Americana

24-1. The Namesake of Denver.

Splendid A.L.S. of James William Denver, who laid out the Colorado city named for him, then  part of Kansas Territory, of which he was Governor at the height of the slavery debate. His  exciting life captured the flavor and excitement of America’s formative century: A Virginia-  born adventurer, he was a Shakespearean actor, fought in the Mexican War, and traveled  overland to California early in the Gold Rush. A rapidly rising political star, Denver prevailed  in an 1852 duel with a critical Californian which in his own estimation cost him the  nomination for the Presidency. Fighting at Corinth as a Brig. Gen., his later visits to Denver  were met with disappointment at the “little affection” shown him by the inhabitants of the city  bearing his name. From his law office in Washington, D.C., Jan. 19, 1871, 7¾ x 9¾, 4 full pp.,  signed “Will.” To his wife. “I have been so very busy for two or three days that I have hardly  had time to sleep. During the short session of Congress so much business is crowded into so  short a space of time that we cannot afford to waste an hour...This is especially so with me, for  Hughes being absent there is no one to look after anything outside of the courts but myself. A  letter from Hughes to Roane today announces that he has no hope of returning here before the  last of February. He is without exception the most reckless and uncertain man about matters  of business I ever knew...Hendricks is here but I have not yet met him...Sam Smith is on his  back again with the govt. Such is the penalty men sometimes have to pay for fast living in  youth. Sam is ten years my junior but he is already a superannuated old man physically. Gen.  Corse and wife are here...He inquires very kindly after you, and always mentions our stay at  Memphis. Jo. McKibben is here figuring about a steamship line on the Gulf of Mexico. Jim  Craig is here also and last night he told me he had about 5,400 acres of land...west of St.  Jo(seph), Mo. in Kansas, almost every piece of which is within sight of a railroad built or being  built, which he would exchange for his (your father’s) possessions in Nebraska. Ask him what  he thinks of such a proposition. There is upward of 100,000 acres of it held in common by  several parties, and this 5,400 acres is his (Craig’s) proportionate share...Craig also told me  that a Rail Road would certainly be built up the Mo. River next summer, running right  through Aspinwall. That must make property very valuable there, but still I would advise the  selling of all or nearly all the town lots as fast as possible, for they will soon begin the grading  of streets &c. and tax the town property so heavily as to amount to a confiscation...Does Mary  hold on to her doll as fast as ever? And fast does the baby grow? Kiss them all for me....” The  “baby” was Matthew Denver, born less than a month before, who would serve in Congress  1907-13. Few ink and butterscotch-colored smudges on pp. 3-4, probably by his own hand,  minor toning along folds on p. 4, else fine and clean. $950-1250 

24-2. An Iron Empire in the South.

Attractive chromolithographed promotional sheet for sole North American agent of West  Virginia’s Low Moor Iron Co., makers of “Low Moor Iron - Will bend Cold to any shape...,” c.  1875, 7¾ x 9½. Imprint of “Bufford, Boston & N.Y.” Large color view of their iron works (in  Alleghany County, W.V.), the numerous smokestacks rivaling Pittsburgh. Gold metallic  (Canadian?) Royal arms at top. “Full assortment of sizes always in store, for sale by W. Bailey  Lang, Sole agent in U.S. and Canadas [note plural usage], N.Y., Boston...Low Moor plates  unequaled for fire boxes, boilers, axles... piston rods, tires...Susceptible of the highest  polish....” Illustration of an iron bar twisted into a pretzel. An example of then-extravagant  “sales literature.” Light uniform marginal toning, minor handling evidence, else fine. The  firm’s papers reside in Univ. of Virginia Library. Scarce thus. $90-120 

24-3. Folk Art Liberty Bell Embroidery.

Large, strikingly attractive hand-embroidered depiction of the Liberty Bell, backed by golden herald  trumpets proclaiming its name, and suspended from vivid red ribbon. A coppery eagle alights at top,  flanked by crossed 39-star American flags. Red, white, blue, black, silver, shades of brown and tan,  and yellow, on sand-colored fine linen, perhaps a sack, hemmed bottom. Overall 19 x 19¼.  Nominally c. 1889; artistic license with number of stars possible, but judged not later than about  1920s, and probably older. Found in Pennsylvania Dutch country. Some old storage creases, else  colors brilliant, the embroidery superb, and lovely for display. In modern black frame, ready to hang.  $90-140

24-4. Stickley Furniture.

