John Francis “Frank” Holme, printmaker, illustrator, educator and book printer, was born in Corinth, West Virginia on 29 June 1868. He grew up in Keyser, West Virginia where he graduated from high school. As a young man, Holme worked as a reporter and artist for the Wheeling Register. In the mid 1890s he relocated to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and, after two years with the Pittsburgh Press, moved to Chicago. There he worked as an illustrator for several newspapers, including the Chicago Post, the Chicago Chronicle and the Daily News. Holme was known for his ability to capture action with quick sketches. He explored many methods for illustration, experimenting in chalk-plate, copper-plate etching, drypoint, and photo-engravings from pen and ink drawings. In December 1897,

Frank Holme co-founded the Palette and Chisel Club in Chicago in 1895 and founded the Chicago School of Illustration in September 1898. The Art Institute of Chicago held an exhibition of newspaper drawings by Holme, John T. McCutcheon and William Schmedtgen in December 1897. Holme wrote twelve books of instruction for a mail-order course in illustration.

In 1895, Holme founded the Bandar Log Press and printed the first book, Just for Fun, in his home in Chicago. When Holme was stricken with tuberculosis, he moved himself and the press to Asheville, North Carolina in 1901. There the second Bandar Log Press book, Swanson, Able Seaman, was printed. In a quest to cure his illness, he moved to Arizona. Unable to be idle, he printed a series of booklets of tales written by George Ade and illustrated by Holme, known as Strenuous Lad’s Library. His health did not improve so he moved to Denver, Colorado where he died a few months later on 27 July 1904.