Programs > Conference
The Annual Conference
Since 1976, the American Printing History Association has organized an annual conference on a selected theme in printing history. In the early years the annual conference was invariably held in New York City, but since the mid 1980s the organization has sought venues further afield. Conferences typically consist of a day or two of formal papers, presentations, and panels combined with tours of local collections, studios and other spots of interest to historians of printing. There are also plenty of opportunities for socializing and fellowship.
Conference papers are usually summarized in the APHA Newsletter; indeed, many of them have been published in APHA's semi-annual journal, Printing History.
At the Crossroads: Living Letterform Traditions
Columbia College Chicago, Center for Book and Paper Arts
October 12–13, 2012
When Carl Sandburg described Chicago as the “City of the Big Shoulders,” he was probably not referring to foundry type, but to the work ethic and industry, which made this city a center of commerce and printing. The conference will be held at Columbia College Chicago, located a mile from Lake Michigan, near the city’s original Printer’s Row. The area, active since the 1880s in design and printing, was home to the Inland Printer magazine, the Union Type Foundry, binderies, engravers and huge printing plants built by R.R. Donnelly and Rand McNally among others. The Chicago region was also home to the Ludlow and Vandercook Companies and designers such as Oswald Cooper, Will Bradley, Frederic W. Goudy, and R. Hunter Middleton. Although the printing industry is smaller, Chicago remains part of a continuing, vibrant book arts scene. Attendees will have the opportunity to sample some of Chicago’s cultural riches through special members-only tours and visits, such as the Newberry Library, which is celebrating its 125th anniversary, the University of Chicago, the Joan Flasch Artists’ Book Collection at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Center for Book and Paper Arts itself.
The Call for Papers is now available.
Past conferences
The following is a complete list of APHA conferences
(held in New York City unless otherwise noted).
2011
Printing at the Edge: 36th Annual Conference at UC San Diego
2010
Learning to Print, Teaching to Print at the
Corcoran College of Art + Design, Washington, DC
2009
The Book Beautiful at the Redwood Library, Newport Public Library, and Newport Art Museum, Rhode Island
2008
Saving the History of Printing at the Grolier Club and Columbia University, New York
2007
Transformations: The Persistence of Aldus Manutius at the University of California Library, Los Angeles
2006
The Atlantic World of Print in the Age of Franklin at the University of Pennsylvania and the Library Company of Philadelphia, Philadelphia
2005
[r]Evolution in Print: New Work in Printing History & Practice at Mills College, Oakland, CA
2004
Picture This: The Art and Technique of Illustration at the University of Delaware, Newark, DE
2003
New Work in Printing History at the Grolier Club, New York
2002
A New England Wayzgoose at the Museum of Printing History, North Andover, MA [Not a formal conference]
2001
Transatlantic Type: Anglo-American Printing in the Nineteenth Century at Washington University, St. Louis, MO
2000
On the Digital Brink at Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY
1999
Fine Book Design in the Twentieth Century at the Grolier Club, New York
1998
Chicago Printing History at the Newberry Library, Chicago
1997
Twentieth-Century Book Design at the University of Texas, Austin
1996
Twentieth-Century Traditions of Fine Printing in California at the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA
1995
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Printing: The Book in Jefferson's Virginia and the Early Republic at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville
1994
APHA at Twenty: Celebrating the Past, Looking to the Future at the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York
1993
The Humanist Printer in Providence, RI
1992
Printing and Publishing History at Princeton: Materials and Methodologies at Princeton University, Princeton
1991
A Washington Wayzgoose at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC
1990
The Printing of American Newspapers from 1690 Into the Future at Columbia University, New York
1989
Colonial New England Printing at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
1988
The Book Arts in Philadelphia, 1785-1840 in Philadelphia
1987
Government Printing in the Western Hemisphere: Technology, Design, Politics
1986
The Printing Surface
1985
Printing Without Type
1984
Eighteenth-Century Anglo-American Printing and Publishing
1983
Twentieth-Century American Typography and Typographers
1982
Nineteenth-Century America: Book Trade Technology and Social History
1981
The Mark of the Printer: Fine Commercial Printing in the Machine Age
1980
The Permanence of Ephemera
1979
The Renaissance Book
1978
The Decorated Book/The Crystal Goblet: A Reconsideration
1977
Printing Revolutions: The First Two and What They Can Teach the Third
1976
Typographic America: A Bicentennial Perspective
APHA is pleased to announce the Lieberman Lecture for 2012, to be given by type designer and letterpress printer Russell Maret. It will be given at 11:00 a.m. on June 2 in Chicago at the Newberry Library in Ruggles Hall at 60. W. Walton Street. More info.
The belated Winter 2012 issue of the APHA Newsletter is comprised of an update on the planning of the 2012 Annual Conference, announcement of the 2012 Lieberman Lecture, a notice on the one hundredth anniversary of the death of Harrison T. Chandler, a review of Alastair M. Johnston's Typographical Tourists and a roster of new and returning members. Download the Newsletter in PDF form.
Elected to their first term, at our annual general meeting held January 28, were Robert McCamant, President; James P. Ascher, VP for Publications; Casey Smith, VP for Membership; and Charles Cuykendall Carter, Secretary. Re-elected to a second term were Kitty Maryatt, VP for Programs; and David Goodrich, Treasurer. Trustees Amelia Hugill-Fontanel and Richard Ring will serve until January 2013.
The American Printing History Association welcomes proposals for its 2012 annual conference. “At the Crossroads: Living Letterform Traditions” at Columbia College Chicago, Center for Book and Paper Arts, October 12–13, 2012. Proposals are due by March 15. Full details are available in PDF
Our annual general meeting will be held at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday January 28, 2012 in the Trustees’ Room on the second floor of the New York Public Library, 5th Avenue at 42nd Street in Manhattan. In addition to Association business, our annual meeting is a chance to meet fellow members from around the country, to network, and to hear some important speakers. (Our meeting marks the end of “Bibliography Week” in New York, when similar groups hold their annual meetings and this year includes a major exhibition on printing at the Grolier Club; more information online grolierclub.org. APHA’s meeting is free and open to non-members (except for voting), so please invite friends interested in printing, books, publishing, and type. Read the President's Letter.
The Fall 2011 issue of the APHA Newsletter comprises of reports from the annual conference including panels, Pamela Smith's keynote address, Gwido Zlatkes's Mark Samuels Lasner Fellowship talk, the SoCal chapter book fair, a tour of the Stuart Collection of outdoor sculpture at UCSD and a list of new APHA members. Download the Newsletter in PDF form.
Kitty Maryatt reports on the first-ever conference book fair. Read all about it.
Many numbers are available to APHA members for a limited time at the bargain rate of $8 for the first issue, $6 for each additional; $15 for double issues. Learn more at printinghistory.org/sale.
Details and application for the 2012 Mark Samuels Lasner Fellowship
in Printing History are now online.
Thanks to the generosity of several APHA Southern California Chapter members, the Southern California Chapter has conducted its first-ever student membership drawing.
To celebrate the start of 2011, the complete listing of Printing History's contents have been put back online. See the contents (and a few select articles) from the Original Series, or a complete listing of the New Series. See something you like? Download the Back Issue Order Form.