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Books > Americana & Canadiana (258 items)
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 ADAMS, Ansel Easton (1902-1984)
Parmelian Prints of the High Sierras
San Francisco: [letterpress printed by the Grabhorn Press] Jean Chambers Moore publisher, August 1927. Quarto (13 x 10 1/4 inches). [6]pp. of quarto letterpress (p.[1] title with an armorial vignette printed in blue and gilt, p.[2] printing details, including limitation, p.[3] dedication to Albert M. Bender, p.[4 blank], p.[5] 'Plate Titles', p.[6 blank]); 18 'parmelian' or gelatin silver-print photographs, printed by Ansel Adams on 'parchment' paper (the images measuring 5¾ x 7¾ inches, the sheets measuring 10 x 12 inches). Each photograph with a letterpress title printed in the margin beneath, and each photograph tipped into a folded folio sheet (13 x 10 1/4 inches when folded), with a more detailed letterpress caption. . First 6pp. stitched, otherwise unbound as issued, now all within a later black cloth portfolio in the style of the original, blocked in gilt with the title on the upper cover, golden shot-silk liners and flaps, with the original black cloth upper cover also laid in. Modern half black morocco box. Provenance: inscribed "Ansel Adams / San Francisco / 4-9-80" on dedication leaf.
An inscribed copy of this classic of western photography probably limited to no more than about 75 copies: a landmark work in twentieth-century photography and in the career of Ansel Adams, containing beautiful images of Yosemite and the Sierras.
Parmelian prints of the High Sierras is Adams' first published portfolio, and contains a number of his best known images. The phrase "Parmelian prints" was constructed by the publisher and used in preference to, say, "Photographic prints" in an effort to raise Adams' work above the level of the standard silver gelatin prints. Adams was evidently very happy with the results, writing to his wife "My photographs have now reached a stage when they are worthy of the worlds critical examination. I have suddenly come upon a new style which I believe will place my work equal to anything of its kind."
Ansel Adams (1902-1984) was born in San Francisco and first visited Yosemite in 1916. He returned the following year with photographic equipment, and beginning in 1919 he was the custodian of the Sierra Club's headquarters in Yosemite for four years. Adams spent these years hiking and photographing Yosemite and the Sierras. He published his first photographic prints in 1921 and worked to develop a realistic quality in his images, though he still planned on a career as a pianist. Adams' career as a photographer took a quantum leap in 1926 when the San Francisco businessman and philanthropist Albert Bender encountered his work and suggested that they should published in a portfolio. Bender arranged for Jean Chambers Moore to publish the work, and for Edwin and Robert Grabhorn, of whom Bender was also a patron, to produce the necessary letterpress text.
Within hours, Bender had sold fifty-six of the portfolios, and eventually a contract was drawn up which specified that 150 portfolios should be produced (this is the figure printed in the limitation information on the verso of the title). In the event, only about one hundred sets of the prints were completed by Adams but some were destroyed in a warehouse fire, and a total of only approximately seventy-five portfolios were offered for sale. Adams printed his images on Kodak Vitava Athena Grade T Parchment, a cream-colored, gelatin silver paper that is translucent when held up to light. This translucency, together with the wide tonal range give the whole series a captivating ethereal quality. Included among the prints are some of Adams' most iconic images, including the majestic "Monolith: the face of Half Dome", and pictures of "El Capitan" and "The Sentinel".
The prints (with the detailed titles taken from the folded folio leaves) are:
1) "Sierra Junipers / Upper Merced Basin / Yosemite Valley"
2) "The Abode of Snow / From Glacier Point / Yosemite Valley"
3) "Monolith: / The Face of Half Dome / Yosemite Valley"
4) "From Glacier Point / Yosemite Valley"
5) "On the Heights / Yosemite Valley"
6) "A Grove of Tamarack Pine / Near Timber Line"
7) "Mount Galen Clark / Yosemite Park"
8) "Mount Clarence King / Southern Sierra"
9) "Roaring River Falls / Kings' River Canyon"
10) "Marion Lake / Southern Sierra"
11) "El Capitan / Yosemite Valley"
12) "Banner Peak / Thousand Island Lake / Central Sierra"
13) "Mount Brewer / Southern Sierra"
14) "Kearsarge Pinnacles / Southern Sierra"
15) "The Sentinel / Yosemite Valley"
16) "Lower Paradise Valley / Southern Sierra"
17) "East Vidette / Southern Sierra"
18) "Cloud and Mountain / Marion Lake, Southern Sierra"
Grabhorn Bibliography 95.
