Part 2

Another daybook of the Williamsburg printing office also survives in original binding. It dates from the time of Hunter's successor, Joseph Royle, and almost beyond question was also bound in the shop where it was used. Its cover, not surprisingly, was tooled in blind with two of the familiar rolls, including the egg roll. A volume of York County records also survives from the period of Royle's proprietorship. Its cover shows the impressions of three old standbys: the egg, the Mousetrap, and a third roll seen on earlier Williamsburg bindings.

_THE BINDING BUSINESS_

If the outside covers of two printing office daybooks can add a few bits to our story, the inside pages should be a gold mine of information about bookbinding in colonial Williamsburg. And so they are.

Hunter's daybook for the period from July 1750 through June 1752 and Royle's covering most of 1764 and all of 1765 tell a great deal about the quantity and variety of binding work they did, the prices they charged, and a little about the wages they paid. Hunter, for example, at the end of 1751 entered payment of 38 pounds 15 shillings against the bookbinding account "To John Stretch For his Wages from the 14th of January to this Day." Thus, from this source, Stretch earned 15 shillings sixpence a week.

The kinds of bookbinding done in the shops of Hunter and Royle--and doubtless also by the other Williamsburg printers, about whose business we lack detailed information--can be divided into three main groups: edition binding, custom binding, and the manufacture of blank record books. As a sideline, they also made and sold pocketbooks, letter cases, and other kinds of pocket cases.

In volume of work done in Hunter's shop, and probably in many other colonial binderies, the manufacture and sale of blank books was easily of first importance. Obviously these were not printed books--although the pages of some of them were ruled by hand in advance of binding. They were letter-copy books, account books, and record books of various kinds used by everyone who was at all systematic about his business affairs.

Accounts kept "after the Italian manner," as described in John Mair's _Book Keeping Methodiz'd_ (about 1750), called for ten different books. The three chief ones were a "wastebook" in which transactions were jotted down at the time they took place, a permanent "journal" or "daybook" into which they were transcribed in a more stately hand when time permitted, and a "ledger" containing in final and complete form all accounts pertaining to the business. Subsidiary records described by Mair were the cash book, book of charges and merchandise, book of house expenses, factory or invoice book, sales book, bill book, and receipt book.

Hunter's daybook shows entries covering sales of all the principal varieties and many of the subsidiary forms. In fact, entries pertaining to "blank books," "legers," "alphabets," "journals," "account books," "day books," "waste-books," and the like far outnumber all other binding entries together. Royle's daybook, which seems to have been kept on a somewhat different basis--perhaps less meticulously--than Hunter's, lists proportionately fewer such entries compared to those for binding printed volumes.

One might expect that business record books would have been bound sturdily, but in plain and cheap dress. Sometimes they were, but often they were just as well finished as were printed books, usually in good quality calfskin, sometimes in vellum or parchment. Ledgers in particular were large and heavy books; since they got steady usage, they needed to be made of the best materials and workmanship for the sake of durability. And custom usually led to a certain amount of decoration on even the most utilitarian volume. The result was that blank books were often as fine in outward appearance as those from the press--and sometimes more costly, because of the larger skins needed to cover them.

Not a few of the books sold by William Hunter and presumed to have been made up by him or John Stretch brought a price of a pound or more. This was, as we have seen, a good deal more than Stretch earned in a week. The most imposing price charged to any of Hunter's customers was the 3 pounds 10 shillings John Hall paid for "a large Record Book Imperial."

All eighteenth-century paper was manufactured by hand, and sheets of various sizes and kinds bore such designations as pot, foolscap, pro patria, crown, demy, royal, super royal, imperial, atlas, and elephant. These names referred to supposedly standard sizes, but actual dimensions were neither precise nor unchanging. In seventeenth-century England a sheet of "demy" measured about 10 by 15½ inches. The English paper of the same name today is 17½ by 22½ inches.

This increase in dimensions of paper took place gradually, and as the size of sheets grew the size of pages could also grow. A result was that folio books became too large to be handy while quarto and octavo formats, which were more economical to print, gained popularity among both printers and book buyers.

_BINDING TO THE CUSTOMER'S ORDER_

Some idea of the volume of binding done in Hunter's establishment during the two years covered by his daybook may be gathered from the partial figures for supplies charged to binding. These included £56 17s. 6d. for paper and £250 13s. 9½d. for other binding materials, chiefly calf and sheepskins, gold leaf, and pasteboard. In physical quantity the totals are again incomplete but indicative: at least 140 dozen skins and more than a ton of pasteboard.

These materials, of course, went to the binding of printed as well as blank books. As their daybooks show, the binding of books to order was a steady source of income for both Hunter and Royle--and doubtless for Royle's successors as it had been for Hunter's predecessor. Custom work included the rebinding of worn books, the lettering and application of title panels, and perhaps some binding of books the printer bought in flat sheets, already printed, from London or from another colonial printer.

