2019 Events

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6PM

An illustrated talk by Laura A. Ackley, author of the award-winning book San Francisco’s Jewel City: The Panama-Pacific International Exposition.

International Expositions, also called World’s Fairs, have showcased innovation since their inception. The major American World’s Fairs in the 50 years between 1915 and 1965 displayed leaps forward in areas including transportation, communication, entertainment, and even recommendations on how Americans should live. Some of these new concepts were unqualified successes, while some proved perilous missteps.

Those decades took aviation from potentially lethal, hand-built aircraft to space flight. They saw communications evolve from the first transcontinental telephony to early video-phones, and entertainment from giant dioramas to audio-animatronics.

The odyssey will start with the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco and conclude with the New York World’s Fair of 1964-65, with visits to the important intervening World’s Fairs in the United States.

Laura Ackley will transport us through half a century of significant advances shown at U.S. World’s Fairs, discussing how they stood the test of time.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

An illustrated talk by Laura A. Ackley, author of the award-winning book San Francisco’s Jewel City: The Panama-Pacific International Exposition.

International Expositions, also called World’s Fairs, have showcased innovation since their inception. The major American World’s Fairs in the 50 years between 1915 and 1965 displayed leaps forward in areas including transportation, communication, entertainment, and even recommendations on how Americans should live. Some of these new concepts were unqualified successes, while some proved perilous missteps.

Those decades took aviation from potentially lethal, hand-built aircraft to space flight. They saw communications evolve from the first transcontinental telephony to early video-phones, and entertainment from giant dioramas to audio-animatronics.

The odyssey will start with the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco and conclude with the New York World’s Fair of 1964-65, with visits to the important intervening World’s Fairs in the United States.

Laura Ackley will transport us through half a century of significant advances shown at U.S. World’s Fairs, discussing how they stood the test of time.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

An illustrated talk by Steve Robison, printer, Tahoe Letterpress, and Katherine Case, owner of Meridian Press.

Details to come.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Remarks at 5:30 PM

Remarks by Chris Loker, author.

A Shimmer of Joy
One Hundred Children’s Picture Books in America

Picture books are a jewel in the crown of children’s literature. They are composed of words, illustrations, and the dramatically paced rhythm of pages turning in the reader’s hand. When these elements come together with creative mastery, a surge of mind or heart can occur, as with any form of fine art. At its most inspirational, a picture book can provide a transporting reading experience—punctuated by shimmering moments of joy—for the children and adults who journey inside its covers.

A Shimmer of Joy is an exciting and colorful presentation of children’s picture books published in – or imported to – America from 1900 to 2015. The children’s books on exhibit are some of those featured in the Book Club of California’s 239th publication A Shimmer of Joy: One Hundred Children’s Picture Books in America by author Chris Loker.

This publication is available in two editions: a Deluxe Edition of 50 copies and a Standard Edition of 200 copies. More information on this publication can be found at bccbooks.org.

Publication available Monday, December 2, 2019
Exhibition on view December 2, 2019 – January 13, 2020

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

A conversation with graphic artist, Michael Schwab, and letterpress printer, Richard Seibert. Moderated by Amos Klausner, Schwab and Seibert will discuss this year’s Quarterly covers as well as their experience over two lifetimes of image making.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

6:00 PM refreshments | 7:00 PM lecture | 8:15 PM book signing

As a Pasadena artist, Frances Gearhart (1869-1959) was embedded in the time, place and ideals of the Arts and Crafts movement. Her color block prints of the California landscape personifies a handcrafted aesthetic. She was bold in her use of color and powerful in the lines of keyblock. Seasons and times of the day captivated her. She celebrated the wintry day, the morning sun on the hills, the splendor of fall. Hence the title, “Behold the Day.”

An exhibition of Gearhart’s work and a talk by Susan Futterman, author.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

*At Pasadena Central Library, Donald R. Wright Auditorium
285 East Walnut Street, Pasadena, CA 91101

Following the first tourist party visit to Yosemite in 1855, literature–whether pictorial, photographic, or printed–enticed sightseers to visit the sublime Valley. Tracing the evolution of this relationship provides an insight into early Yosemite ephemera, books, and lithographs. The literary lure of tourists to the Valley has worked so well, that today Yosemite is painfully loved to death.