#20904 $110,000.00  
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ADAMS, John Quincy
[Autograph letter, signed, to Ward Nicholas Boylston discussing the Boylston prize at Harvard and University politics]
Washington. May 24, 1819. [3]pp. Quarto, on a folded folio sheet.Old fold lines. Minor soiling to third page, but generally quite clean. Very good plus.
J.Q. Adams on Harvard Politics
A fine and lengthy letter written by Secretary of State John Quincy Adams to his father's cousin and close friend, Ward Nicholas Boylston, on awarding the Boylston prize just founded by him, and discussing candidates for a Harvard professorship. Adams graduated from Harvard and was himself a professor of rhetoric there between diplomatic assignments. He writes:
"I have observed with pleasure and gratitude your persevering efforts of beneficence to the University at Cambridge, and have heard of the Institution of your Prizes for Elocution, which cannot but be attended with effects. Its operation by experience may perhaps suggest some rules for the distribution of the Prizes, which, if you should conclude to make the Institution permanent, you may think it advisable to prescribe. Would it not for instance be useful to direct, that if one of the undergraduates should obtain one of the first prizes, he should not upon a succeeding year be admitted as a competitor to speak in the same language? And would it not be proper to enlarge the circle of languages in which the pieces may be spoken - at least by admitting the French? From the experience which I have had of the defects most common among the young orators, I think it should be prescribed as an inflexible rule that no prompting should be allowed; and that whatever merit any of the speakers might display, no prize should be given in any case where a failure of memory should be perceptible."
Adams goes on to discuss his ideas regarding the Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory, specifically that the candidate be well qualified for the office, not just "for any quality required by the place...the corporation of Harvard University, though including some of the best men in the world, is and for many years has been more of a Caucus Club than a literary and scientific society... When they have a place to fill their question is not, Who is fit for the place, but Who is to be provided for? and their whole range of candidates is a Parson or a Partizan or both."
A fine, lengthy letter, written out in Adams' distinctive hand
#23719$14,500.00
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 ADLUM, John (1759-1836)
A Memoir on the Cultivation of the Vine in America, and the Best Mode of Making Wine
Washington, DC: William Greer, 1828. 12mo (7 x 4 1/4 inches). 179, [1] pp. Errata page on verso of the terminal leaf. Engraved folding frontispiece reproducing a letter from Thomas Jefferson to the author. (Light foxing). Contemporary black morocco-backed marbled paper covered boards, spine ruled and lettered in gilt.
The enlarged second edition of the first American book on wine making.
Adlum was a pioneering American agriculturalist, a promoter of American winemaking, and an early proponent of government-sponsored scientific and agricultural research in the Federal Period. After serving in the Revolutionary War and working on several early state surveys, he established a 200-acre farm and vineyard in Georgetown. There, he devoted most of his remaining years to the study and cultivation of American grapes and wine-making techniques. Adlum provided Thomas Jefferson with vine clippings and bottles of his wine.
The second edition of the first American book devoted to viticulture, after the first of 1823, contains significant additions and revisions. This second edition includes letters written to Adlum by Thomas Jefferson, and the identification for the first time of the Catawba (a native American grape) as Adlum's prize winemaking grape. Scarce and important, both in the history of viticulture and in the development of American natural history.
Rink 1499; American Imprints 31902; Longone & Longone, American Cookbooks, p.44 and N1
#24050$5,000.00
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 [ALAMAN, Lucas (1792-1853)]
Memoria de la Secretaria de Estado y del Despacho de Relaciones Interiores y Exteriores, Presentada...en la de Diputados el Dia 7, y en la de Senadores el 8 de Enero de 1831
Mexico: Imprenta del Aguila, 1831. Small folio (11 x 8 inches). [2],53,[22]pp. Wood-engraved crest of Mexico on the title. Contemporary Mexican red morocco, covers with a decorative gilt roll-tool border, the flat spine divided into four compartments by gilt fillets and roll tools, the compartments with repeat decoration of a single small centrally-placed flower-spray tool, gilt turn-ins, green embossed silk pastedowns and free endpapers, gilt edges.
An important official commentary on the state of the Mexican Republic, just prior to the Texas Revolution: here in a deluxe presentation binding.
This scarce annual report on the state of Mexico by Lucas Alaman (1792-1853), Minister of Interior and Exterior Relations, was issued during a time of unrest in the republic, particularly with the growing resentment among Texas settlers. Alaman was a controversial figure in 19th-century Mexico. A scientist, politician, historian, diplomat, and writer, he was conservative by nature and expressed a nostalgia for monarchic rule. He was an influential politician in the early years of the Mexican Republic and favored a strong central government. Alaman was also instrumental in the creation of the Mexican National Archives and the Natural History Museum in Mexico City. This report reviews foreign relations, and lauds the republic's domestic tranquility, prosperity and freedoms.