The fact that custom binding and rebinding accounted for a prominent share of the work done by Williamsburg binders indicates that Governor Botetourt was not the only man in Virginia before the Revolution who owned and cherished books. According to one estimate, there were at least 1,000 private libraries with at least 20,000 volumes altogether before the colony was one hundred years old. Another study of 100 such collections, including the largest, calculated their average size at 106 titles (possibly twice that many volumes).

The average is high because the study included such very extensive libraries as those of William Byrd II, Robert Carter, and Ralph Wormeley. Nearly half of the libraries in the group studied had fewer than twenty-five titles. However, most Virginia gentlemen of the planter aristocracy owned at least an armful of books.

An occasional book in any such collection might have been written by the owner himself. Hunter stitched a manuscript volume for Nathaniel Walthoe, Esqr., and Royle bound a handwritten book for John Blair. What these gentlemen had written that deserved such care can only be guessed at. Both were officials, so the books might well have been public records of some kind. On the other hand, perhaps the content was less prosaic: poetry, maybe, or something like the "list of Horse Matches" that Royle bound for the Hon. John Tayloe at two shillings.

Music books, volumes of collected pamphlets and magazines, a "cyphering book" for Mrs. Jane Vobe, keeper of the King's Arms Tavern, and dozens of similar items in the Hunter and Royle daybooks account for only a portion of custom binding, however. The book most often bound to order was the Bible, closely followed by the Anglican prayer book. Hunter bound a number of Bibles for 6 shillings, but charged 12 shillings for a "large Church Bible" and 50 shillings for one "neatly bound in Turkey." "Turkey," "levant," and "morocco" leathers were all goatskin, each taking its name from the region where it was tanned.

Here are a few entries from Royle's daybook during mid-1765, selected not only because they show the binder's price list, but also because the customer's name or occupation, or his preferences in reading matter and binding, or his concern for the intellectual advancement of the fair sex may be of interest:

[shillings/pence

June 11 William Waters, Binding Corelis Sonate, 8/9 lett^d ... 4to June 19 Hon. John Blair, Binding Amelia [County] 15/- rent roll. folio June 27 George Davenport, Binding Mrs Ballard's 3/9 Prayer Book Col Robert Bolling, Binding Councel of 17/6 Trent, folio, gilt & Letter'd 15/- D^o ... Baconi Historia, Henrici Septimi, d^o 2/6 Thomas Jefferson, D^o History Virginia, 4to 8/9 July 3 Col Robert Bolling Jun^r Lettering Pope's 5/7½ Works, 9 Vols for Miss Sally Waters Aug. 28 Rev^d David Mossom, Binding a Bible 5/- John Gilchrist, Ditto Love Elegies 2/- 7/- Aug. 31 James Anderson, Blacksmith Binding a Quarto 10/- Bible. in ruff Calf

An advertisement Royle placed in the _Maryland Gazette_ for May 2, 1765, throws an interesting light on one of the characteristic labor-management difficulties of his time:

WILLIAMSBURG, April 23, 1765

Ran away from the Printing-Office, on Saturday Night, a Servant Man named _George Fisher_, by Trade a Book-Binder, between 25 and 26 Years of Age, about 5 feet 5 Inches high, very thick, stoops much, and has a down Look; he is a little Peck-pitted, has a Scar on one of his Temples, is much addicted to Licquor, very talkative when drunk, and remarkably stupid.

Whoever apprehends the said Servant, and conveys him to the Printing-Office, in Virginia, shall have Five Pounds Reward, and if taken out of the Colony, TEN POUNDS, beside what the Law allows.

JOSEPH ROYLE

This seems a generous reward indeed for the return of a man of Fisher's unendearing qualities. Not that Fisher, a transported convict, was untalented in his way. "Conveyed" to Williamsburg and lodged in the gaol, he escaped at the end of July, both from custody and from history.

_MASS PRODUCTION BY HAND_

The third principal variety of work done in the Williamsburg binderies was edition binding--the stitching and uniform covering of a whole run of books printed in the same shop. Session laws of the Virginia Assembly, and periodical codifications of them printed in editions of 1,000 copies or more constituted the bulk of edition binding for Parks and his successors.

