Page 48 - Print21 November-December 2021

Print History
Travels with
my grandfather
Identity matters. Knowing who you are and where you’ve come from is important to most of us. For James Cryer, discovering his grandfather’s diary opened up a new dimension not only to his family’s history but also to his engagement with the printing industry. It launched him on a publishing journey following a young Australian printer’s odyssey across pre-World War l USA.
James Cryer’s identity is firmly founded on printing. The owner of well-known Sydney print recruitment business, JDA Recruitment,
is the fourth in his family line
to be part of the industry. In his business of finding the right printing professional for the right job, he knows just about everyone in the Sydney industry. Enthusiastic and indefatigable, he epitomises an ‘old school’ tradition of dedication to the wellbeing of the industry at large.
There’s been a WJ Cryer engaged in Sydney printing ever since his great grandfather, WJ Cryer the 1st, arrived from the UK in 1882. A well regarded, credentialed, compositor from Liverpool, he co-founded a printing company that would in time become WJ Cryer Co Ltd. His son, WJ Cryer the 2nd, and latterly WJ Cryer the 3rd, picked up the gauntlet all the way to the 1960s, when the public company was taken over.
This family engagement with the industry has gained new prominence with the publication of The Romance of Letterpress, a self-published hardback from the current WJ Cryer the 4th. Lavishly illustrated, it is
an account of an odyssey across the USA in 1914, undertaken by his grandfather, WJ Cryer ll, then a 21-year-old letterpress printer. Based on an original diary and a collection of postcards the young printer sent back to his family, the book is a unique insight not only into printing practices of the time, but also to the spirit of adventure that drove the so- called Australian ‘tramp printer,’ to travel across the continental USA.
Supplemented by observations, commentary and wry asides from the author/publisher, The Romance of Letterpress, is a time capsule on the
social mores, industrial policies and a technology print revolution in an age of real disruption. A true labour of love, it stands as a marvellous tribute to the young man’s initiative, as
well as providing an account of how printing and printers were regarded in the days when the craft was at the cutting edge of mass communication.
Go east young man
For the young Wal Cryer ll, printing was more than a job; it was a way
of life. He became a credentialed letterpress printer after serving his time at the family firm in Sydney in the early years of the 20th century. Following his father’s prompting,
he left home at 21 years of age, not only to see the world but also to research new printing methods to bring home to the family firm. Fired with a fine sense of adventure the young printer, along with a mate,
Ed, sailed from Sydney on the SS Aorangi on Monday, 1 December, 1913, across the Pacific in the first stage of a round the world odyssey.
A conscientious diarist he dutifully records the disillusion that waited on making landfall at the Golden Gate. Arriving in San Francisco in 1914 he found a USA deep in depression. It was a harsh landing and the reality of his situation struck home when he was refused a union card because the printing union was on strike. ‘They will not take me into the union and therefore debar me from getting a job.’
Recognising there was no point
in staying in the Bay City without the prospect of work, the two struck out straight away through a snowy, winter landscape to the Mormon capital of Salt Lake City in Utah. The city of the Latter-Day Saints posed even more challenges. The printing
union there didn’t want him either, and told him so in no uncertain manner. Despite his enthusiasm for Freemasonry, which was an essential qualification to be a credentialed printer at the time, it took forty-five minutes of detailed examination to satisfy the Mt Moriah Lodge of the Salt Lake Masons on his Australian credentials so he could join as an Entered Apprentice.
‘He does not want me here at all! But I told him, here I was and here I was going to stay.’
By now running low on cash, and well over the novelty of deep snow, nine days later he scored his first
job in the USA, at a print shop of
the Hotel Utah, on the strength of having printed samples of his work with him. Whether in gratitude or not, he went to church three times the following Sunday, twice to the Methodists and once to the Mormon Tabernacle, where he was less than impressed by the grand organ.
48 Print21 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021