Collection Guide
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Cole (L. Averill) Collection
mssCole
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Table of contents
Contributing Institution:
The Huntington Library
Title: L. Averill Cole collection
Creator:
Cole, L. Averill
Identifier/Call Number: mssCole
Physical Description:
1.83 Linear Feet
(2 boxes)
Date (inclusive): 1904-2015
Abstract: A collection of material related to L.
Averill Cole, American bookbinder.
Language of Material: Materials are in
English.
Open for use by qualified researchers and by appointment. Please contact Reader Services at
the Huntington Library for more information.
The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from
or publish images of this material, nor does it charge fees for such activities. The
responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining
necessary permissions rests with the researcher.
[Identification of item]. L. Averill Cole collection, The Huntington Library, San Marino,
California.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Purchased from Kenneth Karmiole Bookseller, Inc., April 2015.
Transferred to Archival Processing Team, October 2022, formerly Rare Book call number:
645435.
Louise Averill Taylor Cole (1880-1971) was born in Elmira, New York, the first child of
Frank Taylor and Lillie Bramhall Taylor. The Taylor family moved to San Francisco,
California, around 1883; soon after arriving in California, Frank and Lillie Taylor divorced
and Louise was sent to live with her paternal grandmother in Elmira. Louise moved from New
York in about 1890 and, after an unhappy stay with her father in Washington State, moved
back to San Francisco in the mid-1890s; her mother had married Charles Melvin Cole in 1888,
and Louise took the name Louise Averill Cole. In the late 1890s, Louise traveled and studied
in Europe as she decided on a career in fine bookbinding. She studied first in Germany, and
then was accepted as a student in Brussels by Louis Jacobs and Joseph Hendricks. Louise left
Brussels in 1906 for London, where she taught bookbinding to various titled ladies; she
returned to the United States in 1908 to work for Houghton Mifflin, in charge of the
Riverside Press division for fine bindings. Louise Averill Cole married Gerald Shephard
Howland on October 31, 1913, in Belmont, Massachusetts; he was a printer by trade. During
the years of raising their two daughters Louise retired from her work as a bookbinder. The
couple lived in various Massachusetts towns before retiring to Santa Barbara, California, in
1948.
A collection of material related to the work of L. Averill Cole, an American bookbinder.
The collection includes correspondence, manuscripts, a volume, photographs, a prize medal,
ephemera, and scrapbooks. The correspondents include: Louis Jacobs, Robert J. Milevski,
George Wolfe Plank, A. S. W. Rosenbach, Sandra Howland Smith, and Marianne Tidcombe; the
correspondence also includes a small number of family-related letters. The collection also
includes research material on Cole collected by Robert J. Milevski, Sandra Howland Smith,
and Marianne Tidcombe. The volume was compiled by Sandra Howland Smith about her grandmother
entitled: "Selected Fine Bindings of L. Averill Cole, (1880-1971)."
Processed by Gayle M. Richardson in December 2022.
Arranged alphabetically.
Forms part of L. Averill Cole Bookbinding Collection.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Bookbinding
Embossed bindings
Fine bindings
Leather bindings (Bookbinding)
Women bookbinders
Ephemera
Letters (correspondence)
Manuscripts
Photographs
Prize medal
Scrapbooks
Jacobs, Louis, active 1890-1918
Milevski, Robert
J.
Plank, George
Rosenbach, A. S. W. (Abraham Simon Wolf), 1876-1952
Smith, Sandra Howland
Tidcombe, Marianne