Sales portfolio, “Illustrations of Stickley’s Early American Period Furniture,” Syracuse and  Fayetteville, N.Y., c. 1930. 5¾ x 8¾, brown on rich cream. Containing 6 plates (of at least 9), brown on matte cream, showing his  reproductions of tables, chairs, cupboards, bureaus, and other furnishings of the early 1700s, handsomely photographed in period  room settings. Style numbers and measurements on verso. Printed text: “I shall be very glad to welcome you as a visitor to my Display  Room and Workshop...Leopold Stickley.” Some dust and other stains of covers only, enclosures very fine and clean. $40-50 

24-5. Old Time Radio.

Fascinating sales catalogue of Atwater Kent, then the world’s largest radio manufacturer. Philadelphia, n.d. but c. 1923, 6 x 9, 24 pp.  Ornate blind-embossed cover cartouche with pale spring green, black on matte cream text. Introducing their new “One Dial Receiving  Set. Four interior photos and centerfold of the vast factory on Wissahickon Ave., three photos of their radios in homes of authors  Burton Holmes and Mary Roberts Rinehart, and cartoonist Clare Briggs; seven photos of their models, with technical specifications and  prices (up to $140 - not including tubes and batteries); horn speakers and phonograph attachments. Speckling of covers (only), a  peculiarity of the paper used, ivory toning of first and last leaves, else good plus. $45-65 

24-6. Exquisite Printing of the Declaration of Independence.

A curiosity: magnificently copperplate-engraved composite print, believed issued to celebrate Pres. William Henry Harrison’s  inauguration. At top, Trumbull’s famous scene of the Signers gathered, text of the Declaration below - and a cleverly ghosted profile of  all 56 Signers shown above, their outlines numbered to correspond to miniature facsimiles of their signatures. Printed 1841 by Franklin  Print Co., (Boston), engraved by D. Kimberly, lettering by J.B. Bolton, published by James Fisher, 71 Court St., Boston. Bordering the  above in dime-sized insets, “the Arms of the States, and of the United States, and Portraits of the Presidents,” Harrison at 12 o’clock,  flanked by Jefferson, Washington, and his other seven predecessors, each linked by elaborate oak leaf filigree. Meticulously trimmed  slightly to 8½ x 11¾, evidently by an expressive 19th-century owner, simulating a diecut creation, to the contour of border design  features, and mounted on interior side of heavy, attractively marbled cover removed from a period book, 10½ x 13½. (The dimensions  of the only example of this print located by WorldCat, in the University of Virginia Library’s specialized Small Collection of Signers, is  nominally 9-1/8 x 12-3/16. The massive, long-ago Henkel auction of the Hampton L. Carson Collection of Engraved Portraits of Gen.  George Washington, lot 757, gives dimensions as 8½ x 11-7/8.) In all events, comparison with a modern photograph of an untrimmed  example on offer by a major London specialist printseller (for £480) confirms that no live matter was removed. Corners of print with  old creases, defects, and repairs, but complete, and detectable only upon close examination; interior side of board considerably dust-  soiled, but in all a very scarce, charming item, with enormous artistic flair and intricacy, suitable for display. $275-375 

24-7. World’s Peace Jubilee – and Russia’s “banner of Peace.”

Substantial songbook, “Music to be Performed at the World’s Peace Jubilee and International Music Festival, Boston, June, 1872.”  Published by Oliver Ditson & Co., 6¾ x 10¼, 177 pp., bright red wrappers, with view of the impressive proceedings on outside back:  indeed, a contemporary pencil notation on inside board records, “550 feet long, 350 feet wide, 4½ acres, seating 40,000.” In turn  bound within red boards imprinted with numerous local advertisements, for resale by Boston stationers Cyrus G. Cooke & Bro., ornate  typography in black. Words and music for songs including “He Watching Over Israel,” “Festival Hymn,” “The Harp that once Thro’  Tara’s Halls,” “O Come All Ye Faithful,” “Star Spangled Banner,” and more. The Jubilee marked the first time African-American  “singers (were) included in a big musical production” in America--Music of Black Americans, Eileen Southern, 1997. Johann Strauss  also conducted a 2,000-member orchestra - with 100 assistants - backed by a 20,000-voice choir! The program concludes with  “Quadrille of All Nations,” divided into four parts, demarcated by drums and trumpets, including “Russian Hymn - Waving the banner  of Peace o’er our Land...,” “Departure for Syria - To Syria young Dunois would go, That gallant, handsome knight; And prays the Father  to bestow his blessings on the fight...,” and “My Country ‘tis of Thee.” Inside cover lacking 1 x 1½” corner at upper right, affecting only  border design; some tip wear first and last few leaves, else internally about fine and clean; some scuffing of outer boards, but still highly  appealing for display, highly satisfactory, and a very rare variant binding. A fascinating artifact from the annals of American pacifism,  used by a participant. $60-80 

24-8. The Shakers Shun their Prize.

