Mid-20th-Century Rare Book Rebindings

There’s a recognizable “house style” to Folger rebindings from the 1940s through the 1960s, a period when it was routine practice at the Folger and other libraries to discard tatty bindings.

Five volumes rebound at the Folger that happen to be on the random shelf in the STC Vault that was picked for this blog post.

Robert Lunow, bookbinder at the Folger from 1948 to 1971, typically used dyed leather around the spine with decorative paper covering the rest of the binding  (examples A and E). Less often, he used book cloth instead of decorative paper on the front and back boards (examples C and D). Occasionally, titles deemed particularly important received full leather bindings and more extensive tooling (example B).

Here are the same five books as they appear on the shelf:

Arrows indicate the five volumes rebound at the Folger that happen to be on this random shelf in the STC Vault. Left to right: Folger STC 15653, STC 15656, STC 15676 copy 2, STC 15683.5, STC 15697.

Once you’ve seen a few, they become fairly easy to spot.

At the back, they always almost always have a typed physical description initialed and dated by the librarian in charge (or, more rarely, signed and dated). This one comes from Folger STC 15656, which is example B, above.

Typed note from Giles E. Dawson bound in Folger STC 15656 during 1954 rebinding.

The note reads:

Before being taken apart for rebinding this book was in the original vellum forel,¹ with original stabbed stitching. The vellum was thin and much gnawed by rodents, with resultant staining and damage to title and last leaves.

Collation: 8vo. A-M⁸ N⁴.

Condition: All pairs of leaves normally conjugate.

12 October 1954 [initialed in pen] GED

Researchers need to be aware that almost none of these physical descriptions have made it into the online catalog. At the time of writing this paragraph, the copy-specific note for this book read as follows:

Screenshot from Folger catalog before expansion of Folger-specific note.

The brevity reflects the catalog record’s origin as part of a grant-funded project in the late 1990s and early 2000s that added pre-18th-century publications to the English Short Title Catalog (ESTC). The project’s goal was to describe each edition and variant of a given text, with the emphasis on “text”. Copy-specific notes always indicate imperfections that affect the text, but rarely anything else. It was more important to record the existence of as many books as possible before grant funding ran out than it was to describe a few copies in great detail.

I’m easily distracted while writing blog posts, and I’m a cataloger, so at the time of writing this paragraph, the Folger catalog record has the book’s accession number in a separate field, and a transcription of the typed note:

Screenshot from Folger catalog after expansion of Folger-specific note.

This verbal description is all that remains of the original binding. The assumption at the time was that knowing what type of binding a particular text had was the important part. The binding itself, as a physical object, was beside the point.

Nowadays when damaged bindings are removed, they do remain part of the collection. Some are stored inside a custom box that also holds the rebound volume, as with Folger INC N167, where the catalog notes “Later calf binding using printed fragment (in Latin and Greek) as spine reinforcement removed and housed with book in clamshell box.” Other old bindings are stored separately, and can be requested from the catalog record for the text, as with Folger V.a.489.

Screenshot from catalog record for Folger V.a.489 showing the previous binding as a separate unit that can be paged to the Reading Room.

Sammelbands, also known as “bound-withs” or “composite volumes”, often suffered an extreme form of rebinding in the mid-20th century. Instead of repairing or replacing a damaged binding containing multiple titles, the volume was broken up. This allowed each title to circulate separately, and allowed each title to spend the rest of the time shelved in logical order (at the Folger, this was by STC or Wing number for publications in scope for those catalogs, and by subject according to Library of Congress classification for most others). At the Folger, this historic practice reveals the privileged position given to STC books, the only classification to have a separate, dedicated vault. The vast majority of rebound books are STCs.

The note at the back of re-bound Folger STC 15653 is a good example.

Typed note from Giles E. Dawson bound in Folger STC 15653 during 1959 rebinding.

It reads:

Before it was separately rebound (by R. Lunow) this work was bound with 4 unrelated post-STC works: Wing G51, W2812, C4612, and S4220. These were in 18th-century calf, the volume broken in two.