Shortly before his death Parks had agreed to print and bind 1,000 copies of the 1748 revision of the Virginia code "with the Arms of Virginia stampt on each book." Along with the other assets and liabilities of the printing office, Hunter took over this contract, which called for the volumes to be finished by June 10, 1751. In October of that year however, he felt obliged to defend himself with the following notice in the _Virginia Gazette_:

{hand} The Subscribers to the _Virginia_ Laws, as well as the Public Magistrates, having loudly complain'd of their long Delay, and thrown the Blame of it entirely on the Printer; it is judg'd necessary to assure them, That they have been printed near four Months, and that their Publication has been in no wise retarded through his Neglect, but for Want of the _Table_; the Gentleman appointed to draw it up, not having yet compleated it---- Those subscribers who are in immediate Want of them, on paying a Pistole, may have them Stitch'd for present Use, which they may afterwards have bound when the Table is printed, making it up the Subscription Price.

Nearly twenty years later a subsequent collection of Virginia laws caused a different kind of trouble for three of Hunter's successors in Williamsburg. The job of printing and binding 1,000 copies of the great volume was too much for the public printer, William Rind, to handle alone. So he undertook it jointly with the partnership of Alexander Purdie and John Dixon. Their order for leather to cover the books was answered by a shipment from London of "Nasty dirty little skins" that could neither be used nor returned. Eventually the skins rotted on the wharf at Yorktown, while the printers had to ask reimbursement from the House of Burgesses.

Although William Parks published a number of books under his own imprint, just as he had done in Annapolis, Hunter, Royle, and their successors seem to have been much less active in this phase of the printing and binding business. Those who were public printers continued to issue the Virginia laws and other public compilations, proclamations, and the like. Also, they annually printed small pocket almanacs, usually only stitched and covered in paper, which sold in considerable numbers each December and January.

_OTHER WILLIAMSBURG BINDERS_

The several Williamsburg printers who followed Royle left no daybooks or other records that have yet come to light. What little we know of their bookbinding activities comes from their advertisements in the various _Virginia Gazettes_. (At one time three separate weekly papers were issued in Williamsburg by rival printers, all called the _Virginia Gazette_!) Here are some typical samples:

GENTLEMEN may now be supplied, on short notice, at the Printing Office, _Williamsburg_, with BLANK BOOKS of all sizes, ruled or unruled, and bound either in Calf or Vellum. OLD BOOKS also new bound, and any thing in the BOOK BINDING business executed in the cheapest and best manner.

_Virginia Gazette_ Alexander Purdie and John Dixon, Printers March 14, 1766

BLANK Bills of Exchange, Bonds, Bills of Lading, and all other Blanks, may be had of William Rind, at the New Printing-Office, near the CAPITOL. Gentlemen may also be supplied with all Sorts of Blank Books; and old Books are neatly and expeditiously Bound, at a reasonable Rate.

_Virginia Gazette_ William Rind, Printer May 30, 1766

A COMPLETE ASSORTMENT OF All Kinds of STATIONARY,

At _Dixon_ & _Hunter_'s Printing Office:

BEST Writing Paper, Imperial, Royal, Medium, Demy, Thick and Thin Post, Propatria and Pot, by the Ream, or smaller quantity; Gilt, Plain, and Black Edge Paper for Letters; Parchment; Inkpowder; best large _Dutch_ Quills and Pens; red and black Sealing-Wax and Wafers; Memorandum Books; Red Ink, in small Vials; Red Inkpowder; Pounce and Pounce-Boxes; Black Lead Pencils; all Sizes of neat Morocco Pocket Books; all Sorts and Sizes of Pewter Inkstands; best _Edinburgh_ Inkpots, for the Pocket; best Playing Cards. ---- Legers, Journals, Day-Books, and all Sorts and Sizes of Blank Books for Merchants Accounts or Records. Blanks of all Kinds for Merchants, County Court Clerks, _&c. &c. &c._

{hand} Old BOOKS new BOUND, and all Kinds of BOOK-BINDING done at this Office, either in the NEATEST or CHEAPEST Manner, according to Directions; and where any Thing in the PRINTING BUSINESS is expeditiously performed, on moderate Terms.

_Virginia Gazette_ John Dixon and William Hunter Jr., Printers March 18, 1775

THOMAS BREND, BOOKBINDER and STATIONER,

HAS for SALE, at his shop at the corner of Dr. Carter's large brick house, Testaments Spelling Books, Primers, Ruddiman's Rudiments of the Latin Tongue, Watts's Psalms, Blank Books, Quills Sealing-Wax, Pocket-Books, and many other articles in the Stationery way. Old books rebound; and any Gentlemen who have paper by them and want it made into Account Books, may have it done on the shortest notice.

_Virginia Gazette_ John Clarkson and Augustine Davis, Printers August 19, 1780

Alexander Purdie and John Dixon, who placed the first of these advertisements, were the successors of Joseph Royle in the shop on Duke of Gloucester Street in Williamsburg that had passed down from William Parks to William Hunter to Royle to Purdie. Their _Virginia Gazette_ was the direct continuation of the paper founded by Parks in 1736. We are not too surprised, therefore, to find the egg roll reappearing once more on the covers of several copies of a book printed by Purdie and Dixon in 1774.