An illustrated talk by Dennis Kruska, author of Bibliography of Yosemite, the Central and the Southern High Sierra, and the Big Trees, 1839-1900 (1992) and James Mason Hutchings of Yosemite: a Biography and Bibliography, 2009.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

*At Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens
1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA 91108

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Following the first tourist party visit to Yosemite in 1855, literature–whether pictorial, photographic, or printed–enticed sightseers to visit the sublime Valley. Tracing the evolution of this relationship provides an insight into early Yosemite ephemera, books, and lithographs. The literary lure of tourists to the Valley has worked so well, that today Yosemite is painfully loved to death.

An illustrated talk by Dennis Kruska, author of Bibliography of Yosemite, the Central and the Southern High Sierra, and the Big Trees, 1839-1900 (1992) and James Mason Hutchings of Yosemite: a Biography and Bibliography, 2009.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

A talk by Natalia Kresich, writer and owner of 34 Trinity Arts & News, and Rick Wilkinson, owner of G.F. Wilkinson Books.

For the past eight years, the three gallery display windows at 34 Trinity Place in San Francisco’s financial district have been utilized as a fully operational used bookstore; first as GF Wilkinson Books, then as 34 Trinity Arts & News.

34 Trinity Arts & News was created in 2017 to preserve the legacy of GF Wilkinson Books, the last remaining used bookstore space in downtown San Francisco. 34 Trinity is a bookstore and art space that specializes in books and ephemera focusing on art, poetry, literature and counter-culture history, as well as film photography and poster art. 34 Trinity Arts & News curates and hosts poetry readings, book releases and music performances.

Located in what has come to be known as the epicenter of technological development, the bookstore advances the legacy of the physical bookstore space and the centuries-old intimacy of an individual’s relationship with a book. Their goal is continue to provide the bookstore as an amenity to San Francisco and support sustained access to affordable and unique reading materials for the public.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Ilia Zdanevich, known as Iliazd, was a Russian Futurist writer, typographer, and book designer who moved to Paris in 1921, published the first anthology of experimental visual and sound poetry in the late 1940s, and became a producer of livres d’artistes until his death in 1975. His books included collaborations with many celebrated modern artists—Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Max Ernst and others—and are much sought after by bibliophiles and collectors. But does appreciation of the books depend upon information about his life? And what are the practical and critical challenges in constructing a biography? What is the relationship between archival evidence and narrative? How do we read an individual life in relation to enormous forces and events of history (Revolution, world wars)? What taboos and lines of privacy need to be respected and when? What relation does the constructed persona of a biographical subject have to their work? The recently completed, Encountering Iliazd: Memoir of a Biographical Project, addresses these and other issues and forms the case study for considering these questions more broadly.

Johanna Drucker is a writer, scholar, and artist who began making books in the 1970s. Her work is represented in major collections and archives. She has published widely on topics related to the history of the book, visual poetry, digital humanities, and graphical forms of knowledge production. Titles include: The Century of Artists’ Books (Granary, 1994), The Alphabetic Labyrinth (Thames and Hudson, 1994), SpecLab (Chicago, 2009), Graphesis (Harvard, 2014), and Downdrift (Three Rooms Press, 2018).

A talk by Johanna Drucker, writer, scholar, and artist.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

A field trip to the oldest continuously operated public library in the American West. Located in Sacramento, the State Library has an extensive collection of documents from and about the state’s rich history and is one of the major genealogical reference libraries on the West Coast.

The library collection includes more than 4 million titles, 6,000 maps, and 250,000 photographs. It has an extensive collection of documents from and about the state’s rich history and is one of the major genealogical reference libraries on the West Coast. It also holds significant collections from Mexico, the United Kingdom and Europe, with manuscripts dating back to the 13th and 14th centuries.

This is a Ticketed Event, limited to 20 participants. Click here for more information and to purchase tickets.

At the California State Library
900 N. Street Sacramento, CA 95814-4869

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

The Missing Pages is the biography of a manuscript that is at once art, sacred object, and cultural heritage. Its tale mirrors the story of its scattered community as Armenians have struggled to redefine themselves after genocide and in the absence of a homeland. Heghnar Zeitlian Watenpaugh follows in the manuscript’s footsteps through seven centuries, from medieval Armenia to the killing fields of 1915 Anatolia, the refugee camps of Aleppo, Ellis Island, and Soviet Armenia, and ultimately to a Los Angeles courtroom.

Reconstructing the path of the pages, Watenpaugh uncovers the rich tapestry of an extraordinary artwork and the people touched by it. At once a story of genocide and survival, of unimaginable loss and resilience, The Missing Pages captures the human costs of war and persuasively makes the case for a human right to art.

