Wednesday, January 15, 2025
Beginner's Guide to Quakerism
by Maurine Pyle, Margaret Katranides, Thomas Leverett, and Fernando Freire
$3.83 + postage on Amazon
$0.99 on Kindle
Followers of this blog and the press will recognize this as the pamphlet, published in 2021 and printed at home by me for $0.80 each + postage. It will still be available in pamphlet form, printed more professionally, and possibly cheaper; stay posted. This Amazon version is at least available now, here from this site.
It was intended to give the average outsider a good general overview of what Quakerism is. It is, after all, a discipline to live by Truth and integrity, and to have as your community people who may feel differently about the exact role of God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and the literal doctrines of mainstream Christianity. Many Quakers today do not call themselves Christian; if so, what do they have in common? This pamphlet will explain.
Stay current here.
Sunday, January 12, 2025
New Chapter for the Pamphlet
Long-time readers of this blog will know which pamphlet I'm talking about: Beginner's Guide to Quakerism. Just to recap: it's a 12-page document, written mostly by Maurine Pyle (but also by Margaret Katranides, Fernando Freire, and me), put into a 4 1/4 X 5 1/2 pamphlet (40 very small pages) with a cardstock cover that, in good times, is in color. I have been constructing them at home with a worn-out home printer, collating and stapling one at a time, at the price of about ten minutes each. St. Louis Meeting has been my main customer and I have not advertised widely, partly for lack of time.
I sent an order for twenty out a couple of weeks ago to Villa Park Illinois in preparation for a class they were doing called Quakerism 101. I sent the best pamphlets I could make yet they were still unacceptable. I'd become used to reading poor printing yet that was because I knew what it said. The color printing on the cover was long gone. Our home printer just wasn't handling it and I could not rectify the situation even with enough ink, constant head cleaning, etc.
When they complained, I put it on Amazon. This was a quick decision yet something I knew how to do and could do within a day. It is now here, $3.83 in paperback and $0.99 kindle, with its color cover and guaranteed printing, but it's 5 X 8, barely 25 pages. I could get them 20 author's copies for $2.30 each and $11 shipping, but that was disappointing; I'd hoped for much cheaper. Turned out they have to put a lot of work into making 5 x 8 pamphlets.
There were some objections to Amazon; it turns out that it's not a very good fit for the Quaker community, even if they do print things at a reasonable price and quickly. I didn't have to do much checking around to find that several Quakers were not fond of Amazon. Now as it turns out I use Amazon often and have come to just not worry about its unsavory methods as, for starting authors, it's the only show in town. So I didn't really ponder it hard when I had to produce documents; it was just the quickest way to get where I was going. I couldn't print them at home. I can't even find someone in town to do it reliably.
It has brought up the topic of religious harmony, namely does the printer actually feel good about printing what they're printing? As a commercial printer I'd probably accept any job that came my way but things would change when coming up against one's religion and it would also change if the documents advocated revolution, etc. Not sure how I'd handle it. But I don't entirely blame Galesburg printers for basically hemming and hawing and not wanting to do it except for healthy profit. They didn't really want to do it at all.
I was given the name of Barclay Press in Oregon, and wrote away to them, and then to three printers in the Chicago area. These last three weren't until Fri. and I have no idea what they will say (beyond that they received my request). But Barclay wrote back and said they can do it for about 25c each but depends on how many. I thought quickly. Surely at 100 it would be significantly more because they would still have to set it up, etc. At 100 each it would be $25 + shipping, but probably way more, but at 500 it would be $125 + shipping minimum and the higher we went the closer we could probably get to $0.25 each. Very cool!
Following through on this logic it seems I'm being called to set up a distribution system in Oregon, with my son and his young family (wife is also Quaker) who could then just drive out to this press (it's about 30 mi. from Portland) and pick up the 500. I am now thinking maybe I should ask them if they are interested in setting up a Quaker pamphlet distribution system.
