Architectural Graphic Standards by Charles George Ramsey and Harold Reeve Sleeper, first published in 1932 (and
now in its eleventh edition), is a definitive technical reference for architects--the one book that every architect
needs to own. The authors, one a draftsman and the other an architect, created a graphic compilation of standards
that amounted to an index of the combined knowledge of their profession. This first comprehensive history of Ramsey
and Sleeper's classic work explores the changing practical uses that this "draftsman's Bible" has served,
as well as the ways in which it has registered the shifts within the architectural profession since the first half
of the twentieth century. When Architectural Graphic Standards first appeared, architecture was undergoing its
transition from vocation to profession--from the draftsman's craft to the architect's academically based knowledge
with a concomitant rise in social status. The older "drafting culture" gave way to massive postwar changes
in design and building practice.
Writing a history of the architectural profession from the bottom up--from the standpoint of the architectural
draftsman--George Barnett Johnston clarifies the role and status of the subordinate architectural workers who once
made up the base of the profession. Johnston's account of the evolution of Ramsey and Sleeper's book also offers
a case study of the social hierarchies embedded within architecture's division of labor. Johnston investigates
what became of the draftsman, and what became of drafting culture, and asks--importantly, in today's era of digital
formats--what price is exacted from architectural labor asarchitecture pursues new professional ideals.