An illustrated talk by Heghnar Watenpaugh, Ph.D., author and professor of art history at the University of California, Davis .

To RSVP, please complete this form.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

From across the sea, they came by the thousands, escaping war and poverty in southern China to seek their fortunes in America. Converging on the enormous western worksite of the Transcontinental Railroad, the migrants spent years dynamiting tunnels through the snow-packed cliffs of the Sierra Nevada and laying tracks across the burning Utah desert. Their sweat and blood fueled the ascent of an interlinked, industrial United States. But those of them who survived this perilous effort would suffer a different kind of death—a historical one, as they were pushed first to the margins of American life and then to the fringes of public memory.

In this groundbreaking account, award-winning scholar Gordon H. Chang draws on unprecedented research to recover the Chinese railroad workers’ stories and celebrate their role in remaking America. An invaluable correction of a great historical injustice, The Ghosts of Gold Mountain returns these “silent spikes” to their rightful place in our national saga.

A talk by Gordon H. Chang, professor of history at Stanford University.

Reservations available through Litquake.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Pope Francis’s decision in 2015 to canonize Junípero Serra sparked a storm of controversy, especially in California. There were serious disagreements between those who believed Serra should be canonized as an intrepid and even heroic evangelizer of the New World and those who believed that Serra was a central figure in the destruction of the Native American way of life and thus is unworthy of the honor of sainthood.

In this presentation we attempt to get behind the controversy and look at Serra the man. In our judgment, the two major forces in Serra’s life were a) his personal identity as an 18th century Catholic missionary, and b) his relationship with the native peoples he encountered in central Mexico, Baja California, and Alta California. We believe that approaching Serra in this fashion throws considerable light upon the early history of Spanish and Mexican California.

An illustrated talk by Rose Marie Beebe, professor of Spanish literature, and Robert Senkewicz, professor of history, emeritus, both at Santa Clara University.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

This talk will provide an introduction to the Situationist International (S.I.) through the prism of book collecting. Active from 1957 to 1972, the S.I. was a revolutionary alliance of artists, intellectuals, architects and political theorists that is hailed as the “last avant garde” of the 20th century. The organization is perhaps best known for its role in shaping the ideas behind the May 1968 riots in France. This talk will also address some of the joys and challenges of collecting a movement that rejects the very notion of collection – e.g., by encouraging endless reprints, using low-quality “stolen” paper, donating (instead of selling) their work, and more.

A talk by Mehdi El Hajoui, private collector.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Vance Gerry was an artist who applied his creative talents to many different interests and pursuits. Perhaps best known for his successful career at Walt Disney Productions, Vance also operated various presses during his lifetime. Although he produced stunningly beautiful books and ephemera, Vance remains largely unknown and undervalued as a fine printer. Please join us for a glimpse into the private life of Vance Gerry, one of Southern California’s premier fine press printers.

An illustrated talk by Robert Bothamley, author and collector.

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 5:30 PM

Woody Guthrie L.A.: 1937 to 1941, edited by historians Darryl Holter and William Deverell, argues that the famed folk singer’s brief residence in Los Angeles in the later years of the Great Depression forever changed his music, his politics, and his legacy. Those changes became the basis of his incredible influence on the world’s music.

The book is the product of many years’ work and close cooperation with members of Woody Guthrie’s family and estate. Lyrics Guthrie wrote about Los Angeles, many of which he never set to music, are published here for the first time. The book also features more than a dozen of Guthrie’s brilliant cartoons—his quickly drawn satires on politics, the wealthy, and the future of Los Angeles.

Because Woody Guthrie came to Los Angeles when he did, his music stridently addresses inequities and inequalities amplified by the Depression. In Los Angeles, the ever-observant Dust Bowl troubadour became the urban folksinger. His time in L.A. created the Woody that—eighty years later—bears witness to America’s promise and its problems.

An illustrated talk with music by Darryl Holter, musician, singer-songwriter, and author, and William Deverell, professor of history and director of the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West at the University of Southern California.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

To RSVP, please complete this form.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 5:30 PM

From its beginnings in Ancient China through its slow spread westward, paper has been an agent of transformation. In this hands-on library event, we will look at the plants used by different cultures to make paper and how the manufacturing process adapted to these raw materials. We will handle a variety of papers from around the world and discuss how the types of fibers and the production processes affect the character of the resulting sheets. Your favorite book will never feel the same!

