Al Cummings, who co-founded A Different Drummer Books and went on to launch Madison Press Books, has died.

Cummings died in his 84th year after a brief illness.

In 1970, he and John Richardson founded the Burlington, Ontario, independent bookstore together, taking inspiration for its name from Henry David Thoreau.

In 1979, Cummings started Madison Press Books, which packaged illustrated books for publishers in North America and beyond. Almost right from the start, Madison Press did well, launching Canadian bestseller The Art of Robert Bateman in 1981. Madison Press is best known for titles such as The Discovery of the Titanic and The Canadian Living Cookbook, and children’s titles Polar the Titanic Bear and Anastasia’s Album. 

Bateman first met Cummings at A Different Drummer Books, which functioned as a meeting place for like-minded people in Burlington. “One day in the latter 1970s Al came to our house and proposed that I should have a book of my art work produced and he would do it. I was flattered by the thought and Al picked up the ball and ran with it,” Bateman wrote in an online condolence.

Cummings sold Madison Press in 2004, but stayed on with the company for two years.

He is remembered by his friends and former colleagues as a bon vivant with exceptional taste in food and wine and a creative and curious thinker.

He leaves his partner of many years, Nicholas Gomes.

A tribute to Cummings was held in Toronto on Sept. 12.