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Bookplate Index by Library or Collector |
Webster Memorial Collection of Modern Poetry, Montclair State University Library A signed artist's proof of this 14.3-by-8.3cm. bookplate of the Webster Collection of Modern Poetry is in the collection of the Montclair Art Museum's Le Brun Library. The bookplate was probably commissioned by the English department colleagues of Edward Harlan Webster (1876-1937) at the New Jersey State Teachers College (now Montclair State University) at Montclair, New Jersey, from the well-known artist-illustrator Lynd Kendall Ward (1905-1985) soon after Webster's death. Edward Harlan Webster joined the faculty of the New Jersey State Teachers College as head of the English department in 1927 to implement the institution's change from a two-year to a four-year program. He had received a diploma from the Washington, D.C., Normal School in 1896 and his A.B. from Bowdoin College in 1910. He then taught in seven school systems in five states and earned his A.M. in 1920 at Teachers College, Columbia University, while he served as a Lecturer. In 1920-1921 he also did advanced work at Oxford University, England. Webster remained as head of the English department at New Jersey State Teachers College from 1927 until his death, teaching courses ranging from English Grammar and Correct Usage to Modern Poetry, and writing English usage textbooks. The Webster Memorial Collection of Modern Poetry contains approximately four hundred volumes of twentieth-century American poetry; the major portion of the published volumes was collected in the 1920s and 1930s by Webster as resource material for his course in modern poetry. The collection has been housed in the library of the Montclair State University since Webster's death, when it was donated to the institution's library by his widow and daughter. Additional volumes were donated to the Webster Memorial Collection by the Senate, the college's honorary men's club, an organization established by Webster, which met regularly in his nearby home. The collection contains books with both the Webster bookplate and the bookplate of the New Jersey State Teacher's College at Montclair. In addition, a few books donated later have, in conjunction with the basic Webster bookplate, one of two smaller cuts with text reading, "This book was presented by Mrs. Edward Harlan Webster & Miss Katherine G. Webster" or "This book was presented by THE SENATE." Dan Burne Jones, in his 1981 checklist of Lynd Ward bookplates in The American Society of Bookplate Collectors and Designers Yearbook identifies twenty-two bookplates done by Lynd Ward between 1927 and 1958. Jones, a close friend and fellow graphic artist, lists a wood-engraved bookplate done for Montclair State College in 1939 and reproduces the Webster bookplate without, however, any direct tie between the text and the illustration. Ward also did eight bookplates for Antioch Bookplate Company, a commercial publisher of universal bookplates. In addition, at least one Ward illustration, from Madman's Drum (New York: J. Cape & H. Smith, 1930), has been adapted as a bookplate. Ward's own recounting of his life and work, Storyteller without Words (New York: Abrams, 1974), has reproductions of only three of his bookplates, not including the Webster Collection bookplate. The significance of the principal design can only be guessed. The image is of a nude male with arms outstretched beneath a large tree; in the background are city skyscrapers and a church. It is possible that it represents a stylized view of the college campus, which is sited on a wooded eastern slope of the First Watchung Mountains with the New York City skyline to the east. Lynd Kendall Ward, designer of the Webster Memorial Collection of Modern Poetry bookplate, was born in Chicago. As early as first grade, Lynd was drawing, noting the name Ward reversed, was draw. His father fostered Lynd's inclination to draw by excusing him from summer household chores so long as his time was spent drawing. Lynd Ward married May Yonge McNeer, a writer, after their graduation from Columbia University in 1926, and the couple spent the next year in Europe, where he studied at the State Academy for Graphic Arts in Leipzig under Hans Mueller, Alois Kolp, and George Mathey. On their return to this country, the Wards settled in New Jersey, spending about five decades in towns near the Palisades, the Hudson River, and New York City. Ward's graphic arts career began with the publication of his first book, Gods' [sic] Man, a Novel in Woodcuts (New York: J. Cape & H. Smith, 1929), which appeared the week before the 1929 crash. In the next eight years, he produced five other woodcut novels. Throughout his life he was concerned with the unfortunates in life, from the time his father worked with Jane Addams of Hull House assisting poor immigrants until his own involvement as director of the New York area Graphic Arts Project of the WPA. He illustrated numerous books authored by his wife, May McNeer, and by others. While he preferred working in wood, Ward also worked in lithography, ink, watercolor, oil, and casein, receiving many awards, including the Caldecott Medal in 1952, and election as associate of the National Academy. He remained active until the mid-1970s, publishing The Silver Pony (Boston: Houghton Mifflin), his final "story without words," in 1973. Today's home of the Webster Memorial Collection of Modern Poetry, Montclair State University, had its beginnings in 1903 when the New Jersey State Board of Education recommended the establishment of a State Normal School in northern New Jersey. By 1908 the first class was admitted and the first building, College Hall, had been completed in Upper Montclair, on the eastern slope of First Watchung Mountain, some five hundred feet above sea level, so that it has a spectacular view overlooking the low-lying Jersey Meadows and salt marshes and, twelve miles to the east, the New York City skyline. The institution's development over the years required name changes to the New Jersey State Teachers College and State Normal School at Montclair (1927), to Montclair State College (1958), and finally to Montclair State University (1994). The institution's library was originally on the main floor of College Hall. In March 1963, the three-story Harry A. Sprague Library was opened, honoring Sprague, the principal who transformed the two-year normal school into a four-year teachers' college and became its first president in 1927. A north wing was built onto Sprague Library in 1970 to pride additional library space; a south wing was completed in 1993.
The present library serves the university's students, faculty,
and local citizens. It contains more than 354,742 books, 37,708 microfilm
items, 2,651 journal and newspaper titles, 78,799 government documents (in
all formats), and in excess of one million non-print media items, as well
as the Webster Memorial Collection of Modern Poetry. Edith Anderson Rights Montclair Art Museum
[Originally published in Libraries & Culture, vol. 30, no. 4 (Fall 1995): 428-431.] |
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