Odeography of B. Franklin.
numbered limited edition
New York: Ayerdale Press, 1929. First. Hardcover.
Black cloth boards with paper spine label. This slim volume is hand numbered in ink no. 88 of 100 copies on the limitation page. Printed in Bodoni & Ultra Bodoni type on Laidtone paper.
Verse tribute to Benjamin Franklin with an interesting and nicely designed typographical layout by the noted poet and printer, Emmons who wrote, designed and composed the book.
Earl Harrison Emmons was born in Adair County, Iowa and began his career at age 13 working as a printer’s devil at a Greenfield, Iowa, newspaper, later moving up to linotype operator at papers in Iowa City and Des Moines; in his spare time, he wrote for trade publications. In 1914 he undertook his first editing job, at Printing Trade News in New York, and afterward at American Printer and Lithographer. In 1921 he returned to New York and was hired to take charge of The Composing Room for the Monotype Group; the publication soon became noted for his clever type and ornament compositions, as well as his humorous poems, news, and feature pieces.
In 1935 Goudy gave Emmons an 8 x 12 Golding clamshell press, and the Maverick Press was founded. From his studio apartment Emmons turned out broadsides, small books, and ephemera as well as some more ambitious and limited-edition projects such as The Book of Ruth. In 1940 Emmons quit New York to return to Iowa, where he set up his Maverick Press in West Liberty. He died of tuberculosis at the Oakdale Sanitarium, near Iowa City.
Price: $60.00