A members-only talk by Elizabeth Newsom, librarian, Book Club of California.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Remarks & Discussion at 6 PM

In June 1945, the members of the Zamorano Club issued the Zamorano 80, a listing with biographical data on the 80 books that the members unanimously agreed were distinguished and important in understanding California. Currently, there are only four known complete collections. The collection on display will include about 40 of the Zamorano 80 in first editions.

Remarks by Bill Donohoo, collector and former president of the Zamorano Club, with Q&A and discussion moderated by Susan M. Allen, director, California Rare Book School.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

From the earliest pueblo cornfields to the struggles of farm workers to the rise of the environmental movement, From Cows to Concrete tells the epic tale of how agriculture forged Los Angeles into an urban metropolis, and how, ultimately, the Los Angeles farm empire spurred the very growth that paved it over, as sprawling suburbs swallowed up thousands of acres of prime farmland. And how, on the same land once squandered by corporate greed and “progress,” urban farmers are making inroads to a greener future. More than 150 vintage images enhance and expand the fascinating, detailed history.

An illustrated talk by Rachel Surls, sustainable food systems advisor and author, and Judith Gerber, farm and garden authority and author.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

The art of the woodcut, as it developed during the 15th and 16th centuries, is the tale of two movements; one driven by printers and woodcutters producing images to illustrate texts for a growing literate public, the other by artists seeking to use the medium of wood block to create prints in multiple copies that resembled the qualities of drawing heightened with tones of color.

This presentation examines the development of both movements and illustrates some of the most sublime printed images produced during the late Medieval and Renaissance periods.

An illustrated talk by Dan De Simone, proprietor, De Simone Company, Bookseller and former curator of the Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection at the Library of Congress and the Eric Weinmann Librarian at the Folger Shakespeare Library.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

In the history of Westward Expansion, the Donner Party stands alone. Their story has been the inspiration for a bounty of books and pamphlets, both serious and some not so much. The literary history of the Donner Party runs the gamut from histories, biographies, fiction, epic poems, plays and even a cookbook! After nearly fifty years of collecting all things Donner Party, amateur historian and author Jim Hier joins us to share items from his collection and discuss the literary legacy of the Donner Party.

An illustrated talk by Jim Hier, historian and author.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

The summer of 1769 was the crucible in which California’s fate as a frontier cornerstone of the Spanish empire was determined. It was, as the Duke of Wellington said after the battle of Waterloo, “the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life.” Two hundred and fifty years ago this July, the so-called Sacred Mission led by Gaspar de Portolá and Junípero Serra nearly foundered more than once, due to chronic food shortages, a ghastly death toll from scurvy, flawed maps, a disappearing supply ship, and a foreboding assault by Kumeyaay warriors. Through it all, Portolá persevered, Serra prayed defiantly, and the surviving troops remained steadfast. This talk will detail the harrowing events that, in the span of only a few months, cemented California’s place in history.

An award-winning journalist and independent historian, Robert A. Kittle is the author of “Franciscan Frontiersmen: How Three Adventurers Charted the West,” published by the University of Oklahoma Press. His forthcoming book details the little-known “trail of tears” inflicted on Cupeño tribesmen in Southern California in 1903.

A talk by Robert Kittle, historian and author.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

As Dominic celebrates thirty years as a full-time bookbinder, he will talk about his large collection of bibles that he has acquired since he started his bookbinding journey. These remarkable books, ranging from 1606 – 2006, tell the story of the evolution of book production over the past four centuries. They contain heart-warming inscriptions, hidden surprises and curious textual features. Each is unique is its own way, and together they show the wide variety of ways the printed word has been bound through periods of religious tension and change.

Dominic Riley is one of the most renowned bookbinders working today. His design bindings are in collections worldwide, including the British Library, the St. Bride Library in London, the Rylands in Manchester, the National Library of Wales, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Grolier Club in New York and the San Francisco Public Library. He is an elected Fellow of Designer Bookbinders and President of the Society of Bookbinders. In 2013 he was awarded first prize — the Paul Getty prize —in Designer Bookbinder’s International Bookbinding competition, and his winning binding was acquired by the Bodleian Library in Oxford. The rest of his time is spent teaching, restoring antiquarian books, and lecturing.

