(pleasant music) - [Announcer] Major funding for "Idaho Experience" provided by the J.A.

and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation, making Idaho a place to learn, thrive and prosper.

With additional support from Anne Voillequé and Louise Nelson, and Judy and Steve Meyer, the Friends of Idaho Public Television, the Idaho Public Television Endowment, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

(light orchestra music) - [J.H.

Gipson] I do not regard books as articles of mere merchandise to make money on.

They are something rare and apart.

They are the basis of all culture, education and progress.

Without the printed word, any civilization would collapse very soon, J.H.

Gipson.

- [Narrator] He was a junior high school dropout in a small Idaho town, with little experience.

But J.H.

Gipson would go on to build a publishing house respected around his state and the country, Caxton Printers.

It was a business forged in lead and bound in leather, one that honored a passion for the printed word.

- [J.H.

Gipson] I've always been a great lover of books.

They're the one true friend that you have through life, no matter what kind of an incredible fool you make out of yourself.

They're always there to encourage and console you.

(Glass crashing) - [Narrator] The firm would fall on hard times.

But nearly 120 years after its founding, it's still humming along.

And today, a fifth generation of the same family is at the helm, taking a page from their first chapter.

This is a story about stories, more than a thousand of them.

Some would chart new ground.

Others would be lost to time.

And still others are out in the world informing, entertaining and enlightening.

Sometimes, though, the story we know least is our own.

- [Scott Gipson] Can I touch these?

- [Alessandro Meregaglia] You absolutely may.

- [Gipson] That's remarkable.

It's remarkable the history that this represents.

You know my history more than I know my history.

- [Meregaglia] The history of Caxton Printers is an Idaho story.

And it's a great story for the state.

(light orchestra music) - Come on, Mooch, come on!

Come on, come on!

- [Narrator] Rick Ardinger only has to walk a few hundred feet from his house to step back in time.

In his studio, he prints books on a century-old letterpress.

It's a rare art.

- [Ardinger] Everything's by hand, each sheet fed into the press by hand, each collated by hand, each one sewn by hand.

There's nobody else, really, who prints books like this in Idaho.

(machine buzzing) - [Narrator] There was a time, though, when letter presses all over the country were busy day and night, turning out all types of materials, including thousands of newspapers.

One such paper was the "Gem State Rural," started in 1895 to cover agricultural issues in Idaho.

It was the brainchild of Albert Gipson, who had moved from Colorado to Caldwell, Idaho with his wife and eight children.

In 1904, Albert made a new hire.

- [Voice] The new business manager, who is the third son of the editor, will bring to the enterprise not only a considerable knowledge of newspaper work, but a very good business training for one of his age.

- [Narrator] That third son was James Herrick Gipson.

J.H., as he was known, was barely 20, and had dropped out of school after eighth grade.

- [Meregaglia] Very young, no formal education, no formal training in business, no formal training in printing, no formal training in marketing.

Learned it all on the job.

- [Narrator] But he had a love of books and a natural talent for numbers that would allow him to take the business to the next level and beyond.

It would be his life for the next 60 years.

(machines clicking) By 1906, the company owned several presses, and was advertising its printing services in the Gem State Rural.

And the business had a brand new name, Caxton Printers.

- [Meregaglia] The name comes from William Caxton, who was a 15th century printer in England, widely believed to be the first printer in England.

- [Narrator] Caxton began printing a few books on contract.

But the real money came from providing supplies to the growing counties and schools across the state.

Then in 1925, Caxton was awarded the contract to distribute textbooks to all the schools in the state.

With its main departments in the black, the firm decided to move into the publishing arena, despite the financial risk.

- [Meregaglia] This was no well thought-out plan.

There was no business model that they decided to try to pursue.

Instead, it was simply a shift into book publishing.

- [Narrator] But for Gipson, the enterprise was about more than money.

- [J.H] Books with us are not articles of merchandise like slabs of bacon or sacks of sugar to be sold over the counter.

They're something to endure for the ages.

- [Meregaglia] So, he was never printing books with the idea of turning a profit.

Instead, he wanted to give an outlet, a voice to writers who couldn't get published elsewhere.

- [Narrator] Alessandro Meregaglia is an archivist at Boise State University.