A.L.S. of head of the American Shakers Walter Shepherd, on letterhead “United Society of Shakers - Founded 1787,” Shaker Station,  Conn., Nov. 20, 1916, 8¼ x 11. Imprinted “Shakers’ Evaporated Sweet Corn - Farm, Orchard and Dairy Products.” “I appreciate the  fairness of the Thompsonville Fair Association in awarding and transmitting the prize money on the Shaker exhibit at the recent Fair.  We would prefer however that you cancel the cheque, herewith returned [not present], as we don’t want to take anything out of the  coffers of the Association.” Postal creases, light toning, else good plus. A carpenter, the writer certainly made Shaker furniture. Rising  to head of the Shakers in the U.S., Shepherd was an fascinating figure, appearing in a remarkable number of books, both period and  modern, on the sect. He approved the Shaker history appearing in Religious Bodies, Pt. 1, 1936 (modern copy accompanies), in which  he termed Shakerism as “a kind of Christian socialism....” Rare, and a late Shaker item. With Shepherd’s passing in 1933, only a handful  were left: “Shakerism, which etched itself deeply into the American scene for at least a century and a quarter as the most successful  experiment in common life and worship in history, is fading rapidly from the modern scene on the very site that once sheltered its  greatest strength...”--Shepherd’s 1933 obituary (modern copy accompanies). Rare; the massive Shaker manuscript collection at  Western Reserve Historical Society contains only one Shepherd item. $200-250 

24-9. Aspirations of the Gilded Age.

Splendid, extensive salesman’s catalogue of Standard Silver Ware Co., Boston, c. 1900, 6½ x 9½ oblong, (208) pp., comprising 16 pp.  red on eggshell, balance black on same; black on highly stylized green-grey card cover. Exhaustively illustrated with several thousand  exquisitely detailed renderings of a wide range of popularly-priced luxury goods. Including their new line of “Nevada Silver Metal” and  heavy silver plate spoons, forks, tableware, novelties, tea sets, cake baskets, bread trays, razors, scissors, and more. Plus “solid gold  filled” and silver watches, and solid gold watch cases - nearly each one a worthy expression of Gilded Age artistry. Together with neck  and vest chains, emblem charms including Masonic and G.A.R., ear drops, scarf pins, gold brooches, hat pins, bracelets, pens, rings  with ruby, emerald, opal, and turquoise, spectacles, opera glasses, wildly ornate mantel clocks (including models called the “Moslem,”  “Caliph,” and “Kremlin”), photo albums decorated with Dewey’s Manila victory and “Remember the Maine,” Holy Communion  Viaticum Case, the Lincoln fountain pen, and much, much more. The absence of a McKinley memorial item suggests this was produced  after the treaty ending the Spanish-American War in Dec. 1898, but before Sept. 1901. Lacking order form at front, two short edge tears  in blank margin of cover, light spine wear, some toning back cover, else internally fine, and a superb resource of American design and  taste at the dawn of the Twentieth Century. Rare. $90-120 

24-10. Catalogues of Saloon Fixtures.

Oversize catalogue of The Weiss-Sontag Co., Chicago, “Manufacturers of Saloon, Store, Office  and Cigar Store Fixtures,” c. 1901, 10 x 13¾ oblong, 32 pp., red embossed script with lemon  and lime on buff cover, raspberry string tie, black on enamel text. Profusely illustrated with  detailed full-page photos of their saloon furniture, including bar counters, backbars with  mirrors, liquor shelves, and ornamentation. Offered in increasing levels of trim and opulence,  from modest bar outfits for “our country customers,” to massive spreads made to order. Also  showing saloon partitions, including the quintessential swinging doors, plus wine room  partitions, bottle and cigar cases, bar and window screens, beer and wine coolers, a lunch  counter, workboards “where beer is drawn from cellar,” footrails, tables and chairs – and a  bowling alley, “built in sections for shipment to any part of the country.” Covers darkened  and soiled, two fragments lacking at blank margins, edge tattering, separated at spine; two  old soft vertical folds, adhesion from water damage affecting only modest portions of final six  leaves of text, principally affecting captions of some tables and chairs; some pencil notes and  simple sketches (“6 steps”) by an enterprising saloonkeeper, considerable handling evidence,  but complete, and very satisfactory. • With, competitor’s sales circular found nested within  above: American Saloon Fixture Co., Chicago, turn-of-century, 11½ x 15½, (12) pp., black on  ivory manifold paper. Oversize, intricately detailed illustrations of their distinctively different  bar designs, including the Broadway, Amazon, Moresque, and bar mirrors, bar screens, liquor  case, beer, wine and ale coolers, and ice chests. Toning, handling, wear at horizontal fold, else  good. Made for long service, these made-in-Chicago saloon designs almost certainly appeared in movies of Hollywood’s Golden Age - as  well as in the establishments frequented and run by the mobsters and beer barons of Chicago and elsewhere. (Indeed, Dutch Schulz’s  Yonkers office can be seen from our window.) Offering rich pictorial resources, needless to say, any item in these catalogues would be a  sought-after collectible today. Rare. Nothing of any description issued by either firm recorded by WorldCat. $400-550 (2 pcs.) 

