The Johns Hopkins University Press

Daniel Coit Gilman, the first president of the Johns Hopkins University, inaugurated the Press in 1878. For Gilman, publishing, along with teaching and research, was a primary obligation of a great university. Since its beginning, the Johns Hopkins University Press has carried the name and mission of the University to every corner of the world. The Press has published more than 6,000 titles and a wide variety of scholarly journals.

The Press began as the University's Publication Agency, publishing the American Journal of Mathematics in its first year and the American Chemical Journal in its second. The Agency published its first book, Sidney Lanier: A Memorial Tribute, in 1881 to honor the poet who was one of the University's first writers in residence. In 1891, the Publication Agency became the Johns Hopkins Press; since 1972, it has been known as the Johns Hopkins University Press.

Since its founding, the Press has had seven directors: Nicholas Murray, 1878-1908; Christian W. Dittus, 1908-1948; Harold E. Ingle, 1948-1974; Jack G. Goellner, 1974-1996; Willis G. Regier, 1996-1998; James D. Jordan, 1998-2003; and Kathleen Keane, 2004-present.

Today JHU Press is one of the world's largest university presses, publishing 58 scholarly periodicals and more than 200 new books each year. Through Project MUSE®, a collaboration with JHU's Milton S. Eisenhower Library at Johns Hopkins, the Press is a leading online provider of scholarly journals, bringing more than 250 periodicals to the desktops of 9 million students, scholars, and others worldwide. In addition, the Press provides order processing, computer service, warehousing, and shipping for other publishing houses. The professional and support staff of the Press total about 130.

After various moves on and off the University's Homewood Campus, the Press acquired a permanent home in Baltimore's Charles Village neighborhood in 1993, when it relocated to a renovated former church. Built in 1897, the granite and brick structure was the original church of the Saints Philip and James Roman Catholic parish and now houses the offices of the Press on five floors.

The Press has three operating divisions:

• Book Publishing: Acquisitions, Manuscript Editing, Design & Production, Marketing
• Journals and Electronic Publishing, which includes Project MUSE®
• Hopkins Fulfillment Services: Order Processing, Information Systems, and the Distribution Center

The Johns Hopkins University Press continues to uphold the ideal set forth by President Gilman in 1878: "It is one of the noblest duties of a university to advance knowledge, and to diffuse it not merely among those who can attend the daily lectures--but far and wide."