Palau 160863.
#23332$2,750.00
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 ALLEN, John Fisk (1785-1865)
Victoria Regia; or the Great Water Lily of America. With a brief account of its discovery and introduction into cultivation: with illustrations by William Sharp, from specimens grown at Salem, Massachusetts, U.S.A.
Boston: printed and published for the author by Dutton & Wentworth, 1854. Folio (27 5/8 x 21 1/4 inches). Letterpress title (verso blank), 1p. dedication to Caleb Cope (verso blank), 12pp. text (numbered [5]-16); 1p. index, plate list, note and errata (verso blank). The text printed in gold throughout. 6 chromolithographed plates by Sharp & Sons of Dorchester, Mass.(5 after William Sharp, 1 after Allen). Early half calf over purple pebble-grained cloth covered boards by F. Sissons of Worksop, England (with their label on the front pastedown), with contemporary red morocco gilt title label on the upper cover.
A monument to American colour printing, a work which launched the age of chromolithography as an art in the United States, and one of the most beautiful flower books ever produced. This an extraordinary copy with the text printed in gold throughout, believed to have been done for presentation and known only by Allen's own copy.
The Victoria Regia; or the Great Water Lily of America, provides an appropriate showcase for this gigantic water lily, first discovered along the Amazon River and then taken to Britain for cultivation. The so-called "vegetable wonder" was first described by Sir R.H.Schomburg in 1837. From the details he gave, the botanist John Lindley suggested that the lily was a new genera and put forward the name Victoria Regia in honour of Queen Victoria during the first year of her reign. "The giant water-lily is a spectacular flower; nineteenth century commentators describe with amazement the vast dimensions of its floating leaves, which could exceed two meters in diameter, and its great white flower, which opened in the evening and closed again at dawn in a truly lovely spectacle" (Oak Spring Flora.).
In 1853, Allen, a well-respected horticulturalist and author of a treatise on viticulture, cultivated a seed from the water-lily given him by Caleb Cope, president of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, and the man in whose garden the water-lily first flowered in America on 21 August 1851. Working at his home in Salem, Massachusetts, Allen tended the seed from January to July, when, on the evening of July 21st, the flower finally bloomed. Motivated by his success, Allen hoped to make the glory of the water-lily available to a wider audience, and engaged the services of William Sharp, a British-born artist and pioneer of chromolithography then working in Boston.
Sharp had been practicing with the new technique of chromolithography as early as 1841, the first person to do so in the United States. His early efforts can be seen in Mattson's The American Vegetable Practice (1841), but, as McGrath states, those chromolithographs are merely "passable." Fortunately, Sharp improved his technique, and his next major project, the plates for Hovey's The Fruits of America (1852), demonstrated to all who viewed them the colourful and dramatic potential of chromolithography. Still, the process was in its infancy, and it would take a work of tremendous ambition to satisfactorily popularise the technique.
Allen's proposed book on the water-lily provided such a vehicle. Though the first plate of the Victoria Regia is based on a sketch Allen composed himself, the remaining five plates, which show the gradual development of the flowers from bud to full bloom, are wholly attributable to Sharp. Superlative in concept, colour, and execution, they became the first benchmark of the art. "In the large water lily plates of Victoria Regia, Sharp printed colors with a delicacy of execution and technical brillance never before achieved in the United States" (Reese, Stamped with a National Character).
This extraordinary copy of the great work has the text printed in gold throughout. The only other comparable copy which we have been able to locate is recorded in the 5 May 1913 Annual Report of the Essex Institute (now part of the Peabody Essex Museum): "From the estate of Misses Elizabeth C. and Marion C. Allen of this city the Institute has received Mr. John Fisk Allen's own copy of his finely illustrated monograph on the 'Victoria Regia' which was printed in gold ink." That the author's own copy was similarly printed in gold suggests that such copies were of a very special nature, and were probably produced for presentation. While the provenance of this copy is unknown, given the contemporary English binding, it seems likely that this copy had been sent to England by Allen to a botanist as esteemed as Joseph Hooker, Joseph Paxton, or another as intimately involved in the cultivation of the famed water lily.
Great Flower Books (1990) p.69; Hofer Bequest 72; Hunt Printmaking in the Service of Botany 56; Nissen BBI 16; Reese Stamped with a National Character 19; Stafleu & Cowan TL2 85; Tomasi An Oak Spring Flora 106.
#22037$75,000.00
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AMERICAN REVOLUTION - British Act of Parliament
[The Stamp Act]
London: Mark Baskett, 1765. Folio. [2], 279-310 pp. . Disbound, housed in a clamshell box.
