In 1926, countering the pressure from  older Black leaders who were pressuring them to create only uplifting images of Black life in their creative works, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Wallace Thurman, Aaron Douglas, Bruce Nugent, Gwendolyn Bennett and John P. Davis created the journal FIRE!!: Devoted to Younger Negro Artists.  It was meant to be a periodical, but unfortunately, only one issue was published. That issue is now a literary classic, and copies of the original are collector's items of legendary rarity. The Fire Press was established in 1982 by Tom Wirth, a collector of Black books who was friends with Bruce Nugent. When he learned that Nugent had an original copy of FIRE!!, and understood the significance of the publication, they joined forces to publish a replica edition of FIRE!! The Fire Press was created for this purpose