24-11. Shopping in America.

Charming 1905 special catalogue of Montgomery Ward & Co., Chicago, 4 x 6¾ oblong, 64 pp., black on ivory coated groundwood. A  “Bargain List” with a 100-pound minimum order; “Be Your Own Dealer...Buy all your needs at wholesale...orders postmarked after Feb.  28, 1905, will not be filled.” Astonishing range of items, all illustrated, with exhaustive descriptions in miniature type. Including 60 lbs.  of canned tomatoes, $1.48; 25 lb. box California raisins, $1.10; elaborate steamer trunk, $5.00; ornate floral bronze oil lamp, $1.98;  “Our Best Sewing Machine,” 120 lbs., $17.85; telephone, “not a toy...distance not greater than ¼ mile,” $5.92; fine worsted suit, $8.50;  ornate bed, spring and mattress, 150 lbs., $4.75; Thornward Dandy Fixed Focus Camera, $1.94; single barrel gun outfit, 12 or 16 gauge,  $4.95; womens walking skirts, $1.35; conservatory violin outfit, Stradivarius model, $2.98; and much much more. Two-page spread  describing their buggy factory. Two old soft folds, light handling, else very good and clean. An eye-opening view of American industry,  merchandising, popular culture - and copywriting - on the ascendancy. Rare variant. $70-90 

24-12. Surgical Instruments – and Lobster Crackers.

Evidently unique, exhaustively detailed broadsheet of “James Gazard, Jeweller, Cutler, Surgical Instrument, Razor and Table Knife  Manufacturer, No. 96, Bishopsgate St. Without” (a unique place-name!), likely London, judged c. 1835-45. 7¼ x 9¾. Printed by  Redford and Robins, London Rd., Southwark. About 150 lines listing every imaginable kind of “Cutlery and Steel...Silver and Strong  Plated...Jewellry & Fancy...(and) Misc. Articles.” Including, ivory- and horn-handled dessert knives, ham slicers, cucumber slice(r)s,  “bleeding, gum and abscess lancets,” “key tooth instruments, punches & probangs,” “surgeons’ instrument cases, in Russia, Morocco,  &c., and every article used in the practice of surgery,” nut and lobster crackers, pencil cases and lead crayon holders, butter and cheese  knives, cream ewers, and cake baskets. Plus, “jet, amber, pearl and coral necklaces,” “gold and silver thimbles,” “card cases and  smelling bottles,” apple scoops, “seals engraved with arms, crests, &c.,” “Mourning Rings made to order at the shortest notice,” and  much, much more. Dampstain at upper left corner, some other light soiling, a myriad of fine creases, but a survivor, and very  satisfactory. Highly ephemeral, excessively rare, and obscure. Notwithstanding the enormity of Gazard’s wares, neither the British  Library main catalogue, Google, nor WorldCat contain a single meaningful finding for him. $175-250 

24-13. Tribute to America’s Quintessential Artist.

Handsome oversize printed ticket to “Ceremonies attending the unveiling of The Audubon Monument - Admit Bearer and Friends to  The American Museum of Natural History, Apr. 26, 1893...Eulogy of Audubon, by D.G. Elliott, Ex-Pres. of American Ornithologists’  Union....” 4¼ x 7¼, red on rich cream, including undisturbed stub for additional event, the unveiling earlier that day ay Trinity  Cemetery, 156 St. and 10th Ave. Both with printed signature of Chairman Thos. Egleston, N.Y. Academy of Sciences Committee.  Pleasing graduated buttery patination, very light dust toning, else excellent. The event here crowned a major campaign spanning some  eight years, encompassing donations as small as postage stamps and contributions of schoolchildren, to reinterrment of the artist’s  remains. Audubon’s bird prints are among the most prized of all Americana; his Birds of America recently realized over £7,000,000 - a  record price for any printed book. Our estimate for the present item is somewhat less. $90-120 

24-14. Cranberry Bog Barrows and Potato Hooks.