Very rare first printing of the Stamp Act
Macaulay wrote that the Stamp Act of 1765 will be remembered as long as the globe lasts. It marked a sharp break from the past as the first direct, internal tax ever to be laid on the colonies by Parliament; indeed, the first tax of any sort other than customs duties (Morison, 185). Parliaments plan for this tax to be imposed on paper used for all manner of articles ... had its first reading in the Commons (before a half-empty House) in early February 1765, with enactment set for November the same year. What Parliament did not realize, however, was that the Stamp Act sparked the beginning of the end of British America. To scores of enraged colonials, the Stamp Act seemed to announce not just an illegal tax but also a gag on the production and distribution of free political information (Schama 457-8). It is not too much to say that the American Revolution began… with resistance to the Stamp Act (Smith I:257).
In the Virginia Assembly, on Wednesday, May 29, 1765, a copy of the Stamp Act was introduced… According to tradition, Patrick Henry drafted seven resolutions onto a blank leaf of an old law book he had on hand… Standing in the lobby doorway Thursday, as Henry presented and defended these resolutions, Thomas Jefferson heard a speech he would remember for a lifetime. To Jefferson, passage of the Stamp Act threatened to destroy the foundation on which his knowledge was based. If acts of Parliament undermined the fundamental basis of English law, what law remained? If Parliament usurped the colonists rights as Englishmen, what rights did they have? (Hayes, 76, 82). At the same time angry Massachusetts patriots called for a Stamp Act Congressthe first spontaneous movement toward colonial union that came from Americans themselves (Morison, 187). John Adams would write that the enormous engine fabricated by the British Parliament for battering down all the rights and liberties of America, I mean the Stamp Act, has raised and spread through the continent a spirit that will be recorded to our honor, with all future generations (McCullough, 62). In England, seeking repeal of the Stamp Act, Benjamin Franklin… joked that he could make the Act meet his approval with a single change to its text: where the document stated the year the act would take effectone thousand seven hundred and sixty-fivedelete the word one and replace it with two (Hayes, 81). When called before the bar of the House in London and asked what would be the result if the Act were not repealed, Franklin answered candidly but devastatingly, The total loss of the respect and affection the people of America bear to this country. Franklin, however, had already come to believe that time was emphatically not on Britains side (Schama, 461). Although Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in 1766, ultimately the only way for the American colonists to solve their differences with Great Britain was to tear away from it completely. Doing that meant war (Hayes, 166). Printed in gothic type (indicative of first edition). These first printings, from the Fourth and Fifth Sessions of the Twelfth Parliament, are from its Sessional Volumes: the earliest and most accurate contemporary source of the texts, preceding all the American printings. Acts printed prior to 1796 are extremely scarce, since the maximum number printed was only around 1100 copies (see Report of the Committee for the Promulgation of the Statutes, 1796)
Sweet & Maxwell II:176; Church 1054; Stevens 6; Howes A285; Sabin 1606
#24466$24,000.00
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 [AMERICAN REVOLUTION, Broadside] - CONTINENTAL CONGRESS
In Congress, April 14, 1777. Resolved, that from and after the publication hereof, the second article of the 8th section, the first article of the 11th section, the 8th article of th 14th section, and the 2d article of the 18th section, of the Rules and articles for the better government of the troops ... passed in Congress, the 20th day of September, one thousand, seven hundred, and seventy-six, shall be and they are hereby repealed, and that the four following articles be substituted ...
[Philadelphia]: John Dunlap, 1777. Broadside, folio (13 1/2 x 7 1/2 inches). Signed in print by Charles Thomson. (Trimmed but with ample margins, minor stains). Unbound, as issued.
Rare broadside printing by Dunlap of extracts from the minutes of the Continental Congress relating to the rules and articles for the better government of troops.
The articles substituted relate to the military being allowed to bring food on the posts; officers being allowed to seek recourse for unfair treatment; no General Courts Martial sentences being executed until a report of the case has been transmitted to Congress; and the Continental General having the power to appoint General Courts Martials. Below the four amended articles are two additional resolutions. The first, under the dateline May 27, resolves "that the General and Commander in Chief for the time being shall have full power of pardoning or mitigating any of the punishments ordered to be inflicted..." The second, under the dateline June 17, resolves "that a General Officer, commanding in a separate Department, be impowered to grant pardons to, or order execution of, persons condemend to suffer death by General Courts Martial, without being obliged to report the matter to Congress, or the Commander in Chief." The bottom of the broadside is an attestation for the above "Extracts from the Minutes" which is signed in print by Charles Thomson.
