History

The original collection was put together by Robert Shaftoe (1921-1972). Shaftoe was an art director at the Ford Motor Company, and a hobby printer. He named his press “Silver Buckle” after the nursery rhyme, Bobby Shaftoe. It begins "Bobby Shaftoe’s gone to sea, silver buckles on his knee."

In 1973 the Silver Buckle Press was purchased from Robert Shaftoe's estate by the University of Wisconsin libraries, upon the urging of Professor Walter Hamady (now retired) of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Art Department.

When the Silver Buckle Press came to UW-Madison, it was set up by the libraries as a working museum. The museum part of that description refers to the preservation of the Press's distinguished holdings of type and printing equipment; the working designation describes its role in preserving the practice of printing through use of the equipment for publications and demonstrations.