In 2011 alone, manufacturers shipped 30 million ebook readers. And yet, electronic readers and tablets are just one facet of the rising popularity of reading - books sales, especially paperback books, are strong. Growing numbers of book clubs and reading groups meet in-person and online. Youth and young adult readership is on the rise. And, flash that free plastic card - library membership and circulation is at an all time high.
While forms of printed communication go back thousands of years, here are some recent history milestones along the way:
▪ From the 7th to 13th century (hundreds of years!): Religious manuscript books were produced by hand; creating the books was considered an act of worship.
▪ From the 13th to 15th century: Books reflected a human desire to try to express something about the observable world, and while still hand-made manuscript, inspired by the returns from the Crusades and the rise of European universities, books also reflected secular content.
▪ During the 15th and 16th centuries: In 1450, the Gutenberg movable type printing press hits the scene - essentially changing the world - and prayer books were printed for distribution.
▪ In the 16th and 17th centuries: Press-printed books reflected looks at culture and history.
▪ 1658: The first mass-published children's book, called Orbis Pictus (Latin for 'Pictured World').
▪ 1748: Depending on who you talk to, this year marks either the earliest or one of the earliest public libraries in America in Newport, Rhode Island.
▪ 1794: The first actual pencil, as we know it, was invented in France.
▪ 1842: The first literary tour - Charles Dickens read his own books.
▪ 1851: Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin sells 1 million copies, second only to the Bible.
▪ 1874: Christopher Latham Sholes gets a patent for a typewriter. Why the QWERTY keys? To space the type-arms of commonly used letters so they don't jam.
▪ 1884: Lewis Waterman invents the fountain pen.
▪ 1900: By 1900, 99% of all paper is now produced by machine and the telegraph connects most of the "civilized" world.
▪ 1904: The first offset press started out as a printing mistake.
▪ 1905: It looked like a horse-drawn hearse, but it was actually the first bookmobile in Hagerstown, Maryland.
▪ 1933: The IBM Electromatic appears (the first electric typewriter).
▪ 1935: This one's big - the first mass-produced paperback book - a romance novel, in London, England.
▪ 1938: Lazlo Biro of Hungary invents the first ballpoint pen. And, Chester Carlton develops the first electrostatic copy machine - xerography, meaning 'dry writing.' How? With India ink, sulfur, a cotton cloth, waxed paper, a glass slide, a zinc plate, and a bright lamp.
▪ 1952: Dylan Thomas read his poetry for the first audiobook.
▪ 1976: The first word processor is developed by Michael Shrayer (Shrayer's Electric Pencil).
▪ 1982: The Compass 1100 is the first "clamshell" style laptop computer. And, the Commodore 64, the first "inexpensive" home computer, appears.
▪ 1983: Two words: Microsoft Word.
▪ 1990: Thomas Berners-Lee, the first web page, and the world wide web.
▪ 1991: Adobe presents the PDF file (Portable Document Format).
▪ 1993: The first, and longest running blog (forests.org) from Dr. Glen Berry.
▪ 2000: There are 3,200,000 new book titles in-print in America and eBooks begin to emerge.
▪ 2004: The Library of Congress, with more than 130 million actual items, including 29 million books and printed materials, has 530 miles of bookshelves.
▪ 2005: Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling sells more than 300 million copies.
▪ 2006: U.S. book sales total 3.1 billion books.
▪ 2007: Amazon Kindle is introduced.
▪ 2009: U.S. book sales total $23.9 billion.
▪ 2011: eBooks outsell physical books on Amazon. 30 million eBook readers shipped.
No matter the form, we will always need a way to put our reading material in its rightful place.
Click here to visits Amish Originals Furniture Co. Bookshelves online.
Want to read more? Click on these links:
From Cave Paintings to the Internet.
Oral Path: A Bit of History of Books and Writing
Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune: What's the Next Chapter for Bookshelves?
Bookmark Radio: 2012 Book Industry Trends
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