Theory and practice of bookbinding / United States Government Printing Office.

  • United States. Government Printing Office.
Date:
1962
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Theory and practice of bookbinding / United States Government Printing Office. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    strips, which changed the form to resemble a book without a cover. The next step was to add leather backstrips which were enlarged to extend over the sides of the books, and boards were placed on the back and front to which the covering was fastened. During the fourth century A.D. the bindings of books became more ornate and from that time on, fine leathers, silks, and velvets were used for covers which were further ornamented with jewels, gold, and ivory. They were so valuable that it was customary to chain them to the tables to prevent theft. In the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries the monks of various monasteries, especially Ireland, made notable bindings by hand, usually on vellum. The early silversmiths and goldsmiths also were called upon frequently to make book covers. Gold tooling later became popular and certain styles of tooling are associated to this day with such names as Aldus Manutius, Grolier, Canevari, Nicholas and Clovis Eve, etc. The bookbinding art was advanced greatly by the work of many famous binders throughout the world and by such inventions as paper, movable type, printing presses, stamping machines, cutters, sewing machines, and modern bindery machinery. Bindery methods may be classified in two general groups, hand bind- ing and machine binding. These overlap considerably, since many of the operations for a hand-bound book are performed by machine, and some of the work for machine binding may be done by hand on special occasions. Hand binding includes library and job binding in leather or cloth, and blank binding such as springback with or without hubs, patentback, manifold, looseleaf, and mechanical bindings. Ma- chine binding includes edition, pamphlet with self-cover or separate cover, and perfect binding. The Bindery Division of the Government Printing Office is equipped to do all kinds of hand and machine binding. For this purpose it is divided into five sections: Blank, Book Edition, Cutting and Pack- ing, Pamphlet, and Library Binding. Punching, drilling, perforat- ing, ruling, hand gathering of forms, stripping, padding, round cornering, hand sewing of blank books, machine sewing of passbooks and mechanical bindings such as plastic comb or coil binding are the work of the Blank Section. The Book Edition Section produces all editions of hardbound books when more than 4o copies are involved. Work is taken from the folding operation and made into completed books, which includes gathering, sewing, forwarding, casemaking, stamping, and casing-in. Sewed paper-covered pamphlets are also pro- duced in this section. The Cutting and Packing Section handles all work that cuts to size only and is wrapped and packed for shipping. The Library Binding Section does rebinding and repairing for the