This collection consists of printed miniature books, correspondence, ephemera, broadsides, and woodblocks related to William Murray Cheney and his activities as a printer in Los Angeles. It also includes materials related to other Los Angeles area printers, presses, and bibliophiles such as Grant Dahlstrom, H. Richard Archer, the Auk Press, and the Hippogryph Press.

William Cheney was born in 1907 in Los Angeles. He worked as a shipping clerk for Dawson's Bookshop from 1929 to 1932, and then went to work for Thomas Perry Stricker, under whose tutelage he learned to print. Cheney's first printed book was A Voyage to Trolland (1933). Cheney briefly owned his own press which he operated until he went to work as an engineer for Douglas Aircraft from 1941 to 1946. From 1946 to 1947, Cheney worked for the Artesia News. In 1948 he worked briefly for Muir and Watts, and also for Saul and Lillian Marks' Plantin Press before buying his own printing press and starting to print commercially. From 1962 to 1974, Cheney printed materials for the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library and for Lawrence Clark Powell while working in the gatehouse on the Clark Library grounds.

21 boxes 9 linear feet

Copyright has not been assigned to the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, UCLA. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Librarian. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained.

Collection is open for research.