• Potter & Potter Auctions
    How History Unfolds on Paper:
    Choice Selections from the Eric C. Caren Collection
    Part IX
    April 18, 2024
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: [RUTH, George Herman “Babe” (1895-1948)]. Signed photograph. Circa 1930s. 191 x 248 mm. $1,500 to $2,500.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: HARRISON, Benjamin. Document signed (“Benj Harrison”) as governor of Virginia, certifying the service of Daniel Cumbo, a Black Revolutionary soldier. $6,000 to $9,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: ONE OF THE FIRST PRINTED ANNOUNCEMENTS OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE. $4,000 to $6,000.
    Potter & Potter Auctions
    How History Unfolds on Paper:
    Choice Selections from the Eric C. Caren Collection
    Part IX
    April 18, 2024
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: FIRST PRINTING OF LINCOLN’S IMMORTAL GETTYSBURG ADDRESS. $4,000 to $6,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: HIGHLY IMPORTANT MORMON ARCHIVE. ALLEY, George. Archive of 23 Autograph Letters Signed by Mormon Convert George Alley to His Brother Joseph Alley. $10,000 to $20,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: [AVIATION]. [ARMSTRONG, Neil A.] Aviation Hall of Fame Gold Medal MS64 NGC, Awarded to Neil Armstrong in 1979. $2,000 to $3,000.
    Potter & Potter Auctions
    How History Unfolds on Paper:
    Choice Selections from the Eric C. Caren Collection
    Part IX
    April 18, 2024
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: NEWLY DISCOVERED FIRST PRINTING OF "WITH MALICE TOWARDS NONE... " FROM THE ONLY NEWSPAPER ACTUALLY ALLOWED TO PARTICIPATE IN LINCOLN’S SECOND INAUGURAL PROCESSION. $4,000 to $8,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: THE MOST IMPORTANT GEORGE WASHINGTON DOCUMENT IN PRIVATE HANDS; GEORGE WASHINGTON’S COMMISSION AS COMMANDER IN CHIEF, 1775, ONE OF ONLY TWO ORIGINALS. $150,000 to $250,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: A VERY RARE ACCOUNT OF BLACKBEARD’S DEATH AND ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT PIRATE ITEMS EXTANT. $3,000 to $5,000.
    Potter & Potter Auctions
    How History Unfolds on Paper:
    Choice Selections from the Eric C. Caren Collection
    Part IX
    April 18, 2024
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: EDISON, Thomas. Patent for Edison’s Improvements on the Electric-Light, No. 219,628. [Washington, D.C.: U.S. Patent Office], 16 September 1879. $2,000 to $3,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: [VIETNAM WAR]. The original pen used by Secretary of State William P. Rogers to sign the Vietnam Peace Agreement, Paris, 27 January 1973. $10,000 to $15,000.
    Potter & Potter, Apr. 18: SONS OF LIBERTY FOUNDER COLONEL BARRÉ ANNOTATED TITLE-PAGE, “WHICH OUGHT TO ROUSE UP BRITISH ATTENTION”. $4,000 to $6,000.
  • Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A RUTH BADER GINSBURG BEADED JUDICIAL COLLAR. $80,000 - $120,000
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: ONLY KNOWN COPY OF THE ONLY BOOK BY THE REMARKABLE EVE ADAMS. $8,000 - $12,000
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A COMPLETE RUN OF VISIONAIRE MAGAZINE THROUGH 2010. $6,000 - $9,000
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: LAW REVIEW OFFPRINT SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY RUTH BADER GINSBURG. $3,000 - $5,000
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: META REBNER'S WORKING SCRIPT OF THE LOVED ONE. $1,500 - $2,000
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A KATHY GROVE PORTRAIT OF CYNDI LAUPER FOR THE FEBRUARY 1989 DETAILS COVER. $800 - $1,200
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A PLASTIC COAT BY MILLIE DAVID FEATURED IN SOHO NEWS STYLE SECTION, FROM THE COLLECTION OF ANNIE FLANDERS. $500 - $700
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A RUTH BADER GINSBURG JEWELRY BOX. $600 - $900
    Bonhams, Mar. 22 – Apr. 2: A SET OF JONI MITCHELL LYRICS FOR "IF I HAD A HEART." $2,000 - $3,000
  • Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: [Langland (William)]. The vision of Pierce Plowman, nowe the seconde time imprinted..., Roberte Crowley, 1550. £8,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: [Shakespeare (William)]. [Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies], second folio edition, [by Tho.Cotes, for Robert Allot], [1632]. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Bible, Czech Biblia Bohemica, first complete Bible printed in the Czech vernacular, Prague, August 1488. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Shabthai Tzvi.- Collection of four printed and illustrated broadsides detailing the appearance, rise and fall of the false messiah, Shabthai Tzvi, Augsburg, 1666-67. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Leaf from the Beauvais Missal, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on parchment, [Northern France (perhaps Beauvais or Amiens)], [fourteenth century (c.1310)]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Aubrey (John). [Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme], manuscript in English, Latin and Greek, [c. 1693]. £30,000 to £50,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Poems on Various Occasions, first edition, Harriet Maltby's copy, Newark, Printed by S. & J. Ridge, 1807. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Hobbit, first edition, second impression with dust-jacket, 1937 [but 1938]. £7,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Blake (William).- Thornton (Robert John). The Pastorals of Virgil, 2 vol., engraved plates by William Blake, 1821. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: America.- Mount (William J.) & Thomas Page. The English Pilot…, [bound with] The Fourth Book, describing The West Indies Navigation from Hudson's-Bay to the River Amazones, 1721. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Oldfield (Henry Ambrose), Rajman Singh Chitrakar & others. An album of 160 photographs and 13 original artworks, (1833-1919), [c. 1850s-1880s]. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Audubon (John James) [and William MacGillivray]. Ornithological Biography…, 5 vol., first edition, presentation copy inscribed by Audubon, Edinburgh, 1831-49 [i.e. 1831-39]. £10,000 to £15,000.
  • 19th Century Shop
    Catalogue 198 just published
    19th Century Shop. Darwin and Wallace, first printing of the first paper on natural selection
    19th Century Shop. Shakespeare’s Poems, first collected edition
    19th Century Shop. Walt Whitman portrait inscribed with a Leaves of Grass poem
    19th Century Shop. Major Elizabeth Barrett Browning manuscript notebook
    19th Century Shop. Spock's Baby Book, original MS
    19th Century Shop. Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica, the great celestial atlas