Sales catalogue of Ames Plow Co., showing their new Framingham, Mass. factory. “Carts, Wagons,  Trucks & Barrows, Contractors’, City and Town Supplies.” C. 1912 (“almost a hundred years’  experience”), 6¾ x 10, 38 pp., full-color cover with variety of their red, blue, and green carts criss-  crossing the wide road in front of their enormous Georgian “agricultural warehouse.” Profusely  illustrated with fine line drawings, including descriptions and prices, of railroad carts, farm  wagons - “the best wagons made,” “traverse runner pungs” - an elaborate sled for milk men, road  roller weighing 5,000 lbs., cranberry bog barrow (only $4.25), barrows for electrotypers and  printers, “Pennsylvania Lawn Mower,” whiffletrees, potato hooks, and wide range of shovels and  farm tools. Some handling evidence, fairly inconspicuous cover crease, minor marginal  discoloration, else fine and colorful for display. The antecedent firm was the largest manufacturer  of shovels during the Civil War. Rare. $70-90 

24-15. The Birdman of Washington.

A.L.S. of R(obert) Ridgway, “Curator Dept. (of) Birds,” on letterhead of United States National  Museum, Smithsonian Institution - their first full-time Curator of Birds, serving 1869-1929,  compiler of the epic 8-volume The Birds of North and Middle America, originator of color  designations for birds still used today, and prolific bird artist and writer. He was “unmatched in the number of American bird species  that he described for science”--wikipedia. Washington, Apr. 7, 1888, 6¼ x 9¾. To Dr. B.H. Warren, West Chester, Pa.; signed by  Warren on verso. “...The skins of Grackles which you propose to send us would be very acceptable, and we would be glad to exchange  for them specimens of such western and northern species as we may possess duplicates of. The Bronzed Grackle has been entered in  the Museum register as a gift from you, for which you will in due time receive an official acknowledgement.” Possibly trimmed, foxing  at bottom, else very good. $70-90

24-16. A Gift of Red Slate from a Southern Belle.

Delightful partly printed certificate, “U.S. General Land Office has received from Miss M.S. Snead of Ky. one interesting specimen of  Red Slate containing the fossil shell Spirifer Mucronatus of the Devonian Age from Roxbury, N.Y.: intended for exhibition in the  Geological and Mineralogical Cabinet connected with this Office...,” Washington, Jan. 20, 1870, boldly signed by Commissioner Jos. S.  Nelson.11¼ x 15¼. Eagle at top. Ornamental border. Accomplished in violet and cerise inks by a skilled government calligrapher, in  three lettering styles, with ornamental devices and Fraktur-style rubrication. The words “Red Slate” in red ink. Two internal tears,  possibly from postal handling, 3” break at bottom fold, else about very good and charming for display. $45-65 

24-17. A Rabbi’s Story “of a man in Bagdad.”

Shaker magazine, The Manifesto, June, 1884, 5½ x 8¾, (24) pp. “What is True Religion?...True heart religion energizes the  soul...Genuine religion cannot find full expression in words, but will manifest itself at all times and in all places in the minutest deeds  of life....” “A story is told by Rabbi G. at a recent meeting in N.Y.C., of a man in Bagdad who was attacked by another, who, when his  assailant ran away, instead of pursuing him turned and ran in the opposite direction....” “Solomon’s Temple - For Juvenile Bible  Scholars - ...As the Jews became established they made for themselves permanent dwellings...Jesus went to the passover of the Jews....”  Ad of Fowler & Wells for Phrenological Journal, the latest issue including articles on “Girl Idleness” and Mormons. Disbound, light  uniform toning, else fine. The Shakers survived until the 1930s. $50-70 

24-18. Wells Fargo and a Jewish Merchant – in Civil War Nevada.

Letter on ornate blue stationery, “Wells, Fargo & Co. - New York and Calif. - Express and Exchange Co., 84 Broadway, N.Y.,” Dec. 30,  1864, 7½ x 9¾. To E.C. Bailey, Boston. Confirming receipt of 5 cases for R(osenstock) & P(rice), a Jewish merchant in Carson City,  Nevada, population 2,500 (modern research accompanies). “...You will please note ‘Regulations’ in enclosed circular [not present].  They will be rigidly enforced on us by S(team) S(hip?) Co. and by us on customers.” Minor wear, else fine and attractive. Bailey was the  locally noted Irish editor of the daily Boston Herald; Rosenstock & Price are shown as toy dealers in a postwar directory, but they also  appear in the Alabama Claims transcript in a passage on “numerous shipments of merchandise from N.Y. and Boston to San Francisco,  and...five shipments of treasure from San Francisco....” An unusual combination of associations; a finding in the Western States Jewish  Historical Quarterly, 1970, places Rosenstock & Price in the same sentence as Levi Strauss & Co. $120-160 

24-19. The Age of the Alaska Gold Rush.

