Hill, Edwin Bliss, 1866-1949

Hill was a printer and author; West was a Dartmouth College professor, author, and founder of Westholm Publications.

Newspaperman, Western private printer, author, founded a private press in 1884, came to Arizona in 1908 as an agent of the U.S. Reclamation Service and became well-known in literary circles for his hand-printed publications. With Frank Lockwood, founded the Frank Holme Memorial Group.

American author and painter.

Edwin Bliss Hill (1866-1949) was an American printer and author.

Private printer who resided in Mesa, Arizona.

Biography

Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on August 17, 1866, Edwin Bliss Hill began work as a printer's devil at the age of 18. From his first job with the Michigan Christian Herald, he moved on to various positions with the Detroit Tribune, Detroit News, Detroit Times and, finally, the Detroit Journal from 1891 to 1901. His health failed in 1901 and he spent the years until 1908 living and recuperating in the woods near Lakeland, Michigan, where he continued to pursue his avocation of printing brochures and books, an activity begun in 1882.

On October 19, 1908, Hill married Clara Ella Hood. Moving to Arizona, Hill worked for the United States Reclamation Service's Salt River Project, where he was in charge of the distribution of irrigation water for the Mesa-Chandler District. In 1918, he was transferred to the El Paso, Texas, office of the U. S. Reclamation Service. Subsequently assigned to the office at Ysleta, Texas, Hill made that small town his home until 1945. His final employment was as Assessor and Collector for the County Water Improvement District No. 1 in El Paso, where he commuted from Ysleta. By 1945, Hill had been retired for several years and he and Mrs. Hill moved to Tempe, Arizona. At the age of 82, Hill died in Mesa, Arizona, on April 6, 1949.

Throughout his life, Hill devoted his interest and energy to private printing. Having begun to print in 1882 on his first press, a small Daisy, he subsequently used an Excelsior, a Caxton and a Columbian press. Devoting over 50 years to printing, Hill was the owner of the oldest continuously operated private press in the United States. From his press, he issued a variety of verse and prose works, particularly titles by and about Henry David Thoreau, in whose life and works Hill had a strong and lifelong interest. His printing also encompassed works pertaining to Charles Lamb and other authors including Mark Twain, George Moore, John Ruskin, and many others, as well as titles by bibliophiles such as Vincent Starrett and Francis Cummins Lockwood. He produced a series called Sherlockiana, composed of items about Sherlock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars, and there were works relating to the artist Frank Holme and the Frank Holme Memorial Group.

Frank Holme was a Chicago newspaper artist and one of many of the newspapermen, printers and authors Hill met through his printing and literary interests. Holme, born in 1868, worked for a number of papers in Chicago, where he began his School of Illustration. The School was run with the assistance of his wife, Ida May (Van Dyke) Holme, and Oswald Bruce Cooper. Frank and Ida Holme also began a private press called the Bandar Log Press, with the backing of George Ade and others. Traveling to Asheville, North Carolina, Holme spent the years 1901-1902 there in an effort to recover from tuberculosis. During his absence his wife and associates operated the School and ran the Press, with Holme providing supervision by correspondence. In 1902 the Holmes briefly moved their household and their Press to San Francisco and from there to Arizona, where Frank Holme died on July 27, 1904. Subsequently, in the late 1930's, Edwin Bliss Hill, together with Francis Cummins Lockwood, George Ade, Frederic Goudy and others, founded the Frank Holme Memorial Group to perpetuate the artist's memory.

Edwin Bliss Hill was born to Alva Thomas and Frances (Bliss) Hill in Michigan on August 17, 1866. He was one of four children, including Hattie Bliss (1863-1863), Louis Clarence (1865-1938), and Edith (1868-1868). By the age of 6, Hill had become interested in what became his life's work: printing. He acquired his first press, a Daisy Printing Press, in 1882.

At the age of eighteen, Hill became a printer's devil at the Michigan Christian Herald . He worked in Detroit newspapers for nineteen years while continuing to learn the printing trade. His greatest passion was the work of Henry David Thoreau, on whom he published an anthology of articles entitled Pertaining to Thoreau . Hill developed a tubercular condition in 1901 and spent seven years living in the Michigan woods to rest and recover.

In 1908 Hill married school teacher Clara Ella Hood and the couple moved to Mesa, Arizona, which offered the dry air believed to alleviate tuberculosis. Hill acquired a job with the U.S. Reclamation Bureau through his brother Louis and continued to operate his printing press. The couple had one daughter, Gertrude Frances (1909-1981), who married Robert Muir in about 1963.

In 1918, the Hill family moved to Ysleta, Texas so that Edwin Hill could continue his work for the Reclamation Bureau as the first gate-tender of the International Dam. Hill printed on a part-time basis until 1945, when he retired from government service. He planned to move back to Arizona, but before his presses could be sent they and many of his books were destroyed by fire. Hill acquired new presses and continued to print in Tempe, Arizona until his death on April 6, 1949. His signature (printer's mark) was a tiny cowboy hat. Hill's press is believed to be the longest running private press in American history.

In addition to his printing work, Edwin B. Hill wrote many biographical sketches and a collection of fictitious stories of the southwest entitled Range Tales . Hill was a member of several literary societies and served as President of the Frank Holme Memorial Group.