Unrelated? UNRELATED?! They were most definitely related to each other: between the 18th century and 1959, they were bound together as a single volume. Whoever had them bound that way to begin with clearly thought they had some kind of relationship to each other, and everyone who read the volume for the next 200 years or so experienced them as a physical unit.

A memo from Folger director Louis B. Wright reveals that at least one Folger staff member, Head of Acquisitions Eleanor Pitcher, had qualms about the practice at the time.

Memo from Louis B. Wright, Folger Director, to senior staff (Folger archives)

The memo, headed “Concerning the breaking up of composite volumes,”  reads:

Miss Pitcher has raised a question concerning the breaking up of a volume containing items by Dryden and Elkanah Settle once in the possession of Narcissus Luttrell. This volume, tattered and falling apart, was shown me quite a while ago by Mr. Dawson, curator of rare books. Repair would have been difficult and it was too large to keep in an envelope. To my question as to whether there was any good reason to retain it whole, Mr. Dawson said no, and we agreed to break it up. All pertinent information about the relation of the parts was noted on the back of the official card as is the usual practice. The volume could be reassembled if need be. To inform anyone who does not know the usual library practice of noting such information on the official card, the information for these particular items has been typed on the front of the cards.

No book is ever broken up without the approval of the curator of rare books. In many instance [sic], he discusses the problem before hand with me.

Louis B. Wright

February 3, 1962

Thanks to the mention of Narcissus Luttrell (1657-1732) as former owner, I was able to narrow down the possibilities in order to find the constituent parts in the catalog. They’re now Folger S2666 copy 2, S2678, D2320 copy 1, S2702 copy 1, S2675 copy 2, and S2698 copy 2. Remember what I said about the online catalog record that originated as part of a grant-funded project, the one where it was more important to record the existence of as many books as possible than to describe a few copies in great detail? One of the online records had no information at all about the disbinding. Four of the records just said “formerly bound with Folger S2666.” Only the record for Folger S2666 copy 1, the portion that includes the old front board and manuscript table of contents, had a more detailed note, “Disbound; formerly bound with five other c17 plays (see card catalogue for shelf-marks); with front board of mottled calf surviving.”

The note’s brevity echoes the standard practice established in the card catalog era. Instead of typing all of the information on each card, only the card for the first book in the group has the full list of call numbers, “formerly bd.w. this were S2678, D2320/1, S2702/1, S2675/2, S2698/2.” This note is what Louis B. Wright meant by “all pertinent information about the relation of the parts” having been typed on the front of the card.

Official public catalog card for Folger S2666 copy 2.

The other cards sort-of point to the card that has fuller information. Each has the note “formerly bd.w. S2666, copy 2.”

Official public catalog card for Folger S2675 copy 2.

Unless you’re familiar with card catalogs, though, there’s no way to know that “formerly bd.w. S2666, copy 2” means “see the card for S2666 copy 2 for more information.” (If only they’d added “etc.” to the note, to give people a clue!)

Looking at the six separate titles described in the 1962 memo immediately shows that the Folger considered Settle’s play The empress of Morocco (second from left) more important than the others:

Component parts of six-volume sammelband left-to-right in order of earlier binding: Folger S2666 copy 2, S2678, D2320 copy 1, S2702 copy 1, S2675 copy 2, S2698 copy 2.

It was at this point in my investigation of mid-20th-century rebindings that I had to go back to the start of this blog post and change “they always” have a typed physical description at the back to “almost always.” Miss Pitcher was right to have been concerned. There is nothing in the rebound book to indicate when it was rebound, or that it had once been bound with five other titles.

On the plus side, the original binding wasn’t completely discarded. The top board and fragments of the spine remain. None of the other titles were important enough to be rebound at the time, so they’ve lived in separate envelopes shelved by author/title/date for over sixty years. I expect that they’ll continue that way indefinitely. Stacking the pieces back in order makes for an excellent visualization of changes in library practice over the decades.

Component parts of six-volume sammelband stacked in order of earlier binding. Top to bottom: Folger S2666 copy 2, S2678, D2320 copy 1, S2702 copy 1, S2675 copy 2, S2698 copy 2.

From my point of view of 2025, I don’t think Louis B. Wright’s assertion that “the volume could be reassembled if need be” is fully accurate.