Recently in Among the Archives Category

1991 marked our first foray into full-color printing. Techniques had yet to attain today's precision, and the resulting promotional literature bore serendipitous irregularities. As in life, the sunset on each of these 5"x7" postcards varies widely— from an almost entirely chartreuse haze, to a nearly-complete spectrum that steps from red in the upper altitudes, to a flash of green, to deep blue sea. Our trusty logo was perhaps never more at home than it is against this unpredictable backdrop, where ingredients and intent are only suggestions toward a result.

John Malcolm Brinnin delivered the keynote address that year, "Travel and The Sense of Wonder," in which he said:

Some of the soupiest travel writing on record has been done by moonstruck impressionists aspiring to literature; some of the best by close observers aiming to convey no more than pertinent information, a credible economic or sociological overview, a guidebook devoid of Chamber of Commerce soufflé.

Touché, John Malcom. We've got a few of these cards lying around, reader. If you'd like to start a collection, email me with your mailing address, and I'll post one your way before sundown.

1990. If ever a year spoke greater optimism, I, only recently turned twelve, was unaware. The eighties were down, and the twentieth century was nearly out. Our promotional literature from that year displays a timely enthusiasm. A sloop sails counter to the prevailing winds betrayed by the bent coconut palm. The postcard, below, has fireworks. And that custom-cut font, running in every direction it can to get away from itself! In the program, David Kaufelt recounts how it all began:

Literary agent Dick Duane and I were schmoozing over Diet Cokes and white meat chicken sandwiches in a Manhattan hotel bar with Rosemary Jones of the Council for Florida Libraries. She was in New York to round up authors for the council's annual lecture series. But New York publishers' publicists were having none of it, fully convinced no one in Florida read, much less bought books.

I said we have so many writers of so many persuasions in Key West, we could have our own literary festival. There was a suden enlightened silence. We could. We should. And we would.

For our fourth annual event, in 1986, we honored playwright and Key West habitué, Tennessee Williams. The graphic design of the program and poster, as in 1985, is simple and direct. The Martha Swopes photograph shows a dapper, not-quite-at-ease Williams, seated in a wicker rocking chair on the telltale terrazo floors of a Key West home. The font is a straight-ahead serif, printed on glossy stock. We were the Key West Literary Seminar and Festival, it seems, and we were administrated by the Friends of the Monroe County Public Library. Then-President of the Friends, Petronella Collins, pens a delightful early statement of our intents: "The correct mix of intellectuality and frivolity has, over the centuries, proved extraordinarily successful. As our Literary Seminar evolved, the keen judgement and clairvoyance of the Council for Florida Libraries was combined with the magic of Key West to produce a mix of very fine quality."

Yes, intellectuality and frivolity. A fine mix indeed, one whose perfect proportions ever eluded Tennessee:

Frankie and I (let's face it!) have fallen into a virtual social oblivion here. A great old Queen Bee named Erna Shtoll or Shmole or something like that has arrived on the scene and become the center of gay society. Bedecked with yellow diamonds like 1000 watt light bulbs on the marquee of a skating rink, she holds continual court on the beach and at the bars, the boys flock to her like gnats. ...

A regular focus of this blog will be the treasures I breathlessly retrieve from the depths of the KWLS archives. This first installment is a poster from our 3rd annual, way back in 1985. It hearkens to a simpler, perhaps more elegant, time: two colors, ink and paper, professional type-setting, an ordinary handsome mug. All you need to know, and little more.