I have not heard from any of the Chicago printers. Remember that Galesburg printers pretty much weren't enthusiastic. One got into a convoluted argument about setup and formatting which led me to believe that something spiritually was troubling his soul about doing it. Ideally we would have it aligned: everyone involved believes in it. If we do it right it will be more likely to succeed.
By the way you might ask why I don't simply use Canva or some online printing service. These printing services have proliferated lately and they will send twenty, or a hundred, of anything, to your doorstep. I have not ruled them out. I tried Canva and got hopelessly tangled up in setting up an account (bad omen), and also was unable to verify that one could set up a pamphlet of the size I want (I am not actually fussy on the size) - another bad omen. If you can't, through online scrolling, determine that this will be possible, then it's not. But I'm still open to trying.
The present plan is to wait until the facts come in, and possibly run the scenario past my son, who may simply have no time. He would do anything for me, but I would want him to want to do it before I'd want him committing his time to it.
I sent an order for twenty out a couple of weeks ago to Villa Park Illinois in preparation for a class they were doing called Quakerism 101. I sent the best pamphlets I could make yet they were still unacceptable. I'd become used to reading poor printing yet that was because I knew what it said. The color printing on the cover was long gone. Our home printer just wasn't handling it and I could not rectify the situation even with enough ink, constant head cleaning, etc.
When they complained, I put it on Amazon. This was a quick decision yet something I knew how to do and could do within a day. It is now here, $3.83 in paperback and $0.99 kindle, with its color cover and guaranteed printing, but it's 5 X 8, barely 25 pages. I could get them 20 author's copies for $2.30 each and $11 shipping, but that was disappointing; I'd hoped for much cheaper. Turned out they have to put a lot of work into making 5 x 8 pamphlets.
There were some objections to Amazon; it turns out that it's not a very good fit for the Quaker community, even if they do print things at a reasonable price and quickly. I didn't have to do much checking around to find that several Quakers were not fond of Amazon. Now as it turns out I use Amazon often and have come to just not worry about its unsavory methods as, for starting authors, it's the only show in town. So I didn't really ponder it hard when I had to produce documents; it was just the quickest way to get where I was going. I couldn't print them at home. I can't even find someone in town to do it reliably.
It has brought up the topic of religious harmony, namely does the printer actually feel good about printing what they're printing? As a commercial printer I'd probably accept any job that came my way but things would change when coming up against one's religion and it would also change if the documents advocated revolution, etc. Not sure how I'd handle it. But I don't entirely blame Galesburg printers for basically hemming and hawing and not wanting to do it except for healthy profit. They didn't really want to do it at all.
I was given the name of Barclay Press in Oregon, and wrote away to them, and then to three printers in the Chicago area. These last three weren't until Fri. and I have no idea what they will say (beyond that they received my request). But Barclay wrote back and said they can do it for about 25c each but depends on how many. I thought quickly. Surely at 100 it would be significantly more because they would still have to set it up, etc. At 100 each it would be $25 + shipping, but probably way more, but at 500 it would be $125 + shipping minimum and the higher we went the closer we could probably get to $0.25 each. Very cool!
Following through on this logic it seems I'm being called to set up a distribution system in Oregon, with my son and his young family (wife is also Quaker) who could then just drive out to this press (it's about 30 mi. from Portland) and pick up the 500. I am now thinking maybe I should ask them if they are interested in setting up a Quaker pamphlet distribution system.
I have not heard from any of the Chicago printers. Remember that Galesburg printers pretty much weren't enthusiastic. One got into a convoluted argument about setup and formatting which led me to believe that something spiritually was troubling his soul about doing it. Ideally we would have it aligned: everyone involved believes in it. If we do it right it will be more likely to succeed.
