Editing Oxford University Press (section)

==History==
[[File:Oxford University Press Museum (31175477990).jpg|thumb|Matrices for casting type collected by [[John Fell (bishop)|Bishop Fell]], part of his collection now known as the "Fell Types", shown in the OUP Museum]]
The University of Oxford began printing around 1480 and became a major printer of Bibles, prayer books, and scholarly works.<ref>Carter, passim</ref> Oxford's chancellor Archbishop [[William Laud]] consolidated the legal status of the university's printing in the 1630s and petitioned [[Charles I of England|Charles I]] for rights that would enable Oxford to compete with the Stationers' Company and the [[King's Printer]]. He obtained a succession of royal grants, and Oxford's "Great Charter" in 1636 gave the university the right to print "all manner of books".<ref>Sutcliffe p. xiv</ref> Laud also obtained the "privilege" from the Crown of printing the [[Authorized King James Version|King James]] or [[Authorized Version]] of [[Scripture]] at Oxford.<ref>Carter ch. 3</ref> This privilege created substantial returns over the next 250 years.<ref>Barker p. 11</ref>

Following the [[English Civil War]], Vice-chancellor [[John Fell (bishop)|John Fell]], [[Dean (religion)|Dean]] of [[Christ Church, Oxford|Christ Church]], [[Bishop of Oxford]], and Secretary to the Delegates was determined to install printing presses in 1668, making it the university's first central print shop.<ref>Carter ch. 5</ref> In 1674, OUP began to print a [[broadsheet]] calendar, known as the ''[[Oxford Almanack]],'' that was produced annually without interruption from 1674 to 2019.<ref>Barker p. 22</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Oxford University Press on Twitter |url=https://twitter.com/OxUniPress/status/1212679381841256449}}</ref> Fell drew up the first formal programme for the university's printing, which envisaged hundreds of works, including the Bible in [[Greek language|Greek]], editions of the [[Coptic Gospels]] and works of the [[Church Fathers]], texts in [[Arabic]] and [[Syriac language|Syriac]], comprehensive editions of [[classical philosophy]], poetry, and mathematics, a wide range of [[medieval]] scholarship, and also "a history of insects, more perfect than any yet Extant."<ref>Carter p. 63</ref>

[[File:Oxford University Press Building – Walton Street.jpg|thumb|300x300px|Oxford University Press building from [[Walton Street, Oxford|Walton Street]]]]
Generally speaking, the early 18th century marked a lull in the press's expansion. It suffered from the absence of any figure comparable to Fell. The business was rescued by the intervention of a single Delegate, [[William Blackstone]]. Disgusted by the chaotic state of the press and antagonized by Vice-Chancellor [[George Huddesford (Vice-Chancellor)|George Huddesford]], Blackstone called for sweeping reforms that would firmly set out the Delegates' powers and obligations, officially record their deliberations and accounting, and put the print shop on an efficient footing.<ref>I.G. Phillip, ''William Blackstone and the Reform of the Oxford University Press'' (Oxford, 1957) pp. 45–72</ref> Nonetheless, Randolph{{ambiguous|reason=Nobody by this name is mentioned again throughout the article.|date=September 2023}} ignored this document, and it was not until Blackstone threatened legal action that changes began. The university had moved to adopt all of Blackstone's reforms by 1760.<ref>Carter, ch. 21</ref>

By the late 18th century, the press had become more focused. In 1825, the Delegates bought land on Walton Street. Buildings were constructed from plans drawn up by [[Daniel Robertson (architect)|Daniel Robertson]] and [[Edward Blore]], and the press moved into them in 1830.<ref>Barker p. 41. Sutcliffe pp. 4–5</ref> This site remains the principal office of OUP in the 21st century, at the corner of [[Walton Street, Oxford|Walton Street]] and [[Great Clarendon Street]], northwest of Oxford city centre.

The press then entered an era of enormous change. In 1830, it was still a [[Joint-stock company|joint-stock]] printing business in an academic backwater, offering learned works to a relatively small readership of scholars and clerics <ref>Sutcliffe, pp. 1–2, 12</ref> At this time, [[Thomas Combe]] joined the press and became the university's [[Printer (publishing)|Printer]] until he died in 1872. Combe was a better businessman than most Delegates but still no innovator: he failed to grasp the huge commercial potential of [[India paper]], which grew into one of Oxford's most profitable trade secrets in later years.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 39–40, 110–111</ref> Even so, Combe earned a fortune through his shares in the business and the acquisition and renovation of the bankrupt paper mill at Wolvercote. Combe showed little interest, however, in producing fine printed work at the press.<ref>Sutcliffe p. 6</ref> The best-known text associated with his print shop was the flawed first edition of ''[[Alice's Adventures in Wonderland]]'', printed by Oxford at the expense of its author [[Lewis Carroll]] (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) in 1865.<ref>Sutcliffe p. 36</ref>

