December 2011 Vol. 42 No. 12 Songs & Harps Book Arts & Special Collections Annual Holiday Lecture to Celebrate the Printing at the Margins: Holiday Season An Ink-Stained History of Women & Work elcome the holidays with members of the etterpress printing is at a renaissance. Young people are flocking to the San Francisco Center for the Bay Area Youth Harp Ensemble and Triskela Book to learn how to set type and make books. Letterpress note cards are appearing in shops every- Celtic Harp Trio in a program of harp music L where. You can buy a letterpress app for your iPhone. You can follow Kyle Durrie’s blog of her cross coun- W try trip in a letterpress-shop-in-a-van. There’s even a national organization called The Ladies of Letterpress. from around the World. Raise your spirits with songs that celebrate Christmas, Hannukah and the Solstice, There is no better time to highlight one of the library’s best-kept secrets: the Marjorie G. and Carl W. Stern Book Arts & Special Collections Center, which includes the Robert along with pieces from many different countries Join us for an illuminating Grabhorn Collection on the History of Printing and the Development of sung in different talk on Dec. 10 with Professor languages. the Book. By the time the Library acquired Robert Grabhorn’s personal The Bay Area printer’s library in 1965, his collection included examples of almost every Kathleen Walkup of Mills College Youth Harp Ensemble typeface, printer and publisher of note from the and find out more about the is a group of devoted previous 500 years. The collection has grown “ladies of letterpress of yore.” young harpists who over the years and continues to support enjoy sharing multi- the study of typography, printing, papermaking and bookbinding. cultural harp music Book Arts & Special Collections celebrates the holiday with audiences season with a letterpress holiday card and the annual Holiday throughout the Bay Lecture. Since 1995, SFPL has featured a fascinating array of lec- Area. Joining the tures by experts including Alastair Johnston, Carl Rohrs, David youth ensemble will Mostardi, James Keenan, Alisa Golden, Peter Koch, Sandro Berra be Triskela Celtic Harp and Jonathan Aaron. Past topics have included typography, Trio—a popular Bay publisher Paul Elder, poster artist Rick Griffin, and vernacular Area group consisting folk lettering around the world. One year Karen Zukor dis- of Diana Stork, Shawna cussed book and paper repair; another year Patricia Wakida Triskela Celtic Harp Trio Spiteri and Portia spoke on the life and work of Shig Murao. Diwa. They perform This year we are proud to present Professor Kathleen Walk- on handmade harps and assorted traditional up of Mills College, who will talk about women and printing in instruments with three-part vocals. a lecture titled Printing at the Margins: An Ink-Stained History of “The Press Feeder.” Engraving by William Burns, Women & Work. Professor Walkup teaches courses on typogra- Songs and Harps for the Holidays from Life in New York, In Doors and Out of Doors, 1851. phy and letterpress printing, artists’ books and seminars on the Tuesday, Dec. 6, 6 p.m., Koret Auditorium, nature of the book. She is director of the MFA Program in Book Main Library Art & Creative Writing at Mills College, the first of its kind established in the U.S. Her interests include the his- See more holiday music programs, page 4. tory of women in print culture and conceptual practice in artists’ books. Her most recent curatorial project is Hand, Voice & Vision: Artists’ Books from Women’s Studio Workshop (Grolier Club, 2010). Her lecture, The Book is a Public Place, part of Threads: Talk Series, can be heard at the University of Pennsylvania’s PennSound website. Join your book arts community friends and colleagues to enjoy this illuminating talk by Professor Walkup Save the Date! and find out more about the “ladies of letterpress of yore.” Book Arts and Special Collection Annual Holiday Lecture - Kathleen Walkup, Printing at the Margins: What’s Next? An Ink-Stained History of Women & Work Saturday, Dec. 10, 2 p.m., Koret Auditorium, Main Library Planning for Life After Work An Eye for the On Jan. 7, 2012, come to the Main for a special all-day resource fair for retiring—and soon to retire—Baby City’s Landscape Boomers. Meet different educational organizations, veryone in San Francisco, native or visitor, knows the Ferry Building, check out volunteer opportunities, and learn about the Transamerica Pyramid and the city’s other iconic structures. financial planning. The keynote speaker will be In Cityscapes - San Francisco and its Buildings, a collection of urban Miriam Goodman, author of Reinventing Retirement: E design critic John King’s columns in the San Francisco Chronicle, King 389 Bright Ideas about Family, Friends, Health, What to explores