Bristol cites but three known copies (Huntington Library, Massachusetts Historical Society, American Antiquarian Society).
Bristol B4625; Shipton and Mooney 43396; Church 1144; Evans 15662 (variant, with only the April 14 resolutions and signed in print by Hancock).
#24669$6,500.00
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 [AMERICAN REVOLUTION, Broadside] - Massachusetts House of Representatives.
State of Massachusetts-Bay. In the House of Representatives, June 23, 1780. Whereas the troops of the Southern States will now be needed for the defence of that quarter, and by reason of the late advantages obtained by the enemy, we are compelled to call for a further supply of men, to fill up our battalions, which General Washington has earnestly requested...
[Boston: John Gill, 1780]. Broadside (15 1/4 x 9 1/2 inches). Signed in print by John Hancock and John Avery.
Rare broadside calling for enlistments of troops for the southern campaign.
Beginning in December 1779, the British began moving from the northeast and mid-Atlantic, beginning the southern theatre of the war which culminated at Yorktown. As the British troops moved south, and battles began in that region, including the fall of Charleston, South Carolina, George Washington called on the colonies for a renewed increase in troops.
This broadside, calling for additional troops from Massachusetts's counties, continues: "...Though we have much to fear from indecision, yet we have every thing to hope from exertion -- nothing less than, at one stroke, to put a period to the war; for we have the fullest assurances of such aid from our illustrious Ally, as was never before on these shores: The hourly expectation of their arrival, and the late success of the enemy at the Southward, will push them, with the greatest precipitancy, to attempt those advantages they may hope to gain from our present situation..." The Ally referred to, was, of course, the French fleet under Rochambeau, which arrived at Newport on July 11, 1780.
Evans 16859; Ford 2245.
#24672$6,500.00
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 ANDREWS, Christopher Columbus (1829-1922)
Minnesota and Dacotah: in letters descriptive of a tour through the north-west, in the autumn of 1856. With information relative to public lands, and a table of statistics ... Second edition
Washington: Robert Farnham, 1857. Small octavo (7 1/4 x 4 1/2 inches). 215pp., with 1p. of publisher's advertisements. Extra-illustrated with three related newspaper cuttings, one pasted over the advertisements at the end, the two following on either side of the rear blank. Original dark brown cloth, the covers elaborately blocked in blind, the spine divided into compartments by blind rules, lettered in gilt in the second compartment.
Second edition of an early work by an influential figure in the development of the Mid-West.
Christopher Columbus Andrews was born in 1829 in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. Educated in New England and admitted to the bar in 1850, Andrews emigrated to Kansas in 1853, soon returning east to spend two years in Washington. Upon his return to the West, he made the tour described in this work and soon settled in St. Cloud, Minnesota. He was active in state politics and, despite his support of Stephen Douglas in the election of 1860, worked on behalf of Lincoln's administration. After enlisting in the Civil War as a private, he was quickly commissioned, had an outstanding military career, and rose to the rank of Brevet Major-General. In later years he practiced law and served abroad in various diplomatic posts.
This work describes his travels in the Minnesota Territory and encounters with various Indian tribes.
Howes A253; Sabin 1488
#23979$125.00
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 APPLETON, D.
Appleton's General Guide to the United States and Canada. Illustrated with Railway Maps, Plans of Cities, and Table of Railway and Steamboat Fares. Part I. New England and Middle States and Canada. Revised Each Year To Date of Issue.
New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1890.
This is one of the most extensive guides to eastern Canada, New England, and the mid-Atlantic states of the period. It is essentially a railroad guide, with time tables, and a description of the route along each rail line in the region. The town plans are of Baltimore, Boston, Montreal, New York, Philadelphia, Quebec, and Washington. Not in Howes nor Rumsey.
[with:] Appleton, D. Appleton's General Guide to the United States and Canada. Illustrated with Railway Maps, Plans of Cities, and Table of Railway and Steamboat Fares. Part II. Western and Southern States. Revised Each Year to Date of Issue. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1891. 389 (numbered 277-566), 19pp. plus fourteen maps and plans and 24pp. of ads. Illus. 16mo. Black and gilt-stamped blue cloth.
The companion volume to the preceding. The part were sold together, or separately, and were also issued in a one-volume format. The second part contains extensive information on California and the western states. Pages 427-32 are devoted to Texas. The city plans are of Charleston, Chicago, Cincinnati, New Orleans, St. Louis, San Francisco, and Savannah. Not in Howes. Rumsey lists an 1887 edition of Part II.
Rumsey 3765
#3117$650.00
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Copyright © 2002-2010 Donald A. Heald
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