Orange Frazer Press Celebrates 39 Years

Left to Right: Marcy Hawley, Janice Ellis, John Baskin, Catie South, and Sarah Hawley

"We're not business people. We're writers and editors with a design mind. We just want to make something beautiful and high-end," stated Marcy Hawley, publisher at Orange Frazer Press, located at 37 1/2 W Main Street. Marcy, along with her team of four, operate the publishing company, creating 15 to 20 books a year for clients regionally, nationally, and internationally.

In the early 1980s, Marcy and John Baskin, editor, were editors for Ohio Magazine. The two created a book for Ohio Magazine called, 'Ohio Matters of Fact', from information they had gathered while working there. After publishing, the book was stored in Ohio Magazine's basement before Marcy and John decided to buy the book back and sell it themselves. She shared that they "put it in the trunks of [their] cars" and sold 12,000 copies. With that, Orange Frazer Press was born in 1987 and they created one book each year for the first five years.

Marcy and John described the extensive process of creating books before computers, sharing that it required traveling to Washington Court House for the typesetter, a professional who arranged texts and images in books to prepare for publication. Marcy explained that errors had to be corrected manually by physically cutting and pasting individual letters or words into place.

Marcy and John named the publishing company after a local man named Orange Frazer. According to their research, Orange traveled frequently, loved birds, and carried many books with him. His house was located where the current KFC is in Wilmington, at 127 E Main Street, and his headstone is located in Sugar Grove Cemetery.

After five years of creating books, the company was approached by IAMs to create a symposium book. Marcy took on the challenge and that began their "foray into custom books." They sold their first book on Amazon in 1995.

Thirty-nine years later, the company publishes both traditional and custom books. They emphasized that they "can do anything," small or large for clients across the world. In traditional publishing, an author brings an idea or manuscript to Orange Frazer, and the company handles publishing, marketing, and sales. In custom or “self-publishing,” a business, organization, or individual brings their vision, Orange Frazer produces the book, and the client takes on selling the book and the financial risk.

Over the years, Orange Frazer Press has created books for Cintas, Ferno, Wilmington College, Xavier University, the Murphy Theatre, and even Clinton County.

Learn more at orangefrazer.com.