A new book has just been published called The Oxford Handbook of the Bible in America. In it is an article by Michael Gilmour, professor of New Testament at (the Evangelical) Providence University College in Manitoba, Canada, on JWs and the NWT. That's chapter 41. But that is not the only time JWs are brought up.
In chapter 1 entitled "Protestant English-Language Bible Publishing and Translation," written by Paul Gutjahr, professor of English at Indiana University and the overall editor of the volume, is the following: "The third wave of Bible publishing also saw the appearance of three material changes…" He describes the first as flexible, soft leather bindings and the second as using red letters for the words of Jesus. Then he says:
"Finally, in the 1920s Bibles began to be printed on thinner, less costly, more transportable paper, an innovation that gained such popularity among Bible publishers that the paper came to be known as 'bible paper.' Such paper was actually the invention of the Jehovah's Witnesses whose publishing center in Brooklyn, New York, worked with cigarette manufacturers in the 1920s to create a paper that would be lightweight yet durable enough to hold printer's ink in a clean and legible manner." (p. 12)
Gutjahr gives no reference for his statement. I looked through that part of the Proclaimers book which discusses the WTS's history of publishing Bibles prior to the NWT (pp. 603-607) and could find no clue as to this. Does anyone know the story here?