The R.R. Donnelley and Sons Training Department Library consists of 1,200 books on the history of printing and printing processes and examples of finely printed books, bindings, advertising art, and graphic design formerly of the Training Department Library of R.R. Donnelley and Sons Company, a commercial printing company in Chicago. These materials were maintained for the instruction of young printing apprentices, illustrating Donnelley’s pioneering commitment to apprentice training and a tradition of quality as well as the efficient practice of the craft. With a stress on classroom instruction, closely supervised on-the-job training, and access to a well-stocked library, the Donnelley program represented a high point in industrial training in the United States. Thus there were manuals, textbooks, specimen books, treatises, journals, and other similar works on such fundamental elements of printing as typesetting, composition, presswork, engraving, photography, binding, and design. To enliven the perspective of these day-to-day skills, historical examples of printing craftsmanship were also selectively acquired. These examples included the work of master printers and designers, past and present, plus unusual works which depict innovative applications of the various graphic processes. To these were added various types of printed ephemera illustrating solutions to particular contemporary printing and design problems. These books and printer's tools illustrate the intricacy of the printer's craft, the close relationship between industrial training and the continuing development of the printing craft and trade, and an important piece of Chicago history.
Browse the R.R. Donnelley and Sons Training Department Library in the Library Catalog.
For more information, please consult The R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company library : a checklist of some of the outstanding books from the gift to the University of Chicago Library (1979) or the 1982 exhibition catalog for The Printer's Craft: An Exhibition Selected from the R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company Collection.
See also the R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company Archive, which contains correspondence, manuscripts, legal documents, oral and written histories, advertising, customer product, artwork, product samples, and artifacts from the company's history.
Note that a portion of R.R. Donnelley and Sons’ Training Department Library is now housed at the Newberry Library. See R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company. Archive, Box 475, Folder 2 for information on Training Department Library books sent to the Newberry.
