It never rains in southern California. That's how the song goes and that's the way it was in Pasadena, site of the Rose Bowl Parade and the Rose Bowl two months ago and the ABAA Antiquarian Book Fair a few weeks back. The weather for the fair was gorgeous, the hotels close to the convention center, the restaurants satisfactory. The hardest thing about the trip was controlling the TV remote in my hotel room that did everything it could to deliver a paid channel when the free ones were sufficient. The Oakland Airport, in the San Francisco penumbra, offered quick and frequent Southwest non-stops to the Bob Hope Airport in Burbank that is only twenty minutes by cab to downtown Pasadena. Getting there was easy. Not buying - that was more difficult.
This year the ABAA fair moved from downtown LA into the southern California countryside, to Pasadena, a place once nearby to the entire LA metro but now made distant by the heavy traffic. Landing at Burbank trumped the driving problem by being a slim 20 minutes by taxi to the recently rebuilt Pasadena Convention Center.
The show opened to the public on Friday, February 12th at 3:00 pm. Admission for the first day with return privileges for the next two was $25. Exhibiting members were given plenty of free passes that they tried hard to give to other exhibitor's best customers. Their own best customers were much less likely to receive one. After all, who would invite their best customers into a bookseller's feeding frenzy? Nevertheless, the traffic was solid, the $25 an insufficient barrier to keep the motivated away.
The entrance was at the near corner of the exhibition site and its position fed most traffic straight down isle one along the right hand wall. Lucky exhibitors in this row would see and be seen by virtually every guest. After a while the traffic, having rounded the turn at the end of that row made its way back up row two. At the top of row two the flow naturally turned to proceed down isle three. In total there were eight isles and as you might expect progress was slow. I started at 3:00 and by 8:00 pm, when the closing bell sounded, had browsed five isles. On Saturday the fair opened at 11:00 am and I walked to the far row and worked my way back. The final three rows took three hours, my visit concluding at 2:00 pm. I then caught a taxi back to the airport and took a Southwest flight at 3:20 arriving in Oakland at 4:05 pm. Efficient.
DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800
Freeman’s | Hindman Western Manuscripts and Miniatures July 8, 2025
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FRANCESCO PETRARCH (b. Arezzo, 20 July 1304; d. Arqua Petrarca, 19 July 1374). $20,000-30,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF THE VITAE IMPERATORUM (active Milan, 1431-1459). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF ATTAVANTE DEGLI ATTAVANTI (GABRIELLO DI VANTE) (active Florence, c. 1452-c. 1520/25). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FOLLOWER OF HERMAN SCHEERE (active London, c. 1405-1425). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. An exceptionally rare, illuminated music leaf from a Mozarabic Antiphonal with sister leaves mostly in museum collections. $11,500-14,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Exceptional leaf from a prestigious Antiphonary by a leading illuminator of the late Duecento. $11,500-14,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF MS REID 33 and SELWERD ABBEY SCRIPTORIUM (AGNES MARTINI?) (active The Netherlands, Groningen, c. 1468-1510). $10,000-15,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Previously unknown illumination from one of the most renowned Gothic Choir Book sets of the Middle Ages. $6,000-8,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern Now through July 10, 2025
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Book of Hours by the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht, Use of Sarum, in Latin, Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c.1450. £20,000 to £30,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Albert Einstein. Autograph letter signed, to Attilio Palatino, on his research into General Relativity, 12 May 1929. £12,000 to £18,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: John Gould. The Birds of Europe, [1832-] 1837, 5 volumes, contemporary half morocco, subscriber’s copy. £40,000 to £60,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern Now through July 10, 2025
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Ian Fleming. A collection of James Bond first editions, 8 volumes in all. £8,000 to £12,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue. £50,000 to £70,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.R.R. Tolkien. Autograph letter signed, to Amy Ronald, on Pauline Baynes's map of Middle Earth, 1970. £7,000 to £10,000.