For the creative team that produced “They Liked Noble Causes: How a Community Built a Library,” the book was their own “noble cause.”
A volunteer writing and design project to benefit the Bainbridge public library, the collaboration paid an unexpected dividend when the book recently received the International Association of Printing House Craftsmen Gold Award.
“This book never could have happened without the team effort, and everyone’s donations of time and talent,” publisher Sharon Abrams said. “To produce a book of this quality would have been prohibitive.”
Publisher Abrams (The Winslow Group), writer Barbara Winther, editor Verda Averill, designer O. Kern Devin and printer Robert Valentine (Valco Graphics) share the honors of the Gold Award with contributing photographers Art Grice, Joel Sackett, Linda Quartman Younker and Mary Randlett.
The group has the satisfaction of knowing their book topped over 3,075 entries world-wide from more than 1,200 printing firms representing Australia, Britain, China, Germany, Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and the United States.
“They Like Noble Causes” began in fall 1999 when publisher Sharon Abrams went jogging with neighbor Barbara Winther.
In the course of running laps around Battle Point Park, Abrams invited Winther to write the history.
“She told me that she had asked David Guterson first,” Winther said wryly, “but as it turned out, he didn’t have the time.”
Winther, a playwright, immersed herself enthusiastically in the project. “I always love to do research,” she said, “I find it so interesting.”
From the start, the book had some unusual features that contributed, both Winther and Abrams believe, to its success.
First was Winther’s determination to lace what could easily be a dry history with humor and anecdote.
“One has to make a case for the preservation of the little things that make up life,” Winther said. “That’s what makes writing vital.”
To illustrate specific details, Winther called on her playwriting skills to shape the history into a drama, introducing each chapter as an opening act.
Another unique aspect of the book was the unified production process.
“I had always turned my writing over to the designers, once I was done,” Winther said. “I never had anything to say about the way it looked.”
But Winther and graphic artist Dern – a leading designer on the Seattle scene for many years – met often to decide how visual and written elements could mesh. Winther’s particular concern, she says, was to see that photographs were included on certain pages.
Dern decided on large grey or sepia-tone historical images overlaid with small colored contemporary photos.
“He said ‘no’ to color on top of color,” Winther said. “He said it looked too busy. He was right.”
Dern added a “shadow” under the colored photographs that made them appear to float over the full-page image.
The contrast with the diffuse, grainy older photographs made the crisp details of the small images more sharply focused and vibrant.
The design element worked conceptually to symbolize contemporary Bainbridge built on island history.
Dern combined the book’s flyleaf and list of library sponsors to make a unique design element by selecting bright green as the background color for the long list and interspersing tiny, bright photos to break up the text.
A history of the local library might have been a worthy, dreary tome; instead, a group of professionals – animated by the same altruism of the library founders and supporters they record – crafted the subject matter into a prize-winning package.
“It took two years out of my life to do it,” Winther said, “but it was wonderful to work as a team and put the book together so well.”
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“They Like Noble Causes: How a Community Built a Library,” a history of the Bainbridge Island Library is available at Eagle Harbor Books, Fortner Books or the publisher at 842-5105. Proceeds benefit the Bainbridge Library Stewardship Fund.
