Browsing by Author "Meehan, William F."

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    Ben Franklin, Printer: Selections From the Indiana University Lilly Library Collection
    (H.W. Wilson Company, 2007) Meehan, William F.
    Ben Franklin’s career as a printer occupies an important part of a life distinguished by remarkable accomplishment. Often overshadowed by his scientific inventions and civic activity, Franklin’s pursuits as a printer reveal an industrious, clever, and resourceful business owner whose sway affected printing throughout colonial America, particularly from Philadelphia to Charleston. His work as official printer for Pennsylvania, beginning in 1730, demonstrates his gift for winning friends and influencing lawmakers, as well as his ability to deliver quality work. Typical of printers in Colonial America, Franklin also sold books, and the title page of his imprints is a clarion call to bibliophiles still today: “Printed and Sold by B. Franklin.” The second printer to set up shop in Philadelphia, Franklin became one of the trade’s leading members, his venture combining roles as type founder, papermaker, binder, and woodcut artist.
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    First Impression: An Interview With Author and Bibliophile Nicholas A. Basbanes
    (H.W. Wilson Company, 2006) Meehan, William F.
    Nicholas A. Basbanes did not publish his first book until he was 52 but, in the ten years since, the former literary editor at the Worcester Sunday Telegram has given bibliophiles and librarians five books about books. The first, A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books (Holt, 1995), was a landmark commentary on book collecting that has sold 100,000 copies. The second, Patience & Fortitude (HarperCollins, 2001), named for the pair of lions that guard the entrance to the New York Public Library, explored the ways librarians and collectors have protected and housed their treasures throughout history, while describing libraries and book culture in general. Next came Among the Gently Mad: Strategies and Perspectives for the Book-Hunter in the 21st Century (Holt, 2002), a spin-off book from the first book. Arriving after that was A Splendor of Letters: The Permanence of Books in an Impermanent World (HarperCollins, 2003), an expanded section intended for Patience & Fortitude that looked at how books are preserved for succeeding generations. Borrowing from Ranganathan's third law of library science, Basbanes' recent book, Every Book Its Reader (HarperCollins, 2005), allowed him to draw on numerous taped interviews conducted for A Gentle Madness that were never used. His next work will be a centennial history of Yale University Press. The Lowell, Massachusetts, native spoke at Indiana University as a guest of its Medieval Studies Institute in October 2005, when William F. Meehan III sat down with the author at the Grant Street Inn in Bloomington.
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    The Importance of Cosimo de Medici in Library History
    (H.W. Wilson Company, 2007) Meehan, William F.
    Cosimo de Medici, the aristocratic banker and statesman who enlivened philanthropy in Renaissance Florence, might have made his greatest contribution to the arts through his patronage of humanist libraries. Cosimo himself accumulated a superb personal collection, but his three major library initiatives were charitable activities and included Italy’s first public library, which made its way to the magnificent library founded generations later by one of his descendants.