A new chapter for Briar Press. The first 30 years, and the next.

Nearly thirty years ago, in the winter of 1995, I started thinking about how fun it would be to use a very new technology in service of a very old one. HTML, the markup language used to create web pages, had been released two years earlier. Suddenly, with just a few simple tools, anyone could publish ideas to the entire world.

This was arguably the *second* time in history that a set of technologies had coalesced into a world-transformative machine enabling the rapid spread of information. Artifacts of that first seismic innovation—the printing press—filled the basement of my childhood home, forming the contours of my mom’s letterpress shop: literal tons of printing machinery, cabinetry, tools, and type.

So it was that two milestones of communication, separated by 500 years, were married on the internet, with an announcement to follow in early 1996, posted by my mother Elizabeth on Letterpress, under the subject “Letterpress Web Site”: Our son gave me a surprise for Christmas: a web page for The Briar Press.

Mom and I operated and grew the site together through several increasingly ambitious rebuilds. What began as a passion project developed into a more complex platform that would need dedicated attention and expertise as membership rose and web technologies advanced. At the same time, in keeping with the ethos of the early web, we chose not to display banner ads or accept commercial sponsorships, which we felt were inconsistent with the site’s educational mission and its supportive, peer-to-peer community. Our internet fees were covered through the kindness of donors.

Eventually, the work of administering Briar Press became too demanding. The community took notice, and many of you offered to help.

As the printing press once liberated information from gatekeepers, independent, self-hosted communities like Briar Press create spaces for open dialogue without the interference of algorithms or the influence of profit-driven agendas.

For all its independence, Briar Press now stands, somewhat unsteadily, at a crossroads. Last year, in collaboration with a development partner, we made some long-overdue repairs to our outdated codebase. Highlights include:
—Critical upgrades to the user messaging system that have nearly eliminated mail server errors and bouncing messages
—Integrated Google search functionality that replaces the inefficient built-in system to improve search performance and results
—Automated spam filtering to reduce the possibility of excessive spam activity
—A somewhat improved (though still fragile) image uploader for the Classifieds and Discussion, with increased file size limits and better error reporting for users
—Improved resilience against certain types of potential attacks on the site
—An automatic backup solution to support site restoration in case of failure

These repairs will help keep Briar Press running for a bit longer. Nevertheless, the age of the site is an inescapable fact. The user interface is not optimized for mobile devices and does not meet current standards of accessibility. The site lacks modern security protocols. It continues to suffer recurrent outages during daily use. In short, it is vulnerable at multiple points to failure, jeopardizing irreplaceable historical and technical knowledge contributed over decades by countless printers, some who are no longer with us.

Over the past year and a half, a small group of advocates for Briar Press has been meeting weekly on Zoom to explore ways of saving the site. Together, we developed a plan centered on establishing a new nonprofit—a collaboratively managed organization to guide and complete the work ahead.
The Letterpress Forward Foundation, pending approval of its 501(c)(3) status, will be dedicated to preserving online letterpress history and providing free access to knowledge about the book arts for a diverse audience. Beginning with Briar Press, and then turning to other aging resources, Letterpress Forward will safeguard electronic book arts resources and independent knowledge-sharing communities that are at risk of disappearing forever.

With the organizational support of Letterpress Forward, Briar Press can finally evolve from a side project into a self-sustaining one. Here’s what we hope to accomplish, in a nutshell:
1. Engage the community to understand what it needs from Briar Press.
2. Define a focused and achievable vision for a new website.
3. Secure funding through grants, partnerships, and community contributions.
4. Design, develop, and transition to a modern platform that is adaptable to evolving community needs.

I am so grateful for the commitment and encouragement of the team behind this plan: the insightful educators and printers Amber McMillan Braverman, Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., and Gerald Schulze; developers Jason Grigsby and Eric Portis (who keeps an idle C&P under a sheet in his garage); and my colleagues at Blackletter—Ruth Martinez, Production Supervisor; Anna Skarstad, Senior Graphic Designer; and Hanna Spencer, Executive Administrator.

We are especially honored by the support of Amber and Amos, inaugural board directors of the Letterpress Forward Foundation.

We would love your help writing the next 30 years of this story.
If you found your press on Briar Press, if you learned something or dropped some knowledge in the Discussion, if you believe that the next incarnation of Briar Press has a role to play in the letterpress community, please share this message with friends and colleagues who may be interested in our mission.
You can also voice your support for this project directly by joining our mailing list at Letterpress Forward.