THE ULTIMATE PRINTING MAP AND A FAREWELL TO OUR MUSEUM MANAGER
/Like many of you, being stuck at home has given me an extreme case of wanderlust. This has inspired me to create THE ultimate print, book, and paper nerd map!
Six years ago when I was first hired for the job of Museum Manager of The International Printing Museum I knew almost nothing about printing. You see the dirty secret of many museum jobs is that you don’t have to be an expert in the subject of the museum, you just have to know how to work in a museum. So I set out on a journey to soak up anything and everything about printing. At the time I was living in Washington DC and Mark sent me a handy list of local places of interest I might visit to start getting a hang of printing history. My first stop was the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, which I had previously interned at in the Division of Political and Military History. Thanks to my connections I was able to finagle a meeting with Joan Boudreau, Curator of The Printing and Graphic Arts collections. She took me to see one of the collection’s storage rooms where none other than Benjamin Franklin’s printing press itself was temporarily being stored. Here I was, barely knowing if I’d ever seen a printing press before, and the first one I see is Benjamin Franklins! From then on I started noticing printing everywhere, in antiquarian books on display at Museums, in local letterpress shops on the street, even in small displays in offices and apartment building that had been repurposed from a printing facility.
From Left to Right: Mark Barbour (Director and curator), Sara Halpert (Museum Manager), and Madeline Helland (assistant manager)
I’m so lucky because I have my very own letterpress travel concierge named Mark Barbour who always knows of some printing museum, letterpress shop, or even private collection wherever I travel. But others are not so lucky and I’ve spent my time making a map, a resource for those not lucky enough to have an unending fountain of knowledge like Mark. In his excellent book “The Itinerant Printer” (seriously you should really get a copy) Chris Fritton made a very astute observation “Social media and the ubiquity of information in contemporary society all but guaranteed that everyone in the modest letterpress community knew what everyone else was doing.” but he soon realized he “couldn’t have been more wrong.” With this map I’m attempting to right that wrong if only a little bit.
Previously I had used resources like the AAPA Printing Museums listing and BriarPress, but my travels taught me that there was just so much more out there than any one list contained. With that in mind I set out to compile this map with an untold number of resources from the aforementioned “Itinerant Printer” book, to Atlas Obscura, and even to findagrave.com. I did deep google dives and ended up in great but unexpected places.
As some of you might know, after six wonderful years at The Printing Museum I will be leaving the position next month. Think of this as a parting gift to thank you for all the printing passion and knowledge you’ve all sparked in me.
Till We Meet Again,
Sara Halpert
Museum Manager
UPDATES AND ADDITIONS
The world is an ever changing and moving environment where businesses and museums shut down, move, or otherwise change. I’m sure there are many errors in the map with wrong addresses, long shut down shops, or other mistakes. If you can a correction or an addition to the map please feel free to email me Sara@printmuseum.org
PARAMETERS
I had to decide what I wanted to focus in on and what parameters to place. The map is split into 10 sections, although many of the locations could fit into multiple categories
1. Printing Museums and
Working Historic Shops
These are Museums that focus primarily on the history of printing or museums that have working historical print shops or working presses.
2. Book Art Centers, Workshops, Private Presses, and Galleries
The main parameters for this section were that the gallery had to have displayed printed art and the art centers or print shops had to offer workshops or welcome visitors to see the shop. Basically it’s a resource for anyone who wants to find where to see or learn printing near them.
3. University Book Arts
These are print shops connected to a University program or Universities that offer some kind of book arts programs or classes.
4. Typography and Typecasting
These places focus primarily on typography or typecasting.
5. Libraries, Archives,
and Book Collections
This very broad category includes libraries with rare books or historic collections, rare book shops, archives, and other related places.
6. Historic Sites & Public Art
These are historic print shop buildings and sites, plaques noting printing history, statues dedicated to printing history, gravesites of notable printing industry people and other printing and book related public art.
7. Paper History
These are mostly historic paper mills or places dedicated to paper history specifically.
8. Museums with Objects of Interest
I can’t be the only one to get excited just because a little museum has one small printing press right? This category is extremely broad, it’s basically any public institutions that has notable printed objects or printing equipment, even if only a small amount.
9. Shops
Places to spend your money on printed goods and ogle pretty presses.
10. Other
Anything and everything vaguely related to this map but doesn’t necessarily fit into another category.
