book Society (1983). The British Printing Society, which she joined in 1973, named her a Master Craftsman in 1974 and Printer of the Year in 1975.
Carol has been an active collaborator with other printers and designers, most notably Joe D’Ambrosio, who was responsible for many of the bookbindings of Sunflower Press publications. Sunflower Press publications are to be found in many prestigious libraries, both in North America and Europe.
We are honored that Carol has chosen the Library of the Book Club of California as the permanent home of her own collection of her publications, as well as the many items given her by friends and fellow printers.
We are deeply grateful to all donors for their thoughtful, generous contributions.
John McBride, Associate Librarian
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