The Gregg Group was founded 22 May 2004, prompted by the lack of online shorthand resources. As the primary use for shorthand — business and legal recording — has waned in recent decades, we generally acclaim the skill as a hobby or personal tool. The purpose of the group is to promote the use of Gregg systems of shorthand by providing advice to beginners, support for students, and an association of users of this efficient, attractive, and enjoyable method of writing.
Here is a PDF with the 1893 Gregg’s Shorthand Manual. This is the 1895 edition. This has Parts 1 and 2. Previously, I have only seen Part 1. The 1893 Gregg Manual was the first version published in the United States. Apparently, there was little revisions in between Manual versions. This one shows a print year of 1895.
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Thanks Paul. Like you, I had only seen Part 1 before.
It's amazing to see how well developed all the Gregg theory was by 1895. I'd seen the 1904 reprint of the 1902 Manual, I like the 1916 Manual with the 1917 Speed Studies and associated texts, and best like the Anniversary Manual which surprisingly omits some of the previous word beginnings but does seem with the supplemental texts to be "the best" version of Gregg — certainly far better laid out than previous Manuals. I've often wondered if John Robert Gregg himself personally approved the changes to his system with the publication of Simplified or if McGraw Hill basically used the revision as a means to sell more texts. Thanks so much for providing this interesting PDF.
If you read the book about John Gregg, you will discover the he paid very little attention to the 1929 manual because his wife had died not long before work was done on that manual. When it came out, it was full of mistakes. You will not see a manual from 1930 with those errors, but it took a while to fix the 1929 manual. According to that book, Gregg was able to compensate for the mess with the 1929 manual with the Functional Method and other textbooks.
When Simplified came out in 1949, Gregg continued to publish the 1929 anniversary manual. McGraw Hill renewed the copyright on the 1929 manual in 1957. I have a copy of the 1929 manual that lists this renewal date. So I would assume that the 1929 manual was sold until Diamond Jubilee came out.
It was not uncommon to overlap the manuals. Many teachers who liked the extra shortcuts, prefixes, and suffixes in the 1916 manual protested when the 1929 manual came out. Gregg mentioned that he would continue to publish the 1916 manual as long as there was demand for it. It is my understanding that it continued to be published for an extended period of time after 1929.
Of course the first Anniversary Manual I saw was in 1958 or 1959 and I know it was published until Diamond Jubilee appeared as McGraw Hill still listed it and it could be ordered (as well as Gregg Speed Studies Third Edition) through local bookstores through the mid-'60's. In 1960 my high school shorthand instructor, gratified that I liked Anniversary, ordered the Teacher's Key to the Speed Studies for me. I assume the errors in the Anniversary Manual had been corrected in the reprints I saw, none of which pre-dated the mid-'40's.
Thanks, Paul.
Very interesting to see how complete the system was already in such an early edition. Part 1 by itself really does leave you hanging, as it warns in the "Advice to Students."
Thanks Paul. Nice find!
My copy of the 1929 Anniversary does not have a print run date, because McGraw Hill did put press run dates. But it says:
Copyright Renewed 1957. Published by Gregg Publishing Division, McGraw Hill Book Company, Inc. And there is an ISBN number.
The paper is a much higher quality than any Gregg book. And the charts are in the last pages, rather than in the inside of the front and back covers.
When I was with McGraw-Hill in 1980, the Anniversary manual was still available along with the Anniversary dictionary. And those were the S90 days.
By the way, you notice that I have not upload any Anniversary materials, except for the Novels, which were never copyrighted. I did an extensive search of copyright and copyright renewal records by Gregg Publishing Company and McGraw Hill. I found that only a few pre-anniversary items originally published before 1929 were renewed by McGraw Hill. Most of the pre-Anniversary copyrights were not renewed in the 28th year, which put the majority of the pre-Anniversary materials in the public domain. However, McGraw Hill consistently renewed all Anniversary materials, including the textbook, key, and supplementary exercises.
It would be interesting to discover when the Anniversary manual finally went out of print. When you were with McGraw-Hill, did they still sell those Green Cover Anniversary Gregg Novels with plates by Winifred Kenna Richmond? Did they keep around historical pre-Anniversary books?
Is there any way of telling what year my McGraw Hill 1929 Anniversary Manual was printed by the following publishers code and ISBN:
ISBN 07-024501-0
24 25 DODO 7 6 5
By the way, I finally figured out why online sellers state, "From a non-smoking home." This book smells like an ashtray.
It looks like my copy of the 1929 Anniversary Manual From McGraw Hill is from 1970 or later. It seems that 10-digit ISBN codes began to be used in 1970. My book ISBN is 07-024501-0. It is missing the first digit (0). The 07 is the McGraw-Hill Publisher Name code. 024501 references the book title and edition.
As much as I hate to say it–and I truly do–the then editor in chief was quietly tossing old shorthand books. I retrieved some from the trash but didn't frequently get the chance to save many of the old texts. Since I left there in 1980, I can't say what happened after that time.
It seems odd McGraw Hill would consistently renew copyright for all the Anniversary texts, unless they feared an ambitious publisher would snap them up for sale against Simplified, Diamond Jubilee, and Century 90 texts. Most people thoroughly familiar with Simplified versus Anniversary are in agreement that Anniversary is the superior version of Gregg.
Why can I read simplified shorthand when I never looked at a simplified textbook? I only studied anniversay, pre-anniversary, and Diamond Jubilee textbooks. What changed in simplified vs anniversary?
Did they change much theory from Anniversary to Simplified? Or did they mostly reduce the number of shortcuts, prefixes, suffixes, and brief forms? It seems that when they went from 1916 Pre-Anniversary to Anniversary, most of the changes were to reduce shortcuts, prefixes, suffixes, and brief forms. There were changes on how certain words were written and there were some additions, but I seem to recall that the focus was on removing items that would increase the memory load.
I think you answered your own question. SInce you know DJS and Anniversary, Simplified is somewhere in between those two, so you don't need to learn it per se to be able to read it because you will use the knowledge from the other two. Now, to write it is another story.