He's fascinated by Caxton and is writing a book about the company.

Meregaglia has spent a lot of time at the University of Idaho, which holds the most complete collection of books published by Caxton, more than a thousand titles.

- [Meregaglia] There's great variety here, both in size of books, in color, and then also in content, in subject matter.

Here we have a copy of "Yellow Wolf: His Own Story," by Lucullus Virgil McWhorter.

And this is an important book, because it's the first time that the story of the Nez Perce War is told from the perspective of the Native Americans.

Here we have what Caxton called a deluxe edition of "In Tragic Life."

The first collaboration between Vardis Fisher and Gipson.

And this is the title that Fisher was unable to get published by Eastern publishers.

- [Narrator] Well-known Idahoan writer Vardis Fisher had had two books published by a large Boston firm.

But he couldn't sell this one.

- They felt that it dealt too frankly with the subject of sex.

- [Narrator] So Fisher asked fellow Idahoan J.H.

Gipson if he would take it on.

Gipson's friends said the book would get him run out of town.

- [Meregaglia] And Gipson said he didn't care.

He really didn't care about what people thought about any controversial topics.

He thought if the book was worthy of being published, he wanted to publish it.

And this developed a two-decade relationship where Caxton became the exclusive publisher for Fisher's books, and were more than just business partners; they were friends, too.

- [Narrator] Five years after Caxton published "In Tragic Life," the business experienced its own tragic event: it went up in flames.

- [Meregaglia] And this fire destroyed almost the entire plant.

It caused millions of dollars-worth of damage.

Their machinery was all destroyed.

But J.H.

Gipson, right after the fire got put out, said that they would rebuild.

And rebuild they did.

They were back up and running within two months able to print and produce books after the fire devastated the company.

- [Scott Gipson] This is the original corporate record from 1907 with the establishment of Caxton Printers.

There are the signatories right there, J.H.

Gipson on top.

- [Narrator] Scott Gipson is the great-grandson of J.H., and part of the fifth generation of the family to run the company.

- [Gipson] You can see that these pages on this record book are charred.

They rescued this from the fire in 1937.

- [Narrator] Gipson is surrounded by history.

His office used to be his great-grandfather's.

Every day, he walks across a floor still charred by the fire.

And the company boardroom is full of books owned by J.H.

Despite being steeped in the family business, or perhaps because of it, Gipson had no desire to follow his father, grandfather and great-grandfather into it.

- [Gipson] No, that was the last thing I was gonna do.

- [Narrator] Instead, he went to law school.

But it wasn't fulfilling.

- [Gipson] And so I started thinking about, well, what is it you really want to do?

And I have always collected books, and I've always been a voracious reader.

And so I put my tail between my legs and came back to my father and said, "Will you talk to your dad?

"I think I'd like to come back."

And that was probably either the worst day or the best day of my father's life.

I'm not sure which one, but.

This one.

(calculator clicking) - [Narrator] Today, Scott oversees Caxton's finances, while his brother Ron is in charge of production.

His father, who still comes in several days a week, couldn't be happier.

- [Dave Gipson] I'm one of the luckiest people, I tell the employees.

I got to work with my dad and my uncle for 20 to 30 years.

And now I've got to work with my sons for 20 plus years.

It's just unbelievable that I was lucky enough to get to do that.

- [Narrator] Scott's love of books meant that he also fell naturally into his great-grandfather's role as publisher.

And while the technology has changed, the guiding principles put in place by J.H.

are still the same.

- [S. Gipson] The trust document that my great-grandfather put in place requires that we continue to publish books.

That's how important he thought it was.

I take that very seriously.

- [Narrator] Gipson no longer accepts the plethora of manuscripts his great-grandfather did.

But he moves quickly when he believes a book will be a good fit.

- [Rod Gramer] I was starting to sell him on the book, and he stopped me and said time out.

And he said, "You had me at hello."

- [Narrator] When author Rod Gramer approached Scott to publish a book of essays about former Idaho governor Phil Batt, Gipson didn't blink.

- [Gipson] I think it's an important piece of Idaho history, and we should have our name on every important piece of Idaho history that's published.

- [Narrator] For Gramer, choosing Caxton as his publisher was also easy.