It took the 1850 [[Royal Commission]] on the workings of the university and a new Secretary, [[Bartholomew Price]], to shake up the press.<ref>Barker pp. 45–47</ref> Appointed in 1868, Price had already recommended to the university that the press needed an efficient executive officer to exercise "vigilant superintendence" of the business, including its dealings with [[Alexander Macmillan (publisher)|Alexander Macmillan]], who became the publisher for Oxford's printing in 1863 and 1866 helped Price to create the Clarendon Press series of cheap, elementary school books&nbsp;– perhaps the first time that Oxford used the Clarendon imprint.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 19–26</ref> Under Price, the press began to take on its modern shape. Major new lines of work began. For example, in 1875, the Delegates approved the series ''[[Sacred Books of the East]]'' under the editorship of [[Friedrich Max Müller]], bringing a vast range of religious thought to a wider readership.<ref>Sutcliffe pp.&nbsp;45–46</ref>

{{Anchor|Henry Frowde}}<!-- This Anchor tag serves to provide a permanent target for incoming section links. Please do not remove it, nor modify it, except to add another appropriate anchor. If you modify the section title, please anchor the old title. It is always best to anchor an old section header that has been changed so that links to it will not be broken. See [[Template:Anchor]] for details. This template is {{subst:Anchor comment}} -->Equally, Price moved OUP towards publishing in its own right. The press had ended its relationship with Parker's in 1863 and, in 1870, bought a small London bindery for some Bible work.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 16, 19. 37</ref> Macmillan's contract ended in 1880 and was not renewed. By this time, Oxford also had a London warehouse for Bible stock in [[Paternoster Row]], and in 1880, its manager, Henry Frowde (1841–1927), was given the formal title of Publisher to the university. Frowde came from the book trade, not the university, and remained an enigma to many. One obituary in Oxford's staff magazine ''The Clarendonian'' admitted, "Very few of us here in Oxford had any personal knowledge of him."<ref>The Clarendonian, 4, no. 32, 1927, p. 47</ref> Despite that, Frowde became vital to OUP's growth, adding new lines of books to the business, presiding over the massive publication of the [[Revised Version]] of the [[New Testament]] in 1881<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 48–53</ref> and playing a key role in setting up the press's first office outside Britain, in New York City in 1896.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 89–91</ref>

Price transformed OUP. In 1884, the year he retired as Secretary, the Delegates bought back the last shares in the business.<ref>Sutcliffe p. 64</ref> The press was now owned wholly by the university, with its own paper mill, print shop, bindery, and warehouse. Its output had increased to include school books and modern scholarly texts such as [[James Clerk Maxwell]]'s [[Maxwell's equations|''A Treatise on Electricity & Magnetism'']] (1873), which proved fundamental to [[Albert Einstein|Einstein's]] thought.<ref>Barker p. 48</ref> Without abandoning its traditions or quality of work, Price began to turn OUP into an alert, modern publisher. In 1879, he also took on the publication that led that process to its conclusion: the massive project that became the ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' (OED).<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 53–58</ref>

Offered to Oxford by [[James Murray (lexicographer)|James Murray]] and the [[Philological Society]], the "New English Dictionary" was a grand academic and patriotic undertaking. Lengthy negotiations led to a formal contract. Murray was to edit a work estimated to take ten years and to cost approximately £9,000.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 56–57</ref> Both figures were wildly optimistic. The Dictionary began appearing in print in 1884, but the first edition was not completed until 1928, 13 years after Murray's death, costing around £375,000.<ref>[[Simon Winchester]], ''[[The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary]]'' (Oxford, 2003)</ref> This vast financial burden and its implications landed on Price's successors.{{citation needed|date=March 2021}}

The next Secretary, [[Philip Lyttelton Gell]], was appointed by the Vice-Chancellor [[Benjamin Jowett]] in 1884 but struggled and was finally dismissed in 1897.<ref>Sutcliffe pp. 98–107</ref> The Assistant Secretary, Charles Cannan, was instrumental in Gell's removal.<ref name="Gadd">{{cite book |last1=Gadd |first1=Ian Anders |last2=Eliot |first2=Simon |last3=Louis |first3=William Roger |last4=Robbins |first4=Keith |title=History of Oxford University Press: Volume II: 1780 to 1896 |date=November 2013 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-954315-1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_bYJAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA111 |page=111 |language=en}}</ref> Cannan took over with little fuss and even less affection for his predecessor in 1898: "Gell was always here, but I cannot make out what he did."<ref>Sutcliffe p. 66</ref> 

