Jeffrey D. Groves

Professor of Literature, Emeritus

I taught my first course at HMC in 1984. After being hired into the tenure track some years later, I chaired the HSA Department from 2001 to 2006, served as Chair of the Faculty from 2007 to 2010, was appointed Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Faculty from 2012 to 2017, and worked as the inaugural faculty director of the Harvey Mudd College Makerspace from 2020 to 2023. I retired in December 2025.

I loved my job at HMC. Teaching our creative and exceptionally able students was a great pleasure; working with inspiring faculty and staff colleagues was another. I also loved being part of a scholarly community. My research examined nineteenth-century American printing and publishing history. I co-edited and contributed to two volumes in this area: Perspectives on American Book History (2002; co-edited with Scott E. Casper and Joanne D. Chaison) and A History of the Book in America, Volume 3: The Industrial Book, 1840–1880 (2007; co-edited with Scott E. Casper, Stephen W. Nissenbaum, and Michael Winship). My interest in nineteenth-century printing history also led me to establish a letterpress studio—The First-Floor Press—at The Claremont Colleges Library. With the support of my department, several donors, and the library’s Special Collections department, for seventeen years and with six antique printing presses I taught Claremont Colleges students how to typeset and print their own designs.

Selected Courses Taught

• Art 60: Workshop in Hand-Press Printing
• Environmental Analysis 174: Building Los Angeles (co-taught with Dan Petersen and Char Miller)
• HSA 10: The History of Literacy Technologies
• Literature 104: An Introduction to Middle English Literature
• Literature 107: Fourteen Poems: An Introduction to Poetry
• Literature 110: Shakespeare
• Literature 117: Dickens, Hardy, and the Victorian Age (co-taught with Jim Eckert)