Superb archive of over 340 photographs of Alaska and the Arctic region, taken c. 1898-1909, by renowned pioneer Seattle art  photographer F.H. Nowell, who frequented Alaska during its Gold Rush. Combination of period sepia, and somewhat later silver  contact prints, the latter forming the majority, and judged made c. 1925-45 from original negatives (not present). All high quality and  expertly done, most with sharp detail, compelling composition, and lush exposure. Various sizes from about 1½ x 2¼, 2 x 3, 2½ x 2½,  3¼ x 3¼, to 3½ x 5¼. Many identified, with pencil notations on verso, or neatly lettered or typeset descriptions on front within  emulsion, these evidently stepped-and-repeated on a larger sheet for development, then cut to singles. Evocative range of subjects  capturing the flavor of Alaska, including Eskimos - both children and adults, dog teams, prospectors, logging, railroads, boats, glaciers,  village life, kayaks, and more. Places include Dawson City, Fairbanks, Ketchikan, Nome, Sitka, Skagway, White Horse, and Yukon.  Much of the scenery is jaw-dropping and daunting. Among the more unusual subjects: winter mail arriving in Nome, the dog team  resting in front of the Post Office, with sacks of mail on the sleds; totem poles, “Eskimo Automobile Transfer Co., Nome, Alaska - All  Aboard for Cape Prince of Wales...,” Russian block huts in St. Michael’s, excursion steamers, fish eggs, Russian church, Lake Bennett,  skins drying, Miles Glacier, Eskimos hauling reindeer meat(?) on sleds to Nome market, Indian fishing on Copper River, Eskimo baby  in front of tent, walrus killed at Nome, dog race about to start, gold mining, Marine barracks, $2,000 in gold, 1906 fire in Fairbanks,  floating ice, and much, much more. One sepia realphoto postcard, “Columbia, Eskimo Queen,” by Oakes Photo Co. • With, 8 picture  postcards, 1909-11, from same collection: North Yakima (3), color; San Francisco postmarks (2), comprising embossed  chromolithographed Easter Card, and magnificent chromolithographed on silver New Years card; Campbell, Calif. realphoto (1); San  Jose; and realphoto of Pres. Taft addressing large crowd; all but latter postally used. • Tintype of two children, creases. Nowell was the  official photographer of Seattle’s Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition. His Alaskan photographs were displayed with E.S. Curtis et al in the  1913 annual exhibition of photographic art in Seattle, reported in Camera Craft magazine. Purchased from buyer of photographer’s  house in 1965; in older Seattle bookseller’s kraft envelope, marked “The Terrell Collection...”; this may be an error by cataloguer in  interpreting the microscopic “F.H. Nowell” imprint. Presumed largely if not entirely unpublished. A rich trove of vintage images by this  noted lensman, affording an in-depth cross-section of what remains - more than a century later - one of the world’s last frontiers.  $2400-3000 (about 350 pcs.)

24-20. “If you really prefer the lonely cottage whilst blest with liberty....”

Delightful homemade manuscript college notebook, plus separate sheets of numbered compositions, assignments, and one  transcription, the work of thoughtful and incisive student Samuel Buell, Jr., scion of an important Pilgrim family. Penned at “U.V.M.”  (University of Vermont), the fifth-oldest of the venerable New England colleges, after Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, and Brown. 1814-18,  about 6 x 7½, about 29 pp. in all. Comprising: “Simplicity a beauty - Composition, Oct. 12, Nov. 12 & 19, 1818,” 16 full written pp.,  carefully sewn by hand, likely by the writer. “...Simplicity in science is like the pure metal separated from its dross. However great an  estimate may be placed upon minerals, while in a state of nature, they fail to please til they have passed through the refiner’s fire....”  Proceeds to analyze the components of mechanical, liberal, and fine arts, including “rhetorick, logick, arithmetick, musick...poetry,  painting....” • Buell’s manuscript “Extract from Dr. Joseph Warren’s oration deliver’d Boston, Mar. 5, 1772.” “In vain we met the frowns  of tyrants...If you with united zeal and fortitude oppose the torrent of oppression, if you feel the true fire of patriotism burning in your  breasts; if you, from your soul, despise the most gaudy dress which slavery can wear; if you really prefer the lonely cottage whilst blest  with liberty, to gilded palaces surrounded with the ensigns of slavery....” • “Observations concerning distilled spiritous liquors”:  Arguing in favor of the benefits of alcohol in preparing medicine. “If there are some who by a too-free use of liquor lose their lives,  remember...that the fault is not in the liquor but in them...It did no more than discharge its respective duty...We may as well condemn  wheat, because a certain man was so great a glutton...So it is with all kinds of grain and herbs, even tobacco....” • “On the importance of  a good education”: “There is no station on which a man can be placed, where an education is of no use....” • “On the importance of  founding an education on a good basis.” Latter with substantial tea(?) stain; others with fold wear, average stains and toning, one sheet  nearly separated at fold, but all darkly penned in a clear hand, and generally good plus to about fine. Fascinating exemplars of an Ivy  Leaguer in the Age of Madison and Monroe. $225-300 (6 pcs.) 