By the early 20th century, OUP expanded its overseas trade, partly due to the efforts of [[Humphrey Sumner Milford|Humphrey Milford]], the publisher of the University of Oxford from 1913 to 1945. The 1920s saw skyrocketing prices of both materials and labour. Paper was hard to come by and had to be imported from South America through trading companies. Economies and markets slowly recovered as the 1920s progressed. In 1928, the press's imprint read 'London, Edinburgh, [[Glasgow]], Leipzig, Toronto, Melbourne, [[Cape Town]], Bombay, [[Calcutta]], [[Madras]] and Shanghai'. Not all of these were full-fledged branches: in Leipzig, there was a depot run by H. Bohun Beet, and in Canada and Australia, there were small, functional depots in the cities and an army of educational representatives penetrating the rural fastnesses to sell the press's stock as well as books published by firms whose agencies were held by the press, very often including fiction and light reading. In India, the Branch depots in Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta were imposing establishments with sizeable stock inventories, for the Presidencies themselves were large markets, and the educational representatives there dealt mostly with upcountry trade.<ref>Milford's Letterbooks</ref>

In 1923, OUP established a Music Department.<ref name="Sutcliffe p. 211">Sutcliffe p. 211</ref> At the time, such musical publishing enterprises, however, were rare.<ref name="Sutcliffe p. 210">Sutcliffe p. 210</ref> and few of the Delegates or former Publishers were themselves musical or had extensive music backgrounds.{{citation needed|date=March 2021}} OUP bought an Anglo-French Music Company and all its facilities, connections, and resources.<ref name="Sutcliffe p. 211"/> This concentration provided OUP two mutually reinforcing benefits: a niche in music publishing unoccupied by potential competitors and a branch of music performance and composition that the English themselves had largely neglected. Hinnells proposes that the early Music Department's "mixture of scholarship and cultural nationalism" in an area of music with largely unknown commercial prospects was driven by its sense of cultural philanthropy (given the press's academic background) and a desire to promote "national music outside the German mainstream."<ref>Hinnells p. 8</ref>
It was not until 1939 that the Music Department showed its first profitable year.<ref name="Sutcliffe p. 212">Sutcliffe p. 212</ref>

The Depression of 1929 dried profits from the Americas to a trickle, and India became 'the one bright spot' in an otherwise dismal picture. Bombay was the nodal point for distribution to the Africas and onward sale to Australasia, and people who trained at the three major depots later moved to pioneer branches in Africa and Southeast Asia.<ref>Milford's Letterbooks</ref>
In 1927–1934 Oxford University Press, Inc., New York, was reorganized by Geoffrey Cumberlege to return it to profitability from the lows of the Depression years. (In 1945–1956, Cumberlege would succeed Milford as publisher to the University of Oxford).<ref>John Brown and Clare L. Taylor, [https://sl.nsw.gov.au/10.1093/ref:odnb/30989 Cumberlege, Geoffrey Fenwick Jocelyn (1891–1979)]{{Dead link|date=February 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}, ''[[Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]]'', sl.nsw.gov.au. Retrieved 3 March 2023.</ref>

The period following [[World War II]] saw consolidation in the face of the break-up of the Empire and the post-war reorganization of the Commonwealth.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}

In the 1960s, OUP Southern Africa started publishing local authors for the general reader, but also for schools and universities, under its [[Three Crowns Books]] imprint. Its territory includes [[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Swaziland]], and [[Namibia]], as well as South Africa, the biggest market of the five.{{citation needed|date=March 2021}} OUP Southern Africa is now one of the three biggest educational publishers in South Africa. It focuses on publishing textbooks, dictionaries, atlases, supplementary material for schools, and university textbooks. Its author base is overwhelmingly local, and in 2008, it partnered with the university to support [[Mandela Rhodes Scholarship|scholarships]] for South Africans studying postgraduate degrees.{{citation needed|date=March 2021}}

Operations in South Asia and East and South East Asia were and, in the case of the former, remain significant parts of the company.
Today, the North American branch in New York City is primarily a distribution branch to facilitate the sale of [[#Bibles|Oxford Bibles]] in the United States. It also handles marketing of all books of its parent, Macmillan.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}
By the end of 2021, OUP USA had published eighteen Pulitzer Prize–winning books.<ref>{{cite web |title=OUP Major Book Awards |url=https://global.oup.com/academic/aboutus/major-awards/?cc=us&lang=en& |website=OUP Academic |publisher=Oxford University Press |access-date=6 February 2022}}</ref>

In March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic its Bookshop on the High Street closed.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2022-02-15 |title=Oxford University Press bookshop in High Street has shut forever |url=https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/19923908.oxford-university-press-bookshop-high-street-shut-forever/ |access-date=2025-03-12 |website=Oxford Mail |language=en}}</ref>
On 27 August 2021, OUP closed Oxuniprint, its printing division. The closure will mark the "final chapter" of OUP's centuries-long history of printing.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Flood |first=Alison |date=9 June 2021 |title=Oxford University Press to end centuries of tradition by closing its printing arm |work=[[The Guardian]] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/jun/09/oxford-university-press-to-end-centuries-of-tradition-by-closing-its-printing-arm |access-date=9 June 2021}}</ref>