Hellbox Press

The Hellbox Press was the first solo private press of printer and designer John Stroble Fass. At about the time he retired from being co-owner of the Harbor Press in New York City, Fass started the press in 1938 using a miniature wooden common press that he made by hand. He printed small items, bookplates for friends, Christmas cards and even a tiny specimen book. In 1950 Fass purchased a tabletop Albion that had been owned by his mentor Bruce Rogers and friend Valenti Angelo, and retired the name in exchange for the Hammer Creek Press, a tribute to his boyhood upbringing in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.