This is part two of a four-part series. Part one covers the period prior to 1900.
Just months after Congressional approval was granted, the machines whirred to life in the new Binding Office at the Library of Congress. Officially known as the Library Branch of the Government Printing Office (GPO), a staff of three from the Library worked with 40 plus staff members from the GPO. As they awaited the equipment, the Library began reassigning staff and preparing more for binding requests from the various divisions.
When what is now known as the Thomas Jefferson Building opened in 1897, the Library of Congress took on a substantial increase in staff. Librarians were sought from throughout the world to help establish new offices, to better serve the new reading rooms, and to prepare and store the collection. Though it took three years for Congress to approve the creation of a binding office, the groundwork began earlier that year before the building opened its doors that fall.
Frederick W. Hebard was hired in 1897 as a stack attendant from Union, NJ. Within two years, according to the Official Register of the United States, he had moved up to assistant in the Catalogue Department. His remit was to determine the needs of a Binding Office for the Library, and he would be officially named the first assistant in charge of binding at the Library of Congress in April 1900.
At the same time that Hebard joined the Library, Arthur Richmond Kimball was recruited from the New Hampshire State Library. Initially hired as an assistant librarian, he was given responsibility to create an Order division, today known as Acquisitions, and was appointed its first Chief in 1899, five months before it was approved in the spending bill.
Hebard would leave in 1901 to become a high school principal. With Hebard gone, Librarian Herbert Putnam shuffled several staff around to find the right person to be the assistant in charge. Kimball took over in 1902 but was also assigned to the Periodical Division, the position being only part of his duties for several years with Lucretia Waring briefly serving in the role alongside him due to a salary limitation. Kimball took it on fully once the salary was raised to match his annual wage of $1500 in 1907. He would hold the position for the next 25 years and set many of the standards and policies we still follow today
When the Government Printing Office opened its binding branch at the Library of Congress, the materials that could be used were prescribed by law. For Library of Congress collections, they were to use half turkey, which is goat leather imported from Türkiye covering the spine of the book and the corners of the front and back covers. As binding frequency increased, and sensibilities changed, the binding process improved and modernized. Additionally, librarians worldwide found their bindings were deteriorating.
In London, UK, the Committee of the Society of Arts on Leather for Bookbinding was gathered in 1905. In their final report, which was cited in several annual reports of the Library, they assessed the present state of bookbinding and found the materials were lacking. The leather was less durable, modern bookbinding techniques weakened it further, and the books were overall not well preserved. “With proper conditions of ventilation, temperature, and dryness, books may be preserved without deterioration for very long periods, on open shelves,” the report stated.
No one from the Library of Congress was included on the committee, nor from the Government Printing Office, despite both organizations’ rise in notability. Throughout the 19th Century, the United States hosted several expositions to gather inventors, artists, entrepreneurs, and others to show advances in their fields. At the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition in St. Louis, MO, in 1904, the Library and the GPO had created displays for the first time.
Though included, the binding office display was not well noted. Attendees from the International Brotherhood of Bookbinders made no mention of the Library’s display in an article reviewing the expo in their journal, the International Bookbinder. When it came time for the Jamestown Centennial Exposition in 1907, the Library was allocated only $5,000 for the display, far less than 1904 and not enough to allow transport of collections items to Hampton Roads, VA. Instead of exhibiting collection items, the Library built the collection on the work of the staff, showing off tools and items that could be displayed within budget.
Materials continued to be in flux as the new century moved forward. Kimball worked with the foremen of the bindery and the GPO’s head foremen to test out various binding materials and even the glue that was used. In 1907, the bindery started working with a stiff cotton material soaked in a sizing agent called buckram. The cost was more than regular cloth, but it showed promise. After the findings of the 1905 committee, it became necessary to care for the leather bindings, especially with those leathers that proved to be acidic.
While the quality of the leather continued to degrade, the invention of Pyroxylin in 1910, a gelatinized nitrocellulouse, allowed buckram to become more stable, and lower in cost. From then on, the bindery began using it more and more, though other issues still persisted. As the collections continued to grow, some of those items required some special care other than binding before reaching the shelves, fumigation.
As World War I broke out in Europe, certain materials became more inaccessible, including leather from Türkiye, which at the time was part of the Ottoman Empire, one of the Central Powers in the war. By that time, all materials for the reading rooms had been switched over to buckram. However, special collections and items for Congress remained in leathers, now in different colors due to available stock. Other items also became unavailable, such as the marbled paper used in endpapers.
The strong partnership between the Library and the GPO allowed the bindery to keep working efficiently through the war years and the material shortages. While the binding budget remained below the Library’s needs, it was not for lack of material. In 1918, the Library bindery took over the newspaper binding and for the first time, all of the Library’s binding was done onsite. This would continue for several years as the budget was increased, but the space provided for the bindery became too small to operate in.
Between 1919 and 1932, the budget for binding had doubled and the binding office saw their annual output go from 26,621 items to 38,491, with all items being bound onsite. Unfortunately, this progress was stalled as the Great Depression caused changes in budget allocations; starting with cutbacks in staffing due to the Economy Act of 1932.
Under the Economy Act of 1932, any federal employee 70 years or older, depending on their position, faced compulsory retirement in order to open up jobs for younger workers. It was at this time that Kimball returned to New Hampshire and was replaced by George W. Morgan, who would hold the position for the next decade, while the bindery space became ever more cramped.
Congress approved the construction of an annex to the Library of Congress on June 13, 1930, after the Library had completely filled in the eastern alcoves with book storage. Once the plans were drawn, it was determined the Binding office would be moving across the street.
With the bindery moving to the Annex, the GPO, in consultation with new Librarian Archibald MacLeish, agreed that the binding office would receive all new equipment in the new space. On March 30, 1939, the bindery staff loaded up carts with the items they were working on and cleaned up the workstations one last time, leaving the large equipment for removal. The following day, around 50 staff of the GPO and Library took the elevator down one level to the tunnel connecting to the Annex building, pushed the trucks carefully down the slope and into the Library’s future.
Thank you to Cheryl Fox of the Manuscript Division for her help in developing this post and providing various items for review from the Library of Congress Archives.
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