CBC Radio Halifax Kid's Book Club

Here’s a link to this morning’s short documentary piece about the visit of CBC Radio Halifax Kid’s Book Club to the printing works at Gaspereau Press. It’s a nice little piece. Thanks to everyone at CBC Radio Halifax for helping to make the visit possible.

ANDREW STEEVES ¶ PRINTER & PUBLISHER

American Houseguests & A Visit from CBC Radio’s Kid’s Book Club

This is a digital rendition of the photograph Thaddeus Holownia made at the Gaspereau Press Wayzgoose on Saturday.(Front, left to right) Julie Rosvell, David Brewer, Michelle Walker, Sue Goyette, George Walker, Andrew Steeves, Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr, (back, left to right) Joe Stevens, Stephen Quick, Adam Steeves, Gary Dunfield, Hillary Savage, Jason Dewinetz, Ceri Sloan, Connie Sheppard.

After an extraordinarily busy wayzgoose weekend, you’d think that we’d be anxious to kick back and relax, or at least to draw the blinds, bar our doors and put out the ‘do not disturb’ sign for a few weeks while we recovered from the shock of over 200 visitors. Nope, not to be.


When I invited Hillary Savage to be one of our guests at the wayzgoose, I sweetened the offer by insisting that she stay and work in our printshop for the week that followed.


And we had a great week. Hillary managed to handset and print two different broadsides during her stay with us, despite the many worthy diversions I threw in her way – like an afternoon excursion to study old books at the university archives or coffee with a reporter from the local newspaper. (Hillary’s day job is at a small weekly newspaper in Maine.) In this photo, Hillary is adding a rusty tone to the bottom of one of her broadsides. When we were casting around for a way to achieve the effect she desired, I suggested that she roll it on with a tooth from a spring harrow which I uncovered years ago from the site of my great-grandfather’s abandoned farm in New Brunswick. She rubbed the ink into the pitted surface of the rusty harrow tooth and then rolled it across the sheet. It looked fabulous. Holding the sheets in this photo is Kings County municipal counsellor and housing activist Emma Van Rooyen. I thought Emma might find it interesting to hear some stories from Hillary about the relationship between the local press and the county government in small-town Maine.


On Saturday morning, as Hillary packed up to head for home, we had a visit from three of the four young participants in CBC Radio Halifax’s most recent kid’s on-air book club. Emma (and her sister Molly), Cassidy and Aidan were accompanied by CBC Radio host Carmen Clausen who recorded much of the visit for broadcast on CBC Halifax’s Information Morning this coming Monday.


We showed the kids how modern books are made. We also helped them cast their names in metal on a Ludlow caster, print their own two-colour covers and then handsew some little blank notebooks. I knew it was going well when Carmen swung the microphone over to Emma part way through the morning and asked what her impression of the printshop was so far. “Impression!” guffawed Emma, “oh, that’s funny!” Clearly, they were into it.

With the travel and visiting of October behind me, I intend to revert to my usual somewhat elusive habits and get some work done. Over the next few months I will be editing books for our spring list and enjoying the relative solitude that task requires.

ANDREW STEEVES ¶ PRINTER & PUBLISHER.

An Interview with Kevin King

While I was in Toronto at the beginning of last month working at Massey College, I recorded a short interview with the calligrapher and type designer Kevin King. This interview is now streaming on Susan Mills’ Bookbinding Now website and well worth checking out.

Click this link to find the interview on the Bookbinding Now site.

ANDREW STEEVES ¶ PRINTER & PUBLISHER

Gaspereau Press Wayzgoose Pictures

Well, Holy Smokes! (as George Elliott Clarke would say). We had an astonishingly, gratifyingly successful Wayzgoose this past weekend. We lost track counting the visitors somewhere north of 200 people. I barely had the door unlocked and the lights on Saturday morning when a yellow school bus pulled in front of the building and students from Halifax started to disembark. From that point on, the joint was rocking. We had four letterpesses, one offset press, and a hot metal caster busy all day long – making stuff! Here are some photos from the day. Thanks to all who helped to make the event a success.


Three of our guest printers at work: Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr, (in the overalls), George Walker (in the hat) and Jason Dewinetz (in the green shirt, in the back).


Kennedy expounds!


Kennedy Prints! Amos set up wood type on our Vandercook Uni 1 to create a punchy one-colour poster reflecting on our dubious relationship with progress.


A waygooser cranks a sheet through the press.


George Walker (in the hat) shows wayzgooser Emma Barr how to hand ink a wood engraving.


George helps Emma pull the Devil’s Tail on the Albion handpress to print the engraving.


George and I collaborated on this broadside. I set and printed the type and George cut and printed the block, with, in this case, some help from Emma. The broadside concerns the Halifax printer, journalist, politician and champion of the Freedom of the Press, Joseph Howe.


George the showman.


George with his favorite parlour trick: writing backwards.


Adam Steeves explaining the workings of the Heidelberg KORD offset press.


Adam Steeves pulling a sheet off his press.


Jason Dewinetz printing a two-colour broadside of the famous “This is a Printing Office” text which was originally written as promotional copy for the Monotype Corporation. Here he’s using the light of the window to check the registration between the two colours.


Jason printing on our Vandercook 219 press.


A wayzgooser helps Jason to print the second colour on his broadside.


Gary Dunfield employing his stature to fish down one of Amos Kennedy’s posters for a wayzgooser.


While I showed wayzgoosers how to cast slugs on our Ludlow hot metal caster, Maine-based letterpress printer & journalist Hillary Savage printed the slugs on a parlour press.


Making simple blank books in the bindery.


Learning a simple chapbook stitch.


A ‘wayz goose’ is a goose fed on the stubble after the grain has been cut. There was no goose, but I did have a stubbly hair cut.


Just home from a trip to Paris, France, photographer Thaddeus Holownia showed up and made pictures of some of our guests with his 10 x 12 view camera. Here he is with George Walker and Steve Slipp.


Thaddeus also made a group photo of some of the guests, staff and wayzgoosers. (Front, left to right) Julie Rosvell, David Brewer, Michelle Walker, Sue Goyette, George Walker, Andrew Steeves, Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr, (back, left to right) Joe Stevens, Stephen Quick, Adam Steeves, Gary Dunfield, Hillary Savage, Jason Dewinetz, Ceri Sloan, Connie Sheppard.

ANDREW STEEVES ¶ PRINTER & PUBLISHER