24-21. The Timeless Cartoon Characters.

Original cartoon of Mutt & Jeff - America’s first successful daily comic strip characters, signed  by (different) artist “A.C.M. / 1916.” Executed in sepia brown ink on sand linen. 7¾ x 9¾.  Showing the inimitable duo laden with luggage, badminton racket, and a golf bag across Jeff’s  polka-dotted vest, embarking on a trip. Creator “Bud” Fisher had copyrighted his characters,  which preventing their original venue, the San Francisco Chronicle, from continuing the strip  using another artist when it moved across town to Hearst in 1908. Further legal disputes took  place in the Teens; it is possible that “A.C.M.” was one of the growing number of assistants  being groomed by Hearst, and increasingly relied upon to turn out the work. Waterstains at  top, mostly limited to blank field, edge tears and chipping, somewhat darkened at lower left  corner, but satisfactory, and the perfect personification of America’s favorite mischief-makers  of the early twentieth century. Intriguing, and delightful relic of the early years of modern  American popular culture. $90-120

24-22. Religion in Antebellum Louisiana.

Highly unusual letter of Thos. Rand, Jr., running a private school in Opelousas (La.), July 24,  1853, 8¼ x 10¾, 3 pp. To his father, Rev. Thos. Rand, Ireland, Miss., describing the state of  organized religion in rural Louisiana and his own schism with the Baptists “...I frequently say that New-England Christians do not  know what or where they are. Surrounded by the restraints that ages of religious influence have thrown around them, if they do not  yield to temptation and fall into sin they need not attribute it all to their innate virtue, nor boast of their piety. They can stand on their  mountain and despise those that dwell in the valley as barbarous heathen, but let them leave the regions of pure air and themselves  descend into the relaxing, enervating vapors that fill the vale below, and lo! they wilt like the tender plant plucked at mid-day in the  heat of summer. The Christians from the north coming here are shocked at the want of religious feeling in the churches here, but how  soon they fall into the very habits that shock them. You ask what are our religious privileges. We live in a neighborhood of Roman  Catholics. There is in this village a Methodist church, but is seldom that they have a tolerable preacher...I have attended one prayer  meeting in eight years... The Baptist cause in this religion is in a very low state. In the whole La. Association there is not a church that  sustains a pastor. The church to which we belong (in Bayou Chicot) has a pastor...but he has to sustain himself and family by making  saddles...Bro. Robert, our pastor at Bayou Chicot, is unable to have prayer meetings on account of feeble health...There (are) three  Baptist ministers within 50 miles...with six feeble churches scattered over the space. Within 10 miles of Opelousa are about 10  Baptists...The revival in 1841 left the churches in this region in a miserable state...I am aware Dear Father that you will feel hurt at  some of my rough impressions...If they are heterodox, I am heterodox... There are many inferred views held even by Baptists that I am  bound to class with that vis vitae of the Mother of Harlots Infant Baptism. I cannot say that my children give evidence of piety but  considering the abundance of evil influence...in the midst of which they have lived I have great reason to be thankful ...We send love to  those that love us.” Minor wear, else very good, and darkly penned. The writer appears in the Encyclopedia of Southern Baptists by  Wooley (1958) as “one of the earliest foundation-builders, a native of Mass...,” and other sources. $150-225 

24-23. An American Journey – 1855.

Travelogue letter of Jno. C. Stockly, Burlington, Iowa (“Ill.” crossed out by the just-arrived writer), Oct. 11, (18)55, 7¾ x 9¾, 4 full pp.  To brother Ayres Stockly, Burlington, N.J. “You are in Burlington; so am I, but the difference between us, is that between Iowa & N.J...I  stopped at Huntington, between Phila. & Pittsburg...pretty well built...Pittsburg...contains some 40,000 inhabitants, and is a very busy  place, but full of smoke. We crossed the Alleghanies before reaching Pittsburg & I found the scenery very wild and beautiful...Changed  to the Ohio & Penna. Road...arrived in Cleveland...”: describing Cousin John’s house “upon a hill, upon the Lake shore & gives a fine  view of the water...He is rough & open in his manner...John’s house is frame and not very nice looking. He has not a single horse...He  says his building lots are worth $35,000...Cleveland is a very pretty place. The streets are very wide and the houses neat, many of them  extremely handsome. I reached Chicago...but was obliged to sit up after stopping at the Young America House, as the city was full of  strangers. Yesterday I went out to the Agricultural fair...Surpassed the one which I saw at Phila. They had some splendid looking  horses...Last night I was fortunate enough to get a cot to sleep on, for which privilege I paid 75¢, though it was in the ball room with  some 40 or 50 other beds... Chicago contains about 80,000 inhabitants and has a very large trade. It is situated in a low prairie & is not  near so pretty a place as Cleveland...Took the cars from Chicago to Burlington...In some parts of the prairie there is not a tree to be seen  & being so level it puts one in mind of the ocean...I saw a good many Prairie chickens this afternoon along the road. They fly in large  flocks like Partridges & are thick in the corn fields...Concluded to come to Burlington, go down on the Mississippi to Quincy & try to get  company from there up to Galena & St. Paul....” V.G. • Attractive envelope, large midnight-blue oval cornercard of Barret House, green  Burlington, Iowa c.d.s. on defective Scott #11. $120-150 (2 pcs.)

