In Memoriam

 “A real gem.” This was how Joe Rothrock’s picture was captioned in Princeton University’s student newspaper in 1975. This sentiment remained true throughout his distinguished career. Orville Joseph (OJ) Rothrock died peacefully in his home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on August 10, 2023, at the age of 92. He is survived by his three children, Emily, Sarah, and Ian; four grandchildren; and several generations of appreciative students.

Born in Monticello, Indiana, on April 13, 1931, Joe received a BA in 1953 from Harvard College, specializing in art history. It was the time of the Korean War, and so he enrolled at Navy Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, serving four years with the Seventh Fleet and as a communications liaison officer with Project Vanguard at the time the USSR launched Sputnik.

When he returned to the United States, Joe spent several years studying at New York University’s Institute of Fine Arts and teaching, eventually landing a job as an instructor in the Department of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University. Already focusing his studies on Jacques Callot and the history of fine art printing, Joe was the perfect candidate to take over when the position of Curator of Graphic Arts at Firestone Library became available in 1966. While there, he organized a dozen exhibitions, managed an active print lending library for students, and taught seminars, including a course on the description and handling of medieval manuscripts, using original materials from the Graphic Arts Department and the Scheide Library.

Three years later, a full scholarship from Princeton allowed him to return to his studies full time; he completed an MFA in 1971 and a PhD in 1987 with the dissertation Jacques Callot and Court Theatre, 1608–1619: Studies in Court Theatre and Its Printed Propaganda in the Background of Callot’s Artistic Individuality. He became a member of the Print Council of America in 1977.

Joe was invited to the University of New Mexico in 1975 for a semester as a visiting lecturer in art history; three years later, he joined its art history faculty full time, lecturing on the history of printing, book arts, and photography until his retirement in 1998. He was also one of the first Print Council members to be granted emeritus status upon retirement.

A prolific scholar, Joe organized numerous exhibitions both in Princeton and in Albuquerque and published articles on a variety of topics, including “The Janet Munday Gordon Collection of French Portrait Engraving” (1967); “P. J. Conkwright. Style & Tradition: Book Designs, 1940–1970” (1971); “The San Francisco of Alfred Pioche and Charles Meryon” (1972); “Rowlandson Drawings at Princeton: Introduction and Checklist” (1975); “The Graphic Arts” (1979); and “Seeing and Meaning: Observations on the Theatre of Callot’s Primo Intermedio” (1979). Joe’s unpublished manuscript “Dignitas Non Moritur: Ruben’s Vision of the Luxembourg Palace of Maria de’Medici” and his bibliography of books in Spanish colonial New Mexico, 1598–1776, are preserved in the Rothrock archive at the University of New Mexico.