The name of Thomas Brend brings to a conclusion the known list of bookbinders who worked in Williamsburg before the Revolution. Brend emigrated from England to Annapolis in 1764 and set up in trade there. It seems probable that he moved to Williamsburg with William Rind in 1766 or arrived shortly afterward. Rind was the Annapolis printer whom Jefferson and some other patriots had induced to come to Virginia. They hoped Rind's press would offset the impact of Joseph Royle's, which they thought was too much in the governor's pocket.

Jefferson was among the men for whom Brend bound books, as were St. George Tucker of Williamsburg and other persons less known to history. This work, however, he did in Richmond, where he moved after the capital of Virginia had been changed to that city in 1780. There he did most of his work, including the covers of many books of public records, as an independent binder.

On an account book of the state auditor for 1785 appears the familiar egg roll. How it got into Brend's possession no one can say, since he was presumably not in the direct line of succession from Parks through Hunter and Royle. Somehow he did acquire tools from the succession, for the trail of detection comes full circle in 1799. In that year in Richmond Thomas Brend rebound Jefferson's collection of the laws of Virginia, using to decorate the board edges the same Mousetrap roll that William Parks had used in Annapolis in 1728.

_THE BINDING OF A BOOK_

Although this small pamphlet does not pretend to be a thorough manual on how to bind your own books, anyone seeking a hobby might well consider bookbinding. The procedures are simple, the necessary tools and materials need not cost a great deal, and the satisfactions one can take in the production of his own fine bindings should be obvious.

What we can do here is to describe only the basic tools, equipment, and procedures that would have been used by a Williamsburg craftsman in binding a book in the most usual dress of colonial times. The practicing binder, of course, would have had a comparative wealth of tools and materials with which to turn out--by the time-honored and still-used procedures--bindings in greater number and variety of finish. The following lists represent the minimum essentials for binding a book.

_Materials_

printed or blank paper (the contents of the book) decorative paper for fly-leaves long-fibre tissue for mending torn pages hemp cord or leather thongs for crossbands linen thread for sewing silk thread for headbands pasteboard or milled board calfskin for outer cover piece of morocco for label leather dressing gold leaf animal glue wheat paste vinegar egg white

_Tools & Equipment_

stitching frame paring stone gluepot pastepot water basins laying presses trimming press and plough press boards bone folder skiving knife and other knives scissors needles stone or lead weights paste and glue brushes metal straightedge backing hammer awl knife and cushion for gold leaf brass alphabet stamps brass decorative stamps brass decorative rolls heater for gluepot and brass tools

The printer's job was done when the flat sheets of paper came off his press, each sheet containing four or more printed pages arranged so that folding would bring the pages into proper sequence. The binder's first task was to fold the sheets into "signatures" of four, eight, twelve, or sixteen pages.

Sheets folded once--into two leaves, a four-page signature--made a large-format book called a "folio." Two folds in each sheet made eight-page signatures and "quarto" books. Three folds gave "octavo" volumes of sixteen-page signatures. A different arrangement of folds produced twelve pages in a signature and a "duodecimo" book. For any number of folds, however, a bone or ivory folder--a thin, smooth blade--was essential for rapid and accurate work. And it came in handy for a number of other binding operations, too.

After he had folded all the printed sheets, the binder gathered a full set of signatures in the proper order to make the book. On his stitching frame--which was simply a four-piece vertical framework, the upper crosspiece adjustable in height--he stretched four to six leather thongs or pieces of hemp cord. With needle and strong linen thread he then stitched the signatures, one after another, through their center folds to each of the crossbands. The sewing frame held them parallel to each other and at right angles to the pages.

These bands gave bound books their flexibility and created the ridges across the spine characteristic of most of them. The stitch used in sewing the signatures to the bands was about as simple as could be, but it cannot be duplicated by any machine yet devised. The crossbands and the stitching together were the keys to the all-but-everlasting durability and the flat opening of the well-made book.

The binder next squared up the back of the book and applied glue to it. When dry, he put the book in the trimming press and trimmed the fore edge, head, and tail, then with his backing hammer rounded off the spine. Having cut the boards just a bit larger than page size, he punched holes through them close to their back edges. These holes he spaced in pairs to match the position of the bands, which he laced through the holes, pasted firm, and pounded smooth.

Very little the binder had done so far would be visible in the finished product. But at this point he could begin to put his artistry on display. Selecting silk thread in two colors to suit his taste, he bound a narrow piece of leather across both the top and bottom of the spine, completely covering them with something like a buttonhole stitch. These "headbands" added little to the strength but much to the appearance of a book. Careful binders said that a book should no more be seen in a library without headbands than a gentleman should appear in public minus a collar.