- [Gramer] Caxton is the quintessential iconic Idaho publishing house, and they've published so many wonderful books about Idaho.

(machine beeping) - [Narrator] Today, Caxton is printing the cover of the book, called "Lucky."

Gone is the laborious process of hand picking and setting lead type.

Gone, too, are the massive linotype machines.

Now, everything is laid out on a computer, and then transferred to lightweight plates.

But the process still requires finesse.

And once the printing begins, it's done in a flash.

(machine humming) - [Jerrad Bright] That's it, that was 3,000 covers for the Phil Batt book.

It took maybe 10 minutes, something like that.

- [Narrator] But just as a century ago, there's still a lot of manual labor.

Cutting pages, folding them, and gathering the sections to be bound.

Many of the employees have been with Caxton for decades.

- [Gipson] We have had some and still have some unbelievably loyal and good employees.

I cannot stress that enough, that that's what has made this company.

- [Gramer] Wow, perfect.

Boy, what a beautiful book.

Look at that cover.

- [Narrator] This is Gramer's third book.

But he never gets over the excitement of seeing the first copies.

- It's the best feeling, other than my kids being born, of having those books in my hand for the first time.

You know, it's just something I'll never forget.

(light pleasant music) - [Narrator] Caxton is no stranger to printing books with political themes like "Lucky."

In fact, J.H.

Gipson made them a priority, especially those about his political philosophy of choice, libertarianism.

- [Meregaglia] The theme of freedom ran through his entire life and the books he published, especially, the library of libertarian thought that he started in the 1930s.

Perhaps the best-selling book that Caxton has published is "Anthem" by libertarian Ayn Rand.

- [Narrator] A veteran of World War I, Gipson was attracted to the anti-war platform of libertarianism.

He was against interventionism of any kind, including entering World War II, which he saw as emboldening the Soviet Union.

By 1953, Gipson had become a staunch anti-Communist.

- [Narrator] J.H.

started making the rounds of civic clubs and radio shows to express his views.

- [J.H.]

We understand that there can be no freedom and no security for any country until communism has been destroyed in Russia and in every other country.

- [Narrator] Even before his move to libertarianism, Gipson was mesmerized by politics and politicians.

- [Meregaglia] Almost any Republican politician in Idaho you can name, and Gipson would have corresponded with them.

Gipson also corresponded with Teddy Roosevelt, who he came to know during the 1912 presidential election when Gipson ran Roosevelt's presidential campaign in Idaho.

- [Narrator] It's a legacy that's framed on the wall of his great-grandson's office.

But it's not one that he had ever really explored.

- [Gipson] Alex, how's it going?

- [Meregaglia] Good, Scott, how are you?

- [Gipson] Good, glad to be here.

- Good to see you.

- Thank you for inviting me.

- [Narrator] Today, though, Gipson will learn more.

He's at Washington State University, where Alessandro Meregaglia has been doing research for his book on Caxton.

In the 1980s, Gipson's great-uncle donated thousands of records to the university.

The files include correspondence between J.H.

and prominent Americans, including President Theodore Roosevelt.

Gipson has never seen the letters.

- [Meregaglia] Yeah, so we have a great selection of the 300 boxes of the company records that are here.

- [Gipson] That's why this is so exciting to me, is there's nobody alive in our family that one, knew why they were here, or two, has seen these letters.

This is awesome.

- [Meregaglia] Yeah, so an original Theodore Roosevelt signature.

- [Gipson] From May 7th, 1913.

- [Meregaglia] Right.

- [Gipson] Can I touch these?

- [Meregaglia] You absolutely may.

- [Gipson] Here's a long one.

Two pages from Roosevelt to J.H.

"As you doubtless know, I'm very proud of the Rough Riders, the first volunteer cavalry with whom I served in the Spanish-American War."

- [Meregaglia] It shows a personal relationship.

- [Gipson] Yes.

- And an appreciation that Roosevelt had for, for J.H.

- [Gipson] That's remarkable.

And I love like, some of this.

This message is written to Teddy Roosevelt.

And the back of it are Superintendent of Waterworks work orders for the city of Caldwell that we obviously had printed for him.

So he just used the paper to type a letter to Teddy Roosevelt.

That sounds like my family.