An illustrated talk by Dominic Riley, bookbinder and artist.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

“Robert Dawson’s work is an irrefutable argument for the preservation of public libraries. His book is profound and heartbreakingly beautiful.” – Toni Morrison

Robert Dawson will discuss his twenty-four-year interest in photographing libraries throughout the United States and now globally. Last year he received a Fulbright Global Scholar Fellowship and spent six-months with his wife Ellen Manchester photographing libraries throughout Greece, Italy and Israel. This will be the first public lecture from this work.

An illustrated talk by Robert Dawson, photographer, and Ellen Manchester, independent curator.

Mr. Dawson’s work has been recognized by a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Creative Work Fund grant, a Graham Foundation grant, a National Endowment For the Arts Fellowship and by a Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize. His books include Robert Dawson Photographs (1988); The Great Central Valley: California’s Heartland (University of California Press, 1993); Farewell, Promised Land: Waking From the California Dream (UC Press, 1999) and A Doubtful River (University of Nevada Press, 2000). His latest book is The Public Library: A Photographic Essay (Princeton Architectural Press, 2014).

The Library of Congress recently purchased the entire Public Library project for their permanent collection. Mr. Dawson’s photographs are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the National Museum of American Art (Smithsonian Institution); the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He has been an Instructor of Photography at Stanford University since 1996. He recently returned from a six month Fulbright Global Scholar Fellowship photographing libraries throughout Greece, Italy and Israel.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Since 1915 M&H Type has been providing type for printers in the Bay Area and beyond. For decades M&H Type provided composition for advertisers as well as type for the great printers of the day: Nash, Taylor & Taylor, Grabhorn Press, Kennedy, and others. This talk will focus on some of the history of M&H, the machines that have been running for so many years, their connection to Arion Press, and what they hope to accomplish in the future.

A talk by Brian Ferrett, typecaster, Arion Press.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Beginning in 1874, the Occidental Mission Home on the edge of San Francisco’s Chinatown served as a gateway to freedom for thousands of enslaved and vulnerable young Chinese women and girls. Run by a courageous group of female abolitionists who fought the slave trade in Chinese women, it survived earthquakes, fire, bubonic plague, and violence directed against its occupants and supporters. With compassion and an investigative historian’s sharp eye, Siler tells the story of both the abolitionists who challenged the corrosive anti-Chinese prejudices of the time and the young women who dared to flee their fate. She relates how the women who ran the home defied contemporary convention–even occasionally breaking the law–by physically rescuing children from the brothels where they worked or by snatching them off ships as they were being smuggled in–and how they helped bring the exploiters to justice. She also shares the moving stories of many of the girls and young women who sought refuge at the mission, and she writes about the lives they went on to lead. This is a remarkable chapter in an overlooked part of our history, told with sympathy and vigor.

A revelatory history of the trafficking of young Asian girls that flourished in San Francisco during the first hundred years of Chinese immigration (1848-1943) and an in-depth look at the “safe house” that became a refuge for those seeking their freedom.

A talk by Julia Flynn Siler, journalist and author.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Travel back 200 years with artist Pat Hunter and author Janice Stevens in this visual presentation of the California Missions. From the first mission founded by Father Junipero Serra in San Diego to the last mission founded in Sonoma, California, view full watercolor paintings of the missions on Power Point and discover the remaining asistencias (submissions) associated with the missions. Then take a road trip and discover these historical gems. Perhaps arrange a sleep over in a small mission room, and eat at the communal dining room with other travelers from anywhere in the world who travel great distances to see these 200 year old treasures.

An illustrated talk by Pat Hunter, artist, and Janice Stevens, author.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Discover a short history of Tassajara, from Native American Sweat Lodges to Pioneering Zen Monastery. In Marilyn McDonald’s book (foreword by David Chadwick), you’ll meet the people who have loved Tassajara. Its healing waters, rugged remoteness, memorable characters, perilous road, fires, restorations, conversations under the Gossip Oak, peace and quiet are beautifully documented in this book by the late author Marilyn McDonald. Join her daughter, Lee Doyle, for a talk about Tassajara and the book.

“Everywhere I looked were wonderful old stone buildings. Being inquisitive, I wanted to know who had built them and why. None of the Zen students I asked had answers that were complete enough for me.” — Marilyn McDonald, author of A Brief History of Tassajara.

