Harry "Ward" Ritchie (

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

June 15, 1905

Laguna Beach, California Laguna Beach (; ''Laguna'', Spanish language, Spanish for "Lagoon") is a city in Orange County, California, United States. Located in Southern California along the Pacific Ocean, this seaside resort city has a mild year-round climate, scenic c ...

January 24, 1996) was an American printer, book designer, book collector and writer of around 100 books. He was part of the "Golden Age" of fine printing that took place during the 1920s and 1930s in

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...

. Ritchie was also part of the Artists of the Arroyo Seco community.

Early life and career

Ritchie grew up in South Pasadena and attended the Marengo Avenue School, South Pasadena High School, and graduated in 1928 from

Occidental College Occidental College (informally Oxy) is a private liberal arts college in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1887 as a coeducational college by clergy and members of the Presbyterian Church, it became non-sectarian in 1910. It is ...

in Northeast Los Angeles. After a brief stint in law school at USC, Ritchie turned his attention to printing, his true passion. He enrolled at Frank Wiggins Trade School (now Los Angeles Trade–Technical College). In 1930, Ritchie apprenticed in Paris with the renowned artist and printer François-Louis Schmied.

Career

Returning to South Pasadena, Ritchie co-founded, along with fellow printer Grant Dahlstrom and bookseller Jacob "Jake" Zeitlin, the Rounce & Coffin Club. This club was created as a less formal alternative to the Zamorano Club, where other bibliophiles gathered in Los Angeles, and to which he was later welcomed in 1934. The following year, he established the Ward Ritchie Press, through which he published thousands of books, over 750 designed by himself; his output included works by poets Robinson Jeffers, Carl Sandburg,

Archibald MacLeish Archibald MacLeish (May 7, 1892 – April 20, 1982) was an American poet and writer, who was associated with the modernist school of poetry. MacLeish studied English at Yale University and law at Harvard University. He enlisted in and saw action ...

, Carlyle MacIntyre, librarian Lawrence Clark Powell, novelist

Alexandre Dumas Alexandre Dumas (born Alexandre Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie, 24 July 1802 – 5 December 1870), also known as Alexandre Dumas , was a French novelist and playwright. His works have been translated into many languages and he is one of the mos ...

, and many others. In 1987 he gave the Englehard Lecture on ''Fine Printing: The Los Angeles Tradition'' at the

Center for the Book The Library of Congress's Center for the Book was founded in 1977 by Daniel J. Boorstin, the Librarian of Congress, to promote literacy, libraries, and reading and an understanding of the history and heritage of American literature. The Cent ...

at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

. He was a member of the Book Club of California.

Personal life and death

In 1983, Ritchie became romantically involved with film actress

Gloria Stuart Gloria Frances Stuart (born Gloria Stewart; July 4, 1910 – September 26, 2010) was an American actress, visual artist, and activist. She was known for her roles in pre-code films, and garnered renewed fame late in life for her portrayal of Ro ...

, who was inspired by him to design her own hand-printed books under the imprint Imprenta Glorias. Ritchie maintained a close relationship with Stuart until his death. Ritchie died of pancreatic cancer in

on January 24, 1996.

External links

Interview with Ward Ritchie
in 1976 at

California State University, Northridge California State University, Northridge (CSUN or Cal State Northridge), is a public university in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. With a total enrollment of 36,848 students (as of Fall 2024), it has the ...

(by Norman Tanis)

References

1905 births 1996 deaths American printers American book publishers (people) Writers from Los Angeles 20th-century American businesspeople {{US-writer-stub