David K. Ream provided invaluable support to indexers, publishers, institutes and corporations, government offices, and the information industry at large. His significant accomplishments have long-lasting impact for all his clients and all who benefited from his skills and knowledge.
Dave earned a B.S. in 1971 in Engineering and an M.S.in 1975 in Computer Science from Case Western Reserve University. Dave’s early career focused on publishers in the areas of typesetting design and production, batch composition services, database creation, editorial systems, and electronic publication design and production. His first indexing-related programming was done in the field of legal publishing when he created custom programs to sort legal indexes into locator order and then back into alpha order.
To the indexing community, Dave was our “IT guy.” Starting in 1991, he enhanced CINDEX's existing range and technical support by becoming the sole reseller of the Publisher's Edition of CINDEX designed to be used in a networked multi-user environment. In addition, he developed indexing-specific utilities to improve work output and maximize efficiency (Index/Check, EntryExpander, etc.); utilities to help with electronic indexing (HTML Prep and IXML embedder); and for the specialized field of legal indexing (CaseRev, CaseCheck, etc.). He provided all of these products at reasonable prices, and he volunteered unlimited free technical support for license-holders of CINDEX and Leverage Technologies’ utilities. He also assisted SKY and Macrex users and was developing utilities that would work with those programs to embed indexes.
Dave, Glenda Brown, Jan Wright and Pilar Wyman present The Matrix: a session on embedded and linked indexing.
Dave was generous with his time, not only to individual clients but to indexer organizations. As an active contributing member of the American Society for Indexing (ASI), Dave served as treasurer of the organization (2004–2007), as ASI’s representative to the International Digital Publishing Forum (IPDF), and as co-chair of the EPUB3 Indexes Working Group. The work of IPDF and the EPUB3 Indexes Working Group led to the Recommended Specification for EPUB Indexes (August 2015) which enables EPUB electronic books to include indexes linked to text; Dave is a co-author of these specifications.
He attended every ASI national conference from 1991 to 2017, and in addition, created several ASI webinars on electronic indexing techniques. He spoke frequently at national and local events for indexers in the United States, and traveled to Australia/New Zealand, Canada, and the United Kingdom to participate in the conferences of their official societies. His articles have appeared in ASI publications and in ASI’s newsletter Keywords, as well as in The Indexer which is distributed by the Society of Indexers.
Dave, Enid Zafran, and Frances Lennie
He loved to be outdoors, and to participate in activities like biking, climbing, kayaking, walking, etc. Formerly he had been an avid volleyball enthusiast. Someone who could talk on almost any subject, he was a true “Renaissance man.” He had a fantastic sense of humor and looked forward to talking with people; his positive attitude to solving problems made him an excellent resource when indexers found themselves stumped on how to deal with complex and thorny situations. He was a good listener and wanted to help.
Dave passed away suddenly, on December 20, 2017, while taking a walk in a metropark near his home in Cleveland, Ohio. His love of puns lives on in the name of the scholarship we are establishing for him: “DReam to Index.” Please visit his joke archive here.
May his memory be an inspiration to others to share knowledge, promote learning, and be inclusive in their professional and personal lives.
Questions? Please contact us at DReamtoIndex@gmail.com