AFTER starting work as a floor sweeper in a bookbinding business in Melbourne Ken Edwards decided to get a better job.
At 15, and after 12 months sweeping the floors, Ken was offered an apprenticeship with Thomas Crosby, a medium-size bookbinding business.
His four-year apprenticeship involved all types of stationery binding – account books, library binding and paper ruling.
Ken eventually opened his own business in Preston – BJ Edwards Bookbinders – and soon after changed the name to Edwards Burnco Pty Ltd after taking over Burnco Cellulose Products, a company that Thomas Crosby was doing work for.
These days, 79-year-old Ken is well and truly retired but still keeps his hand in binding the occasional book in his back shed where he’s surrounded by the “tools of the bookbinder’s trade” – a saddler’s sewing machine (his favourite), heavy duty and ancient English manufactured guillotines and the shed wall lined with hundreds of different hand tools that have seen many hours of work.
Ken was born in Melbourne in 1932 and after leaving the Brunswick Boys School when he was 15 started work at Thomas Crosby bookbinding business in Bourke Street, Melbourne.
“The bookbinding trade faded during the early 1970s and the tabbing side of the business grew to become a big part of my business and still is today a going concern,” the sprightly retired craftsman said.
“In the early days of automated binding there were quite a few errors made along the way,” Ken said.
“The grain of the paper went crossways instead of down the page and resulted in the pages breaking away due to the paper not hinging away from the spine of the book.
“The other main problem was with the formula of the early glues – they became brittle with the passing of time.
“Now it’s a different story with the acrylic glues – they’ve got it right,” he said.
In Ken’s shed he has all the equipment he needs to work on his hobbies which have grown out of his bookbinding career.
The impressive black steel hand cutter has pride of place in the well laid out workshop.
“It cuts large sheets of strawboard used for the covers of the books I still produce.”
The equally impressive guillotine is next in line ready to trim the three edges of the book.
“My pride and joy is my grandfather’s treadle saddler’s machine; it’s over 100 years old and is still going strong.
“This machine is crucial to the structure of the bookbinding process – stitching the sections – a little bit of machine oil and the occasional wipe down and that’s all is necessary to keep it operating well.”
Ken married Beverley in 1956 and together they raised their four children in Melbourne – Belinda, Douglas, Gary and Joanne.
Ken’s son Doug joined him in the bookbinding business in 1976 and worked with his father for nearly 25 years before heading to Mildura “for a lifestyle change” with his family.
“The first book I bound was in 1956 in the shed at home, from the Sun newspaper and was made up of 15 days of results from the Olympic Games bound in book cloth.”
Another heavy and bound book Ken has in his pile on the table is the 2006 Commonwealth Games results as published over the duration of the Melbourne event.
“I’ve also got the tragic story of the 9/11 terror attack on the United States along with the 2003 Bali bombing attack which killed many Australians.
“I’ve bound these significant events for their historical importance and my grandchildren will hopefully appreciate them in the future.”
Ken sold his tabbing business in 2004 and not long after sold his house, business and factory and moved to retire in Mildura to be near family.
“I’ve diversified in other arts and crafts in recent years since my retirement in 2004 – acrylic painting, leatherwork including key pouches, cloth-covered diaries, velvet-lined jewellery boxes and – just to make sure I haven’t got too much spare time – genealogy.
“Technology has helped me a lot in being able to print, copy and research the history of the family.
“I’d never have got as far as I have without the computer,” Ken said.
“I’ve never thrown out any tools that I’ve inherited over the years, they always come in handy in my hobby work,” the “creative graphica” said.
This article appeared in Tuesday's Sunraysia Daily 17/1/2012.
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