Featured Collection: Thomas Bird Mosher Press

The American publisher Thomas Bird Mosher (1852-1923) published his first book in 1891, a poem titled Modern Love by George Meredith, without the author's knowledge or permission. The next year he published James Thomson's The City of Dreadful Night, and the year after that, 1893, he published two books, including his first anthology, Songs of Adieu. By 1895, he had published 16 books, and decided to publish full-time.

Mosher believed that everyone should have access to good literary works, and produced small, beautifully printed books at a reasonable price, rendering them affordable to the middle class. Mosher himself became notorious as the impassioned “Portland Pirate” of the turn-of-the-century printing world. The international copyright laws of 1891 were widely misunderstood and commonly flouted. The United States only protected works from foreign publishers if the book was published in America. Any material not published in the States was fair game. Mosher’s books were banned in England, but some authors defended Mosher for giving them an American audience they wouldn’t have otherwise had.

   Thomas Mosher chose quality materials for his publications and often used handmade paper from Holland or vellum imported from Japan. Forty seven of Mosher Press books were entirely printed on vellum made from sheep or calf skin.

The Special Collections Department at the UW-Parkside Archives & Area Research Center owns several editions of Mosher Press publications, including Underwoods by Robert Louis Stevenson, and Danted at Verona, by Dante Gabriel Rosetti.

   

For more information on the Thomas Bird Mosher Press, including a  biography of Thomas Bird Mosher, history of the press and links to related sites, please visit www.ThomasBirdMosher.net

Comments

[Philip R. Bishop]

Hello:

I'm the MOSHER PRESS bibliographer, and just wanted to let you know that I was pleased to see that your comments, although brief, are basically correct, accurate, and in accord with my findings in THOMAS BIRD MOSHER: PIRATE PRINCE OF PUBLISHERS (Oak Knoll Press & The British Library, 1998). The only minor misuse in your terminology is when you say "...or vellum imported from Japan." The paper imported from Japan is called "Japan vellum" which is distinctly different from the vellum you described in the next sentence which IS correctly stated.

You might want to direct your readers to the website on Mosher at www.ThomasBirdMosher.net and let them further discover, for themselves, what the man and the press were all about.

So overall nice job, and again, I was pleased to come across your recent posting.

Best wishes,

Phil Bishop

[Melissa Olson]

Thanks so much for your comment! I appreciate the clarification and I do hope the readers visit your site. These books are amongst my favorites in our collections!

~Melissa