other, less well known but decidedly noteworthy buildings. Do and Where to Live. “King notices the successes among new arrivals in the evolution Meet the Author: Miriam of this city. He notices worthy survivors. And he notices, but not vindic- Goodman Saturday, Jan. 7, tively, the excesses of attitude among builders who want to make their 11 a.m., Main Library, Koret marks on America’s great metropolitan village,” wrote Herbert Gold in Auditorium the San Francisco Chronicle. Cityscapes is a guide book of sorts. It discusses buildings that you What’s Next? Planning for don’t find in regular guides and shows how, in San Francisco, the past Life After Work Resource Fair integrates with the present and allows for the changes of the future. The book opens our eyes and makes us Saturday, Jan. 7, 11 a.m.–4 p.m., appreciate the vibrant, architectural kaleidoscope that is San Francisco. Main Library, Latino Hispanic Community Meeting Room Meet the Author: John King Wednesday, Dec. 14, 6:30 p.m., Latino Hispanic Community Room, Main Library. Miriam Goodman A book sale and signing with Readers Bookstore follows the talk. Coming Up: JANUARY 5-MARCH 11, 2012 JAN. 18 JAN. 30 BiblioTech College Book Art Author Richard Bolles Monday Night Mission Association Exhibition What Color is Your Parachute? League Gaming For Teens Skylight Gallery, Main Library Main Library, 6 p.m. Mission Branch, 6:30 p.m. SFPL.ORG AT THE LIBRARY DECEMBER 2011 1 Branch Library Improvement Program (BLIP) Golden Gate Valley Reopening Celebration he restored Golden Gate Valley Branch Library reopened Oct. 15, the last of seven libraries that Topened or reopened in 2011. The 93-year-old library building underwent a sensitive renovation that was designed and built to meet silver certification standards or greater under the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system. Captions: (clockwise from upper left): Our youngest library users enjoy the new Play-to-Learn resources; lion dancers from the Jing Mo Athletic Association bless the building; families enjoy the fresh collection of materials; Branch Manager Irene Lee, Mayor Ed Lee and City Librarian Luis Herrera cel- ebrate the opening; the library’s central reading room; the grand entrance to this historic Carnegie library. Photos: Jason Doiy Honoring a Historian for Chinatown Temporary Services On Dec. 10, the Chinatown Branch Library will be rededicated in honor of esteemed Chinese American scholar and historian Him Mark Lai. Schedule The rededication was undertaken by the Him Mark Lai Library Committee, The Library provides the following services which consisted of friends, colleagues, and community activists who formed soon during branch renovations. after Him Mark Lai passed away in 2009, to work on getting the Chinatown Branch Library (his childhood library) renamed in recognition of his lifetime service to the Temporary Site Hours: library and the community through his prodigious scholarship. Their one-year effort Bayview to mobilize community support, send letters, and sign petitions resulted in a unani- (1601 Lane St.) mous approval by the Library Commission. Monday: 10 a.m.–6 p.m. Him Mark Lai At the rededication program, four bilingual plaques renaming the library Tuesday: 10 a.m. –6 p.m. “Chinatown / Him Mark Lai Branch Library” will be unveiled. The two outdoor plaques were designed by Wednesday: 10 a.m. –7:30 p.m. Thursday: 10 a.m. –7:30 p.m. Andrew Maloney of the San Francisco Bureau of Architecture; two indoor biographical plaques were de- Friday: 1–6 p.m. signed by Mark Ong of Side by Side Studios. The plaques were funded through donations to Friends of Roots Saturday: 10 a.m. –1:30 p.m. and 50 other community organizations and individuals. The “In Search of Roots” program was co-founded by Sunday: Closed Albert Cheng and Him Mark Lai in 1991 to encourage Chinese American youths to learn about their family history and cultural heritage. Find out more at insearchofroots.org. In addition to the rededication, the event will mark the launch of his posthumous autobiography, Him Mark Lai: Autobiography of a Chinese American Historian, edited by Judy Yung with Ruthanne Lum McCunn and Russell C. Leong. There also will be a preview of Felicia Lowe’s work-in-progress documentary, BLIP Update Barefoot Historian, which tells the story of Him Mark Lai and the particulars of documenting an excluded Branches under construction and projected and marginalized group. On display will be books from the Him Mark Lai Collection. All Him Mark Lai’s books opening dates: and major articles on Chinese American history were donated by his wife Laura Lai to the Library. Him Mark Lai/Chinatown Branch Library Rededication: Saturday, Dec. 10, 2 p.m., 1135 Powell St. Bayview – 2012 The largest building campaign in San Francisco Public Library history is in full swing.