- I'd always wanted to see them.

And I had told myself numerous times over the years, that you know, I'm going to go up there and just ask if I can sit down and start going through the letters.

- [Gipson] It's remarkable the history that this represents.

You know my history more than I know my history.

I think it's very interesting that an academic has taken this interest in this history of J.H.

I'm really glad, because the type of research it would take for me to find this stuff out, I probably would never have the time to do.

- [Gipson] So you've done all the hard work, thank you.

- [Meregaglia] You're welcome, it's been a lot of fun.

- [Gipson] It was a great experience.

And I can't wait to see what he comes up with.

I giving this letter of introduction to our old friend.

- [Narrator] Today, just behind the Caxton warehouses, is a small garden dedicated to the Japanese-Americans who've lived in the area for well over a century.

Teresa Tamura's parents and grandparents are among them.

- [Teresa] My dad's dad actually came here in the early 1900's, and my mom's family came in kind of 1923.

So they were here pretty early on.

And it's just nice to remember them.

(aircraft buzzing) (bombs booming) - [Narrator] After Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, however, people of Japanese ancestry in the United States were considered potential enemies.

More than 120,000 were incarcerated in camps all over the country.

Because the Tamuras were inland, in Idaho, they were spared.

But they never spoke about the camps, including the one just 150 miles away, Minidoka.

At its height, nearly 9,000 people were imprisoned there.

- [Teresa Tamura] I didn't know about the camps.

I maybe heard reference to camp, but again, you don't really think about it or don't question what it was or what happened.

(camera clicking) - [Narrator] During her career as a photojournalist, though, Tamura kept hearing about Minidoka.

So she finally decided to visit what was left of it.

- [Tamura] I thought, gosh, Minidoka is right here.

And I'm so close and I've never been there.

- [Narrator] After she did, she became determined to find as many of the survivors of the camp as she could, to document their lives in Minidoka and afterwards.

- [Tamura] To me, it's not that they were victims, but they stood up and they became stronger afterwards.

And that's what I wanted to focus on, was that strength.

- [Narrator] Her moving black-and-white portraits were published by Caxton in a book called "Minidoka: an American Concentration Camp."

- [Tamura] Caxton Press was the logical and best place, because they were in Idaho.

They published books that were important to Idaho history.

It was the perfect place.

- [Gipson] It's just, it's a really important history, I think, for the State of Idaho.

- [Narrator] Scott has just finished the second printing of Teresa's book.

- [Gipson] You can see, this is one of the new editions.

And it's got the new material that you provided inside the book, but the dust jacket is printed on a different stock.

- [Tamura] Scott was a wonderful person to work with because I just had a strong idea of how I wanted the book to look, and he respected and honored that.

- [Kurt Ikeda] And then right in front of that is your book.

- [Tamura] Aw, that's a good spot.

- [Narrator] Tamura's book and photos are now being used to educate visitors at the Minidoka National Historic Site.

- [Ikeda] Having your book here really highlights that it is not just ancient history, it's continuous work.

And that's why we appreciate it so much here.

- [Narrator] For Tamura, it's a moving experience to see her photos keeping the stories of her subjects alive.

She also hopes the images provide a cautionary tale for those who see them.

- [Tamura] I hope that they recognize that they're individual people that were here, and they were, could have been their neighbors, their kids' classmates, or someone that they knew.

And that this history is part of American history.

And it's important to, I think, recognize that it happened and that it was wrong.

- [Gipson] I've heard from many people that it was an important book to them.

That's as important as the sales numbers.

And the book itself is beautiful, and I'm very proud of that book.

(birds chirping) - [Narrator] Just as in J.H.

Gipson's time, the company can only afford to print books because its other departments do so well.

For instance, Caxton still holds the contract to distribute textbooks to all the public schools in Idaho.

And the production floor is in constant motion, with all types of material being printed, cut, shrink wrapped, and shipped.

- [Ron Gipson] We print everything.

We print point-of-sale sheets, we print brochures.

We do the little booklets that you find on the back of pesticide bottles.

We're a full service commercial printer.

(light orchestra music) - [Narrator] Another legacy project is printing ballots, which Caxton has been doing for decades.

It's all hands on deck when that happens.