A talk by Lee Doyle, daughter of author Marilyn McDonald, and David Rogers, Tassajara historian.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

The Salinas River and Valley has played a large part in the history of the Central Coast of California; but visually it seems to come in as a distant second to the charms of the Carmel and Monterey Peninsula coastlines. This book embodies the idea that this area needs to be appreciated and re-discovered, if not discovered. Based on a model provided by Karl Bodmer’s documentation of his travels on the Missouri River in the mid-nineteenth century, Running North and Underground is a subjective visual exploration of the river and valley, and not an historical or scientific record. Its purpose is to invite the reader to open up to a new appraisal of the area and perhaps to the spirit of discovery. After eight years off research and gathering photos, drawings, paintings and journal notes, the book was published in 2018.

Janet Whitchurch grew up as a third generation Californian in the San Francisco Bay Area and presently works as an artist in Monterey.

An illustrated talk by Janet Whitchurch, author and illustrator.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Even in the land of reinvention, the story is exceptional: Pat Brown, the beloved father who presided over California during an era of unmatched expansion, Jerry brown, the cerebral and iconoclastic son who became the youngest governor in modern times- and then returned three decades later as the oldest.

In The Browns of California, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and scholar Miriam Pawel weaves a narrative history that spans four generations, from August Schuckman, the Prussian immigrant who crossed the Plains in 1852 and settled on a northern California ranch, to his great-grandson Jerry Brown, who reclaimed the family homestead one hundred forty years later. Through the prisim of their lives, we gain an essential understanding of California- an appreciation of the history and importance of the fifth largest economy in the world.

A talk by Miriam Pawel, journalist and author.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 5:30 PM

A presentation and pop-up exhibition of work by emerging Bay Area fine printers.

Participating printers:

Max Stadnick – Co-founder and co-owner of Max’s Garage Press | www.maxsgaragepress.com
Veronica Graham – Co-founder and owner of Most Ancient | www.mostancient.com
Clare Szydlowski – www.americanhinterlands.com
Geneviève L’Heureux – www.genevievelheureux.com

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Los Angeles Union Station—opened on May 7, 1939, after days of celebration—was the last great train station built in the United States. Intended as a grand portal to a grand Los Angeles, it was an anomaly, built at a time when America was eager to drive or fly to its chosen destinations. Protected by early inclusion on the National Registry of Historic Places for its iconic architecture, Los Angeles Union Station has had an astonishing and unpredictable rebirth. As the city modernizes its public transportation system linking the culturally and geographically diverse communities of Southern California, Union Station—in all its Mission Revival glory—is suddenly the hub of the country’s newest light rail and subway system, serving hundreds of thousands of people each week. Where Pullman cars and Harvey Girls once served commuters, where the Super Chief and the Coast Starlight, Streamliners and Domeliners converged, Los Angeles Union Station is now a living-breathing center of transportation modernity.

Author William Bradley relates a rich history of fierce battles, cultural relocation, and astounding financial risks culminating in one of California’s most important stories. Augmenting his words with vintage images, Bradley not only shares the tale of the terminal, but of the trains that rode its tracks—those 1939 tracks to the future.

An illustrated talk by William Bradley, historian and writer.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality and viewing at 5 PM | Remarks at 6 PM

The Book Club of California presents a variety of illustrated books featuring the artistry of Mallette Dean (1907-1975). The exhibition, drawn entirely from the Club’s Sperisen Library, features works printed by the Grabhorn Press, the Colt Press, the Allen Press, as well as several books designed and printed by Mallette Dean. The exhibition includes scarce ephemera, woodcut blocks, and several distinguished titles published by the Book Club of California.

With remarks by exhibition curator and author John Hawk.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

English artist R. Dighton, a contemporary of James Gilray and George Cruikshank, was well known for his satirical caricatures of lawyers, noblemen, actors and military officers. His talent made him successful; his cunning kept him consistently employed. How he kept out of prison despite a second career stealing prints is a tale worth telling.

An illustrated talk by Karen Zukor, art conservationist.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 5:30 PM

Since the ancient world, poets and scribes, and later, printers, have taken advantage of the fact that poetry is both a visual and a verbal art. The layout on the page reflects not only how a poem should sound, but also how it should feel to the reader. This presentation will look at how these creators collaborate in producing multi-sensory works from Ancient Roman ‘versus intexti’ (interwoven verses) and ‘Carmina figurata’ (figure songs) to modern poems that defy a single reading.

A members-only talk by Elizabeth Newsom, librarian, Book Club of California.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

A pop-up exhibition of work and presentations by select students enrolled in Bay Area book arts programs.

