For John Anderson (born 1915), book designer, typographer and printer, a love of fine printing developed early. Inspired by the printing activities of the Wright Brothers, Anderson acquired a small hand press at the age of thirteen. Since that modest beginning, Anderson has established himself among the foremost of small press proprietors continuing the tradition of handset type. Over the course of his six-decade career, Anderson has printed numerous books, broadsides, and catalogues as well as myriad invitations, keepsakes, advertisements, announcements, and other ephemera. The consistent high quality and clean design of Anderson’s work have garnered him both awards and praise among printing circles and a high reputation with clients.
Anderson embarked on his first commercial enterprise in 1934 at the age of 19, when he founded Bantam Press in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He soon realized, however, that his enthusiasm for printing outstripped his experience, and in 1936 accepted a two- year apprenticeship with Peter Beilenson of Peter Pauper Press and the Walpole Printing Office in Mt. Vernon, New York. Anderson further developed his skills at a number of Philadelphia-area businesses, including Royal Typographers of Philadelphia, Sharp & Dohme, Westcott & Thomson, and Lanston Monotype Machine Company. During this period, in 1946, Anderson founded Pickering Press, the imprint under which he continued to print throughout his career, which he named for the nineteenth-century printer, William Pickering.
In 1960, John Anderson and family moved to Pasadena, California, where Anderson hoped to work for Grant Dahlstrom’s Castle Press. Friction with the foreman cut short his tenure, however, and in 1961 Anderson began designing for Paul Weaver’s Northland Press in Flagstaff, Arizona. Anderson designed many award-winning books for Northland, and continued to do so long-distance after he returned to the Philadelphia area in 1963.
Upon his return, Anderson reopened Pickering Press. The press gained mounting respect and claimed such clients as the Philadelphia Art Museum and the Franklin Institute, as well as previous clients like Lanston and the University of Pennsylvania. Notable was Anderson’s ongoing collaboration with wood engraver John De Pol, begun in the 1950s but intensified during this second incarnation of the press. This collaboration resulted in numerous illustrated books, pamphlets, catalogues, and advertisements with engravings by De Pol; all bearing the Pickering imprint.
Throughout his career, Anderson passed along his extensive knowledge of the craft of fine printing to numerous students. Several of his apprentices became successful printers themselves, such as Claire Van Vliet, proprietor of Janus Press; Neil Shaver, of the Yellow Barn Press; and Leonard Seastone of the Tideline Press. Anderson, with John De Pol, also taught annual bookmaking workshops at Fairleigh Dickenson University between 1981 and 1984, with a pilot program in 1979.
In the late 1980s, health problems forced Anderson to scale back his operations drastically, selling off much of his equipment and largely retiring from commercial work.
Biographical information is derived from material in the collection.
From the guide to the John Anderson papers, 1948–1994, 1978–1994, (University of Delaware Library - Special Collections)