- [D. Gipson] Nobody goes on vacation, and we work whatever.

We've gotta work six days a week we work six days.

If we've got to work seven, we work seven.

- [Narrator] Scott's father Dave ran the operation for decades.

But a few years ago, he realized something.

- [Gipson] That was the only thing that no one else knew how to do.

Bad move.

- [Narrator] So now he's training his granddaughter Megan to run that side of the business.

- [Megan Gipson] Okay, Dana L. Jacobsen.

Capital D-A-N-A, capital L, period.

- [Narrator] For the counties that still use paper ballots, they meticulously proof the candidates' names.

- [Megan Gipson] He taught me from the very beginning.

I've been here 13 years, so that roughly equals out to 60-some elections.

I still call him every, at least every day.

I think working with family is truly time we'll never get back.

- [Narrator] Megan's part of the sixth generation of Gipsons to work at Caxton, which includes her sister, Hannah.

One day, they may run the company.

- [Hannah] It's a lot right now for me to kind of process.

But it feels great, it feels really cool.

- [R. Gipson] I'm really enjoying watching my kids, kind of grow into it.

Although sometimes I have a little problem letting go, which I'm sure they have told you, or if you ask them, they will tell you.

- We're always talking about oh, when we're in charge, we're going to do this differently, and stuff like that.

And Megan has to say, "Yeah, in like 40 years when they finally retire or if they finally die in their desks."

- [Megan] So Hud, I put this together when I was in college.

- [Hudson] Oh, my God.

- [Megan] Yeah, so this is all the people that started Caxton's, see all their last names.

Gipson, Gipson, Gipson.

- [Narrator] Megan's already trying to convince the seventh generation of Gipsons to join her.

- [Megan] I tell him all the time, come down to Caxton's, come work with your mom.

It's a great business.

- [Hudson Peña] I think it would be good to keep on the family tradition, and I think it would be fun to work with my mom and my aunt.

- [Hudson] Turn.

- [Megan] Which way?

- [Hudson] This way.

- [Megan] Oh, left, left.

- [Narrator] But for now, he's just a kid, enjoying a cart ride around the plant, or playing in the scrap paper, just as his mother did when she was his age.

- [Megan] I've always known that I was going to come here, always.

What I love about it is the smell of the ink.

The sound of the presses running.

Seeing the product from start to finish.

And honestly, seeing our books on Amazon, or you know, seeing our product out at bookstores.

I mean, it's a proud moment when you see what you've done out in the community as well.

I'll never leave this place, everyone knows that!

- [Gov.

Phil Batt] How are you?

- [Voice] Okay, how are you?

- [Batt] Good, thank you.

- [Narrator] Lucky is finally having its debut.

J.H.

Gipson would surely have been delighted to see this line of people waiting to buy a book printed by his company.

He'd also likely be pleased the book is about Governor Batt, who started his political career as a state representative for the area around Caxton.

J.H.

certainly would have followed his career.

But in February, 1965, during Phil Batt's first term as a representative, Gipson died.

He was 79.

To the end, he was a company man.

- [Meregaglia] Gipson never retired.

He was managing director up until the day that he died.

It's such a unique story in many ways.

The location, the quality of the books that they produced, and also their longevity, speaks to the importance of Caxton's history as a story for Idaho.

- [J.H.]

We hope and believe and feel that probably among the titles that we have published will be some that will be sources of genuine pleasure and inspiration to generations yet unborn.

We hope so.

- [S. Gipson] I take seriously my great-grandfather's belief that it's important that there are books published independently in the western United States.

All I can do is hope to maintain as best I can the tradition that we have.

- [Narrator] Ultimately, though, J.H.

Gipson didn't want to be remembered only for publishing books.

- [Meregaglia] Above all, Jim Gipson wanted to be known as an American.

And in fact, he talked about it multiple times that he wanted on his headstone, "Jim Gipson, American."

And that's exactly what his headstone says.

(light music) (light music) (light pleasant music) - [Announcer] Major funding for Idaho Experience provided by the J.A.

and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation, making Idaho a place to learn, thrive and prosper.

With additional support from Anne Voillequé and Louise Nelson, and Judy and Steve Meyer, the Friends of Idaho Public Television, the Idaho Public Television Endowment, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.