Participating students:

Sasha (Seonho) Kim – Mills College
Julianne Villegas – California College of the Arts
Samantha Caruthers-Knight – City College of San Francisco
Haley Toyama – San Francisco Art Institute

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Spectacular Illumination: Neon Los Angeles, 1925-1965 is a spectacular collection of vintage photography that showcases the glowing neon heritage of the City of Angels. More than 200 images fill its pages. L.A. has long been recognized as the most vibrant city in America, and part of its radiance comes from streets lined with neon signs during the Golden Age of neon from 1925 to 1965. Photographer and historian Tom Zimmerman shows images that depict, in both color and in black-and-white, what Raymond Chandler, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and countless other writers have tried to put into words.

Spectacular Illumination tells a story of a city that has glowed, now glows, and, thanks to institutions such as the Museum of Neon Art, will glow forever.

An illustrated talk by Tom Zimmerman, author and photographer.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Join us for a ceremony celebrating the recipients of the 2019 Oscar Lewis Awards in Western History and the Book Arts. The Oscar Lewis Awards were established by the Book Club of California in 1994 in honor of Oscar Lewis (1893-1992), San Francisco author, historian, and Book Club secretary from 1921-1946.

Please click here for more information about the awards and a list of past recipients.

Reservations required. Limited seating is available.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

After writing 16 books of nonfiction, including 5 on San Francisco history, Charles Fracchia has written a novel: Palimpsest: A Man’s Life in San Francisco.

The novel is a “going to age” (as opposed to a “coming of age”) work of fiction. It deals with the life of a man in late middle age who seeks to re-establish the vibrancy of his youthful years, dealing with issues of sexual potency, work, relationships, and other concerns that mark advancing age.

Fracchia spent the first 25 years of his career in investment banking (he was one of the founders of Rolling Stone Magazine) and then more than 30 years as an academic, teaching at San Francisco State, USF, and City College of San Francisco.

A talk by Charles Fracchia, historian and professor.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Monuments—movable, immovable, tangible, and intangible—of the world’s shared heritage are at risk. War, terrorism, natural disaster, vandalism, technological obsolescence, and neglect make the work of preservation a greater challenge than ever before. In her most recent book, The Monumental Challenge of Preservation, Michèle V. Cloonan makes the case that, at this critical juncture, we must consider preservation in the broadest possible contexts.

Preservation requires the efforts of an increasing number of stakeholders. Michèle will give many examples of dilemmas presented by monuments large and small, from the built environment to individual objects. Examples include the Book of Kells, the buildings of Louis Sullivan, the AIDs Memorial Quilt, the Vietnam Memorial, and digital heritage. She will also discuss the role of collectors in cultural heritage preservation. Every day we make preservation decisions, individually and collectively, that have longer term ramifications than we might expect.

A talk by Michele Cloonan, dean emerita and professor.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

The Chinese American Democratic Youth League was active in the 1940s and 1950s in San Francisco’s Chinatown. The group, known by its Cantonese abbreviation Mun Ching, had a large library, a theatrical troupe, a choral group, a science club, a dance team, and other social clubs. It served as a community center for Chinese-speaking leftists who were isolated both culturally and politically from broader American society. It also became the focus of attention from the FBI after the Korean War broke out, when its members were suspected of working on behalf of Communist China.

In this presentation, illustrated with slides of original ephemera, Alexander Akin, an historian of China and co-owner of Bolerium Books, will discuss the role of theater in Mun Ching’s community work, and examine the programs, scripts, and other surviving materials that document its activities.

An illustrated talk by Alexander Akin, co-owner, Bolerium Books.

*Left photo: Cover of the Mun Ching newsletter for June 21, 1958, a special issue promoting an Arts Night they held every year featuring theater, song, and poetic recitations.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Suzanne Muchnic draws on decades of experience as a Los Angeles Times arts writer to relate the complicated story of how the Los Angeles County Museum of Art emerged as the largest art museum in the western United States. Her in-depth reporting, fleshed out with private interviews and archival research, offers a lively tale about the convergence of art, money, people, and buildings that has produced a museum perpetually in the making.

An illustrated talk by Suzanne Muchnic, journalist and author.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Duggan McDonnell, author of Drinking the Devil’s Acre, shares San Francisco’s vibrant cocktail history and its’ drinking preferences from the Barbary Coast to the Farmers Market.

A talk by Duggan McDonnell, writer, cocktail educator, and historian.

The program featuring the lively art and wit of the ever popular activist Gary Snyder and Goins, is a conversation, reading and slide show with book signing of Dooby Lane Also Known as Guru Road, A Testament inscribed in Stone Tablets by DeWayne Williams. This is their latest collaboration.

