University of Toronto Press (UTP) is Canada's leading scholarly publisher and one of the largest university presses in North America. Founded in 1901, UTP has published over 6,500 books, with well over 3,500 of these still in print.
In 2008, UTP made more than 1,200 of its titles available to the academic library community; that number has since grown to more than 2,500. In 2011, UTP began selling eBooks to the general reader through its own website and other leading e-retailers.
1901: UTP is founded as a printing operation by the University of Toronto.
1912: UTP's first book, A Short Handbook of Latin Accidence and Syntax, is published.
1919: Publishing program is approved by the University of Toronto.
1920: Canadian Historical Review was founded.
1931: University of Toronto Quarterly is founded.
1932: University of Toronto Bookstore begins operation as part of UTP.
1932: Diamond Jenness's The Indians of Canada is published.
1935: University of Toronto Law Journal is founded.
1947: Robert MacGregor Dawson's Government of Canada wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1949: Robert MacGregor Dawson's Democratic Government of Canada wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1950: W.L. Morton's The Progressive Party in Canada wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1951: Harold Innis's The Bias of Communication is published.
1951: Frank McKinnon's The Government of Prince Edward Island wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1955: Established in 1925, the Toronto Legal Directory is first published by UTP.
1958: Press building opens at 21 King's College Circle, Scholarly Publishing's home until 1989.
1959: First book of photographs by Yousuf Karsh, Portraits of Greatness, is published.
1960: Collected Works of John Stuart Mill project commences.
1960: Margaret Avison's Winter Sun wins the Governor General's literary prize for poetry.
1962: Marshall McLuhan's The Gutenburg Galaxy is published. This work popularizes the term "the global village." It wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1966: John Porter's The Vertical Mosaic is published.
1966: First volume of the Dictionary of Canadian Biography is published. The series is described by critic Robert Fulford as "the most ambitious project in the history of Canadian scholarship."
1967: Canadian Books in Print, the complete reference and buying guide to Canadian books, is established as a centennial project.
1967: Carl Dair's Design with Type becomes the first Canadian book to be a recipient of one of the Book of the Year awards presented annually by the American Institute of Graphic Arts.
1968: Collected Works of Erasmus project commences (this project is still underway).
1968: Warehouse in Buffalo, New York, is opened to serve U.S. customers.
1969: Journal of Scholarly Publishing, the first journal to be devoted to the work of academic publishers, is established.
1970: Economic Atlas of Ontario is chosen as the gold medal winner of the Most Beautiful Book in the World competition at the Leipzig International Book Fair.
1972: Memoirs of Lester B. Pearson, Canada's 14th prime minister and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, are published.
1975: UTP begins offering book distribution services to other publishers.
1977: Frank Scott's Essays on the Constitution wins the Governor General's literary prize for non-fiction.
1978: UTP signs an agreement with the Medieval Academy of America for the publication of the Medieval Academy of America Reprints for Teaching (MART) series.
1978: C.B. Macpherson's Property: Mainstream and Critical Positions is published.
1980: Cartographica: The International Journal for Geographic Information and Geovisualization is acquired.
1981: First edition of the Encyclopedia of Music in Canada is published.
1982: UTP is named as Canadian Publisher of the Year by the Canadian Booksellers' Association.
1984: First volume of the Encyclopedia of Ukraine is published.
1985: Ramsay Cook's The Regenerators: Social Criticism in Late Victorian English Canada wins the Governor General's literary award for non-fiction.
1986: Canadian Theatre Review is acquired.
1987: Volume One of the Historical Atlas of Canada, the most complex and sophisticated cartographic project in Canadian history, is published.
1988: UTP is named as Canadian Publisher of the Year by the Canadian Booksellers' Association.
1988: The first volume of the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan is published.
1990: The Spenser Encyclopedia is published.
1991: The final volume of the Collected Works of John Stuart Mill is published, marking the completion of the series.
1993: The third and final volume of the Historical Atlas of Canada is published, marking the completion of a collaborative research effort of over two decades involving authors and experts across Canada, the United States, and Europe.
1995: UTP Distribution begins providing service to U.S., U.K., and Australian based publishers.
1996: First two volumes of the Collected Works of Northrop Frye are published.
1997: CD-ROM versions of Canadian Who's Who and Ontario Legal Directory are made available.
