British Columbia Library Quarterly

There are 2 copies each of 2 issues of the British Columbia Library Quarterly in the Feckless Collection: October, 1960 and January, 1961.

Significant for their covers, block prints of flora made by George Kuthan, signed in the plate; Heather, and Lilium Parviflorum.

The following brief history of the art and design of the Quarterly is borrowed from the Alcuin Society’s web site.

The British Columbia Library Quarterly

June 7, 2016 by Robert Reid on The British Columbia Library Quarterly

Librarians are a civilized lot, so it was a great pleasure for me produce their quarterly journal for four years before I left Vancouver. I printed it in my basement printing shop in my home in Burnaby, and had a totally free hand with the design of both the text pages and the ad pages (including Duthie Books ads, for example). The Covers are outstanding because I got my students at the Art School, where I was teaching, to do woodcuts and linocuts for me to print on the covers. George Kuthan also contributed mightily to the covers, as can be seen by the wonderful series or wild flowers that he did for us.

The librarians took all this for granted until, to their great joy and surprise, their quarterly journal was voted the best library publication in North America. It all started when Neil Harlow, the UBC Librarian and great admirer of my work, asked me to produce a special issue for a convention the BC librarians were having. I got Bill Reid to make one of his beautiful silver engravings for the cover. I used to mount them type high and print them before he turned them into silver boxes and things like that. This one was saved from such a fate and is currently owned by Jan Alexander. The issue was such a great success that I was asked to continue printing each issue from then on.

Alcuin Society