24-24. The Dark Side of Pennsylvania Dutch Country.

Vellum deed for sale of property in Reading, Pa., by J(acob) K. Boyer, to John Boas. 15¼ x 24¾, Aug. 26, 1812. Imprint of “J. Ritter &  Co., Reading.” Scalloped top. Signed twice by Boyer, once by Sarah Boyer, thrice by Justice of the Peace Peter Nagle, and twice by  witness John Snell. For a house and sizeable lot on Hamilton St., “bounded by two public alleys....” For over a century - into the 1960s -  the Boyers of nearby Boyertown were master craftsmen of carriages and horse-drawn vehicles, and later, truck bodies. This Boyer,  however, found himself in a different enterprise: “...for many years a respectable Merchant of Reading, and the father of a large family,  was indicted for forging, uttering and delivering a false and counterfeited note of $100...The District Attorney remarked, ‘...he was  guilty of the most expert, extensive and wholesale plan of counterfeiting ever known in the U.S.’”--Register of Pennsylvania, 1829  (modern copy accompanies). Nagle is probably the noted Revolutionary War captain, serving under Washington in the Battle of Long  Island, later entertaining him in his Reading home, and included in the book The Hanging of Susanna Cox.... Original folds, pleasing  mellow orangish patina, and very fine. $120-150 

24-25. “To the Egress!”

Superlatively rare, ephemeral pamphlet, “Illustrated and Descriptive History of the Animals contained in Van Amburgh & Co.’s  Menagerie...P.T. Barnum, Pres...H. Barnum, Mgr....” Cover imprint of Thitchener & Glastaeter, John St., N.Y., 1868; text block imprint  of S. Booth, Center St. 5½ x 9, 70 pp. present (possibly complete, else of 72). Brilliant emerald green, metallic gold, and forest green  cover, black and white text, profusely illustrated with large woodcuts of dozens of then-exotic animals in the exhibition. “The Monkeys:  People love to see the nimble playful creatures, those miniature men...In one apartment of the menagerie...the dog-faced Baboon...They  are favorites with the crowd, who make invidious comparisons between them and the colored population. All Monkey Land have  representatives in Van Amburgh’s collection.” Also featured: the Large-Lipped Bear, Grunting Ox, Spotted Hyena, Alpaca, Ichneumon  (a fierce Egyptian cat), Gold and Silver Pheasants, and many more. Defective: lacking lower right corner of cover, edge chipping, dark  coffee stain at upper right corner first two leaves, lacking back cover and about 1/3 of last leaf, possibly lacking final leaf; waterstains,  wear, and much handling, but a rare relic of this then-sensational attraction in lower Manhattan, the origin of Barnum’s ultimate  utterance of hucksterism: “To the egress.” Thinking yet another exotic creature awaited behind the door, customers found themselves  out on the street. WorldCat locates five copies of other years, but none of this 1868 edition. Possibly unique survivor of one of American  showdom’s greatest spectacles. $275-350 

24-26. A Century of Assorted Ephemera.

From about 1850 to 1960, a collection of ephemera illustrating American life, from the fields of sports, politics, consumer goods,  business, black history, games, cooking, war, machinery, Presidential, advertising, entertainment, places, old cars, world’s fairs, and  more. Over 350 items of photos, cards, booklets (hard and soft cover), envelopes, reward of merit cards, tickets, postcards, almanacs,  novelties, etc. Also some foreign. Some unique. Condition varied, but generally very good and better. Request  detailed list of items. $200-300 (collection) 

24-27. Immigrants to the Old West: Antique California Bottles.

Pair of thick, glazed ceramic bottles found on site of Chinese laborers’ camp in California. 19th century,  believed imported from China. Contained beer. Grey-white, approximately 8¾” tall; narrow neck, originally  had cork top. Few small brown superficial spots, likely from crude manufacture, else very fine. Unusual  conversation pieces, and social history relics, relating to this major wave of immigrants that helped build the  Old West. $90-130 (2 pcs.) 

Go to Section 25: Antiquities