1998: UofT Bookstore wins the Canadian Bookseller Association's "Campus Bookseller of the Year" award, marking the first of five wins in ten years (1998, 1999, 2002, 2003, 2006).
2001: UTP celebrates its 100th anniversary and issues its list of "One Hundred Most Influential Books Published by UTP."
2001: Umberto Eco's Experiences in Translation and Julia Kristeva's Hannah Arendt: Life Is a Narrative are published.
2004: The first volume of the History of the Book in Canada is published.
2005: Frank Parker Day's Rockbound wins CBC's "Canada Reads."
2007: UTP sells its offset printing division to focus on core operations.
2007: UTP Journals launches online hosting platform and transitions six fully featured journals to online access.
2008: UTP and the Rotman School of Management found a new publishing imprint for actionable business books, Rotman-UTP Publishing.
2008: David E. Smith's The People's House of Commons: Theories of Democracy in Contention wins the Donner Prize.
2008: UTP acquires Broadview Press's history and social science lists, establishing a new course book division, UTP Higher Education.
2010: UTP's Retail Division launches the Espresso Book Machine, making more than 4,000,000 titles available for on-demand printing.
2011: U of T Bookstore wins the Nebraska Book Company's inaugural Award for Textbook Innovation due to their leadership in Textbooks Rentals in North America.
2011: U of T Bookstore wins the Canadian Bookseller Association's "Campus Bookseller of the Year" award.
2012: UTP launches P-Shift, an integrated XML First workflow and digital asset management system designed for publishers who need e-publishing support.
2012: The Canadian Museum of Nature and UTP co-publish the award winning The Natural History of Canadian Mammals by Donna Naughton
2013: U of T Bookstore wins the Canadian Bookseller Association's "Campus Bookseller of the Year" award.
The Scholarly Publishing division produces approximately 175 titles per year, and the Higher Education division publishes around 25 titles per year. The Press has published dozens of notable authors, including Northrop Frye, Robertson Davies, Harold Innis, Marshall McLuhan, Mark Kingwell, Lester Pearson, George Elliott Clarke, Julia Kristeva, Yousuf Karsh, Bernard Lonergan, and Umberto Eco, and has produced some of the most important books ever published in Canada, such as The Gutenberg Galaxy, The Bias of Communication, The Vertical Mosaic, the Historical Atlas of Canada, the Dictionary of Canadian Biography and History of the Book in Canada.
In 2008, UTP and the Rotman School of Management launched a new imprint called Rotman-UTP Publishing that focuses on actionable business books for professionals and students. In addition, UTP has significantly expanded its course and textbook offerings through the acquisition of selected lists from Broadview Press, resulting in the UTP Higher Education Division.
UTP Higher Education actively markets UTP books, in person and online, to academics across Canada and the United States. All editorial, sales, marketing, and production duties are carried out through the UTP Higher Education office in Guelph, Ontario. The division has over 300 books in print.
With more than 115 years of publishing experience serving the needs of journal editors and managers, the Journals Division has been an important part of the press since its inception. As a not-for-profit Canadian publisher, it provides cost-effective services in copyediting, typesetting, journal management, and support for partner journal editors, editorial boards, and associations. The Journals Division has made strides towards innovation in publishing and the sustainability of scholarly journals in areas such as online peer review systems and online advance publishing. More than 30 journals published or managed by UTP are currently available online.
In 2012, UTP launched P-Shift, a suite of services developed for scholarly publishing, including editorial, typesetting, file conversion, digital asset management, and eBook distribution. P-Shift includes an XML-based editorial workflow and production system, the capacity to create digital editions in a variety of formats, digital distribution, and digital asset management.
UTP Distribution represents more than 70 book imprints for distribution in Canada, the United States, and around the world. UTP Distribution's clients include publishers specializing in scholarly, general and literary trade, children's, and educational titles.
UTP Guidance Centre distributes hundreds of resources published by various publishers, providing materials for guidance counsellors, teachers, co-op educators, career practitioners, HR professionals, and ESL and literacy professionals.
The Retail division serves the three University of Toronto campuses, and operates respectively under the U of T Bookstore, Campus Express, Computer Shop, and Varsity Sports Store brands. These stores supply textbooks, medical books and supplies, course materials, University of Toronto logo merchandise, clothing, stationery, general interest trade books, food, and beverages. The Computer Shops offer computers and software, and the St. George Campus store has an Apple service department and cell phone shop.