By the way you might ask why I don't simply use Canva or some online printing service. These printing services have proliferated lately and they will send twenty, or a hundred, of anything, to your doorstep. I have not ruled them out. I tried Canva and got hopelessly tangled up in setting up an account (bad omen), and also was unable to verify that one could set up a pamphlet of the size I want (I am not actually fussy on the size) - another bad omen. If you can't, through online scrolling, determine that this will be possible, then it's not. But I'm still open to trying.
The present plan is to wait until the facts come in, and possibly run the scenario past my son, who may simply have no time. He would do anything for me, but I would want him to want to do it before I'd want him committing his time to it.
Saturday, January 04, 2025
Shelter
Gimme Shelter, Jeff Kisling
The blog I linked to is by a friend of mine and I will try to link to it permanently, soon.
The article is interesting and raises some interesting points, only some of which I'll hit here. He is like me in that some of his tangents are more interesting than the focus of the article itself.
The point he made that really hit home was that the small Iowa rural Quaker communities are endangered. The one he grew up in, Earlham, was home to several friends of mine, but it's not the only one: Paulina is another good example, and Clear Creek another. The older people who were the mainstays of these communities have been dying and in many cases not really adequately replaced by the younger generations. This is a recurring theme of our online Quaker meeting Cloud Quakers as we experience this problem first hand.
He also suggests an interesting solution. In a world where people can live where they want (due to being able to work digitally), why not bring back intentional Quaker villages? I have brought up this point before, I believe, but I'm still exploring ways of making it work.
One way would be to set up a school; this worked for Scattergood and West Branch, which was one Quaker community. If you have about a dozen meaningfully employed Quakers you have a community and, having lived at Scattergood, I can speak to how valuable it is to have real live Quakers amongst your neighbors.
Another way would be to have a very well-organized way of telling people who are interested where they could settle that would be a Quaker-leaning village and that would welcome them. Some plains communities have actually paid new settlers and they are especially generous to people with children as they recognize that it's the future that's important.
I believe in Quaker villages and in community. Community is the foundation of Conservative Quakerism (conservative = conserving the silent meeting format) and, in the modern world, we have to struggle with the meaning of community. Either we live near each other and have Quakers we can touch at the end of meeting, or we continue to meet online which we can all know is not quite the same. I'm for trying to keep places like Paulina, Clear Creek and Earlham alive and vibrant. I'm wondering who else is thinking like I am.
The blog I linked to is by a friend of mine and I will try to link to it permanently, soon.
The article is interesting and raises some interesting points, only some of which I'll hit here. He is like me in that some of his tangents are more interesting than the focus of the article itself.
The point he made that really hit home was that the small Iowa rural Quaker communities are endangered. The one he grew up in, Earlham, was home to several friends of mine, but it's not the only one: Paulina is another good example, and Clear Creek another. The older people who were the mainstays of these communities have been dying and in many cases not really adequately replaced by the younger generations. This is a recurring theme of our online Quaker meeting Cloud Quakers as we experience this problem first hand.
He also suggests an interesting solution. In a world where people can live where they want (due to being able to work digitally), why not bring back intentional Quaker villages? I have brought up this point before, I believe, but I'm still exploring ways of making it work.
One way would be to set up a school; this worked for Scattergood and West Branch, which was one Quaker community. If you have about a dozen meaningfully employed Quakers you have a community and, having lived at Scattergood, I can speak to how valuable it is to have real live Quakers amongst your neighbors.
Another way would be to have a very well-organized way of telling people who are interested where they could settle that would be a Quaker-leaning village and that would welcome them. Some plains communities have actually paid new settlers and they are especially generous to people with children as they recognize that it's the future that's important.
I believe in Quaker villages and in community. Community is the foundation of Conservative Quakerism (conservative = conserving the silent meeting format) and, in the modern world, we have to struggle with the meaning of community. Either we live near each other and have Quakers we can touch at the end of meeting, or we continue to meet online which we can all know is not quite the same. I'm for trying to keep places like Paulina, Clear Creek and Earlham alive and vibrant. I'm wondering who else is thinking like I am.
