Snow, Nancy. Account Book, 1844-1847. An example of repurposing of books, Nancy Snow’s account book was composed within what was at one point a penmanship book, published in 1832. Nancy wrote her name on the inside cover, indicating she used this book as a student the Clapp School when she was 14 years old. Twelve [...]
Jack Downing was a comic character created in 1830 by Seba Smith, who developed the country dialect-speaking character in a series of letters for the Portland Courier. As Downing became famous, Charles Augustus Davis imitated the style and wrote under the same name for New York papers. Davis started Major Downing’s Advocate on Mar. 12, [...]
A previously unrecorded satirical cartoon printed in Lowell, MA, by J.H. Varney, possibly a relation of (or pseudonym for) local newspaper publisher Samuel J. Varney. The cartoon references the 1840 repeal of a Massachusetts state law which regulated the sale of alcohol in quantities under 15 gallons. A large railroad carriage full of drunken men [...]
A very rare self-published collection of poems by Holmes, a farmer in Greene County, OH east of Dayton. Most of the poems are short and predominantly religious in theme. Preceding these is Holmes’s 20-page “Dialogue on Slavery,” which offers an unusual poetic recapitulation of the religious, economic, and political arguments for and against slavery. Firmly [...]
This mathematic exercise book belonged bears the name of Samuel Geer, who was probably from Groton, Connecticut. The book is filled with mathematical calculations and problems, as well as solutions, written in a very neat hand. Questions involve liquid, cubic, long and square measurements, time (“How many minutes since the creation of the world…”), percentages, [...]
This large, colorful broadside was probably printed in two different locations. The red-printed border, which includes advertising slogans suitable for dry goods merchants (and a cartoon of a horse-drawn mail wagon and train with caption “Clear the tracks!!”), bears the Philadelphia imprint of John Duross. The bordered blank sheets were presumably sold to merchants across [...]
The frontispiece to this elocution text features a rare illustration of a young lady doing physical exercise along with her male colleagues to prepare for speaking. By 1867, female reformers like Lucy Stone had blazed new trails for women as public speakers before mixed audiences of men and women. To reflect this change in social [...]
AAS has few newspapers from Delaware County, NY and, until this spring, only two issues from the town of Deposit. Six years ago we were the underbidder at auction on a lot of the Deposit Courier. The person who won it was a Californian, John Aiello, who had grown up in Deposit. Mr. Aiello promised [...]
AAS member (and publisher’s cloth binding expert) Steve Beare regularly alerts us to interesting bindings he spots on eBay. Thanks to his deeply appreciated referrals, over the past two years we have added many unusual bindings to the AAS collection. Perhaps the most remarkable of Steve’s finds is this gift book binding of fine-ribbed white [...]
Don’t let the utilitarian title fool you! In this case, it is not what was printed but what a former owner drew on a flyleaf that is the book’s true treasure. Mimicking a popular political cartoon of the time, a Union soldier chases a cross-dressing Jefferson Davis—giving us a rare glimpse into the intersection between [...]
Appeal to the Democracy (Augusta, ME). Oct. 10, 1840. Over the past few years AAS has acquired a number of campaign newspapers. These are always desirable due to their short existence, rarity, and political content. The Whig Battering-Ram was a revival of a campaign paper with a similar title from the 1840 election. It supported [...]
Charles Eastman & Co. Letterbook, 1828 – 1834 The South Hadley (Massachusetts) Canal opened in 1795 to bypass waterfalls on the Connecticut River and it was one of the earliest canals in the United States. Steamboat traffic on the canal began in 1828. This letter book was kept by Charles Eastman (1803 – 1884) and [...]
Brother Joseph. The White Knight or The Rock of the Candle. (Brother James’s Library). Philadelphia: Henry McGrath, 1867. American Catholic children’s literature is rare before 1850, and The White Knight exemplifies the modest boom in Catholic publishing after the Civil War. The back pages contain advertisements for the Catholic Pocket Library, and books for parochial [...]
Barnard, H. D. Travels by land & water. [Hartford: H. D. Barnard, 1860] A very rare and unusual biography and travel narrative authored by 11-year-old H. D. Barnard, who also set this small-format pamphlet in type and printed it on an amateur press. Born in Detroit, Barnard describes several long journeys to Michigan and Wisconsin, [...]
“Strike, but hear.” Homer, NY, August 16, 1862. This broadside, found between the pages of an August 1862 issue of the Cortland County Republican newspaper, recounts the difficulties of taxation and raising bonds in the small town of Homer, NY, during the Civil War. Issued by dry good merchant (and Town Supervisor) George W. Phillips, [...]
Bradford, Lewis. Letters, 1817 – 1829 Lewis Bradford, a descendant of Governor William Bradford, and son of Levi Bradford and Elizabeth Lewis Bradford, was born in Plympton, Massachusetts in 1768. Lewis lived his entire life in the town of Plympton, working as the town clerk for forty years. In addition to his work, Bradford was [...]
The Boy’s Treasury of Sports, Pastimes, and Recreations. Fourth American edition. New York: Clark, Austin & Co., 1850. Striped publisher’s cloth bindings are rare, and such a binding on a children’s book in good condition is even rarer. The charming gilt vignette of boys at play puts an added layer on an already delightful binding.
Barlow, Joel, 1754-1812. The Columbiad: a poem. Philadelphia: Fry and Kammerer for C. and A. Conrad …, 1807. Rarely does one see “Papantonio-quality” early American bindings on the market any more, but we were fortunate to add this example to AAS’s celebrated Bindings Collection, which boasts the Michael Papantonio collection as its nucleus. John Bidwell [...]
Regnier, Auguste (after a painting by Junius Brutus Stearns). The life of George Washington the soldier. New York & Paris: Goupil & Co., 1854. Printed by Lemercier, Paris. This print is one of four in a set depicting the life George Washington—the other prints include renditions of Washington as a citizen, a farmer, and a [...]
Ker, Patrick, fl. 1691. The map of man’s misery. Or, The poor man’s pocket-book. Being a perpetual almanack of spiritual meditations … Boston: Printed by T. G. for B. Eliot, [ca. 1710?] The only known copy of a newly discovered early American imprint. Patrick Ker’s collection of meditations, arranged in a seven-day “week” extending from [...]
Clerk and the City, 1849 Schoolmarm, 1870
