Lawrence Oakley Cheever (1907 -- 1974) was born in Cliffordsville, Minnesota. He graduated from Wisconsin’s Ripon College in 1929 and earned a degree in library science from Columbia University in 1931. For thirty three years Cheever worked for John Morrell and Company, first in Ottumwa, Iowa and later in Chicago. From 1935 to 1965, he edited the company magazine. He was one of the founders of both the American Association of Industrial Editors and of the Iowa Industrial Editor’s Association. In 1965, Cheever accepted a position with the State Historical Society of Iowa in Iowa City and took charge of the Society’s newspaper collection. He was also a frequent contributor to and associate editor of The Palimpsest.

L. Oakley Cheever’s special interests were in fine printing and book illustration and more specifically in books iillustrated by the artists Rockwell Kent and Edward A. Wilson. His collection of Prairie Press books was one of the most complete in existence. He collected books plates, books about books, and the works of essayists such as Christopher Morley and Vincent Starrett. Over the years, L.O. Cheever published a number of his own writings, usually relating to his collecting interests. These were generally published in journals or in his privately printed Christmas booklets (many of which were printed by Carroll Coleman’s Prairie Press).