Grolier Club


The Grolier Club is a museum, library, private club and society of bibliophiles in New York City. Founded in January 1884, it is the oldest existing bibliophilic club in North America. It is named after Jean Grolier de Servières, Viscount d'Aguisy, Treasurer General of France, whose library was famous; his motto, "Io. Grolierii et amicorum" , suggested his generosity in sharing books.
The Club's stated objective is "the literary study of the arts pertaining to the production of books, including the occasional publication of books designed to illustrate, promote and encourage these arts; and the acquisition, furnishing and maintenance of a suitable club building for the safekeeping of its property, wherein meetings, lectures and exhibitions shall take place from time to time..."

Collections and programs

The Grolier Club maintains a research library specializing in books, bibliography and bibliophily, printing, binding, illustration and bookselling. The Grolier Club has one of the more extensive collections of book auction and bookseller catalogs in North America. The Library also has the archives of prominent bibliophiles, such as Sir Thomas Phillipps, and of bibliophile and print collecting groups, such as the Hroswitha Club of women book collectors and the Society of Iconophiles.
The Grolier Club's public exhibitions "treat books and prints as objects worthy of display, on a par with painting and sculpture." The exhibitions on two gallery floors draw on various sources including holdings of the Club, its members, and of institutional libraries. Subjects of its recent shows include women in science, blooks, Walt Whitman, American menus, Zoe Anderson Norris, Abraham Lincoln, and imaginary books.
In 2022 the Rare Book School was featured in the exhibit, Building the Book from the Ancient World to the Present Day: Five Decades of Rare Book School & the Book Arts Press. The exhibit covered two millennia of the changing form of the book.
The Grolier Club, which also hosts frequent public tours and lectures, is a member of the Fellowship of American Bibliophilic Societies.

History

The Grolier Club was formed on January 23, 1884, with 50 members and was formally incorporated in 1888. The founders of the club were William Loring Andrews, Theodore L. DeVinne, A. W. Drake, Albert Gallup, Robert Hoe III, Brayton Ives, Samuel W. Marvin, E. S. Mead, and Arthur B. Turnure. Perfection in the art of bookmaking was encouraged. E. D. French engraved the club's own bookplate as well as bookplates for many of its members.
Honorary members have included I.N. Phelps Stokes, Bruce Rogers, Henry Watson Kent, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Rudolph Ruzicka, Lawrence C. Wroth, Carl Purington Rollins, Elmer Adler, Joseph Blumenthal, Margaret Bingham Stillwell and Mary C. Hyde Eccles. Honorary Foreign Corresponding members have included Emery Walker, Alfred W. Pollard, Sir Geoffrey Keynes, Michael Sadleir, Stanley Morison, Giovanni Mardersteig, Howard M. Nixon, Nicolas Barker, John Carter, and Hermann Zapf. Harry Elkins Widener, the wealthy young bibliophile whose early death in the sinking of the RMS Titanic inspired his mother to construct Harvard's Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library, had been a member.
From April 20 to June 5, 1971, a newly-discovered pre-Columbian Maya codex was displayed in the club, giving the codex the name the Grolier Codex. In 1973 the club published a facsimile of the codex in a book by Michael D. Coe.

Buildings

The Grolier Club has had three locations since its founding. Its first home was rented space at 64 Madison Avenue, which it quickly outgrew. It moved in 1890 to a Romanesque Revival building at 29 East 32nd Street.
The third and current clubhouse at 47 East 60th Street, on the Upper East Side, was designed by Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue. The cornerstone was laid in December 1916, and the clubhouse opened almost exactly a year later. Its members-only upper-floor spaces include a simulation of a 17th-century New York Dutch taproom. A 51-story apartment tower beside the Grolier Club was built with air rights purchased from the club and the adjoining Christ Church.

List of presidents

The following people have served as presidents of the club:
  • Robert Hoe III
  • William Loring Andrews
  • Beverly Chew
  • Samuel Putnam Avery Porträt: Medaille 1897 by Anton Scharff
  • Howard Mansfield
  • Theodore Low De Vinne
  • Edwin B. Holden
  • Richard Hoe Lawrence
  • William F. Havemeyer
  • Edward G. Kennedy
  • Arthur H. Scribner
  • Henry Watson Kent
  • William B. Osgood Field
  • Lucius Wilmerding
  • William B. Ivins Jr.
  • Frederick Coykendall
  • Harry T. Peters
  • Edwin De T. Bechtel
  • Frederick B. Adams Jr.
  • Irving S. Olds
  • Arthur A. Houghton
  • C. Waller Barrett
  • Donald F. Hyde
  • Gordon N. Ray
  • Alfred H. Howell
  • Robert H. Taylor
  • Herman W. Liebert
  • Robert D. Graff
  • Frank S. Streeter
  • G. Thomas Tanselle
  • Kenneth A. Lohf
  • William Bradford Warren
  • William T. Buice III
  • Carolyn L. Smith
  • William H. Helfand
  • Eugene S. Flamm
  • G. Scott Clemons
  • Bruce J. Crawford
  • Nancy K. Boehm
  • Ken Soehner

    Publications

The Club has issued editions of the following works:
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