A conversation, reading, and illustrated talk by Gary Snyder, poet/activist, and Peter Goin, Photographer. Moderated by Jack Shoemaker of Counterpoint Press.

*At the Commonwealth Club of California
110 Embarcadero, San Francisco, CA 94105

Cost/Tickets: 415-597-6705 or order online here
BCC Promo Code: BookClub

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Described as street photography in the wilderness, Yosemite People is a photography project and book by Jonas Kulikauskas. Carol McCusker, curator of photography at the Harn Museum of Art, describes the project best: “For the first time, a photographer is entering Yosemite as the WPA documentary photographers of the 1930s might, with a shifted priority on people rather than on nature.” The evening will also feature a small pop-up exhibition of photographs.

An illustrated talk and pop-up exhibition by Jonas Kulikauskas, artist and photographer.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

A menu is many things: a list, a brochure, an art-form, and even a manifesto. But menus tells us more than what people ate—but who they aspired to be. This presentation will take us through a cultural history of American menu writing from its 19th-century origins to its current artistic aspirations. By comparing two menus from the early 20th century and two menus from the early 21st, the talk will trace the evolution of American culinary language—and explore how that evolution tells a larger story of class and culture in America. The presentation will be illustrated with notable examples of historical menus from gastronomic collections.

A talk by Theodore Gioia, food writer and critic

Michael Suarez, S.J,. is Director of the Rare Book School at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia. A renowned historian, author, and worldwide leader of rare book scholarship interests, he co-edited the The Oxford Companion to the Book. Suarez will provide us with a compelling, richly illustrated description about how a group of printers were instrumental in making the anti-slavery movement happen in England. Their broadside engraving with an image diagramming the human cargo on slave-ship Brookes became a force for political change in the worldwide abolitionist movement.

A talk with Michael F. Suarez, S.J., director of Rare Book School, professor of English, University Professor, and honorary curator of Special Collections at the University of Virginia.

*At the Commonwealth Club of California
110 Embarcadero, San Francisco, CA 94105

Cost/Tickets: 415-597-6705 or order online here
BCC Promo Code: BookClub

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Codex Polaris, established in 2013 – is an book artist group based in Bergen, Norway that creates opportunities and builds exhibiting platforms for artists who work with books in the Nordic region. Alongside the exhibition program, Codex Polaris invites guest co-organisers to work on various networking projects, and writers to contribute with textworks to raise the profile book arts spanning local and international perspectives. Founded by Sarah Jost, Rita Marhaug, Imi Maufe and Randi Annie Strand. We will be discussing past and current projects at the BCC. – www.codexpolaris.com

A talk by Imi Maufe, founding member of Codex Polaris.

Hospitality at 5 PM | Printing at 6 PM

Letterpress print your own poetry broadside with Mark Knudsen, Elmwood Press, and Norman McKnight, Philoxenia Press, with assistance from Li Jiang, Lemoncheese Press. The evening will feature a special Ralph Waldo Emerson poetry broadside designed by Philoxenia Press.

A limited number of broadsides will be printed. Participation on a first-come first-serve basis. No early arrivals. Doors open at 5:00pm.

Hospitality at 5:30 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Knott’s Preserved reveals exactly how the Knott family turned a berry business into one of the major theme parks in the world. The berries and fried chicken were a just a yummy lead-in to what would become a thrills capital of the world. J. Eric Lynxwiler will share the story of how a man and a woman remained true to their values, sharing profits and credit whenever they could while creating an icon California destination for thrill seekers and children alike.

An illustrated talk by J. Eric Lynxwiler, urban anthropologist and author.

At the Women’s City Club of Pasadena, 160 N. Oakland Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101

Hospitality at 5 PM | Presentation at 6 PM

Dick Evans captures the pulse of life in the Mission District, the San Francisco neighborhood known for its murals and Latin American culture—and more recently for its rapid gentrification. Intimate, colorful images depict a place filled with diverse residents, stately Victorian houses, hand-painted store signs, Carnaval dancers, Día de los Muertos celebrants, political activists, and its namesake, Mission Dolores (here juxtaposed against portraits of Native people and indigenous cultural objects).

Evans’s photos highlight the growing threat to the neighborhood’s character, but they also reveal the many changes that have shaped the neighborhood into its vivacious present-day identity.

An illustrated talk by Dick Evans, photographer.