Thomas Bird Mosher Collection

Thomas Bird Mosher was born on September 11, 1852 in Biddeford Maine to sea captain Benjamin Mosher and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Merrill. He had two sisters, Elizabeth, and Lila. He entered the publishing business when he took on a clerk position in a publishing house located on 37 Exchange Street in Portland, Maine.

In 1882, with his partner Ruel T. McLellan, he started a law-book and stationery business named McLellan, Mosher, and Company in Portland, which went bankrupt in 1890. Not dissuaded by this failure, Mosher instead set up his own publishing business at 45 Exchange Street in Portland and by 1891 he had published his first book, George Meredith's Modern Love under the Mosher Press imprint. The following year, he married his wife, Anna M. Littlefield. Together they had two sons, Harrison Hume Mosher (1896-1963), and Thomas Bird Mosher Jr. (born 1907).

Mosher's credo was nothing is worth printing that is not worth printing well, and his books have often been compared favorably to those of other private- and fine-press printers of his day, including Elbert Hubbard's Roycroft Press, and William Morris's Kelmscott press, which was founded the same year that Mosher printed his first book: 1891. However, while Mosher shared Morris' affinity for well-made books and fine printing, Mosher was determined to keep the output of his press affordable. From 1891 to his death in 1923, he published 730 books, 31 catalogues, and 240 issues of his magazine, The Bibelot. While the majority of his output were reprints of established literary works, Mosher also published some original works and took on private press jobs, printing such things as Christmas cards and pamphlets for businesses.

Thomas Bird Mosher generated controversy several times for publishing works by English authors without their prior permission, and so gained the moniker of the Portland Pirate, despite not breaking any of the international copyright laws at the time. A notable example of this is a series of tense exchanges between Mosher and Andrew Lang, which were published in the popular literary magazines of the day. Lang charged Mosher with literary piracy after Mosher printed (sans Lang's permission) an edition of Lang's Aucassin and Nicolette in 1896.

Many of the books of the Mosher Press were published in different sets, and in limited-editions, all of which were given special names like The Brocade Series or Lyra Americana. These sets of titles were united by format, size, paper choices, and theme, though some titles were reprinted across multiple sets. This approach to publishing whetted his customer's appetite for collecting, who were encouraged to complete their limited-edition sets by notices in each catalog about the dwindling numbers of certain titles. Mosher also offered for sale beautiful hand-made boxes specially made to fit the different book series. The higher-end offerings from the Mosher catalog - such as those printed on Japan Vellum paper and bound with leather covers and gilded edges, were aimed at more well-to-do customers. However, even the lower-tier Mosher Press books were notable in their simple but elegant design, and the sophisticated choice of handmade Van Gelder paper for the textblock.

Mosher issued each of his catalogues with a heartfelt forward, which was always written in the third person. In the 1900 catalog for his List of books in Belles Letters, he touted the beauty of his books as the cause for his publishing success:

If, then, Mosher has succeeded in any measurable degree, it is because he actually loves the literature he has produced in new format. It is not enough for him to send forth books without striving to make them wholly beautiful. Book-making is not only an art, it may also be raised to a passion.

After Mosher died in 1923, Flora MacDonald Lamb, the long-time secretary of the Mosher Press, took over the running of the press until it closed in 1931.