Rare Book Monthly

Articles - October - 2013 Issue

American History: Up for Sale on the 10th

Opportunities on the 10th

Swann Galleries

New York

Sale 2324

 

There are auctions and there are auctions.  Some matter more than others.  Some matter more than most.  If you are an Americana collector Swann’s sale of printed and manuscript material is that rare sale that contains hundreds of obscure and interesting items with estimates that are modest.  They offer such sales periodically and consistently sell more than 80%.  This sale has the potential to reach 90%.  For Swann its good business, for the future of paper collectibles the opportunity for new collectors to join the fray, for emerging collectors to intensify their focuses, and for serious collectors to consider material they rarely see.  This sale will attract intense interest.

Part of the appeal is the array of formats.  Broadsides and wanted posters are as welcome as rare maps.  Manuscript accounts, many of them intensely interesting, are sprinkled throughout the 379 lots.  There are early children’s books and an 1814 broadside printing of the Star Spangled Banner.  There are murder accounts and a sammelband of 128 Lincoln’s speeches.  Buffalo, New York, that was once the thriving western entrance and outlet of the Erie Canal sees a search of its name yield a rare concentration of possibilities.

 

Here are some randomly selected items drawn from the entire sale:

 

Lot 204

Defence of fort M’Henry

EARLY BROADSIDE PRINTING OF THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER [KEY, FRANCIS SCOTT.] Defence of Fort M'Henry.Letterpress handbill, 8 1/2 x 5 1/2 inches; three pieces of clear tape in margins; minor folds and foxing; untrimmed; two contemporary pencil signatures of "Sam Hays" in lower margin. Np: "For sale at the office of the Chronicle," [1814]

 

Lot 214a

POSSIBLY THE FIRST PAMPHLET PRINTING OF THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS [LINCOLN, ABRAHAM.] Everett, Edward. An Oration Delivered on the Battlefield of Gettysburg.Plan of the cemetery on page [32]. 48 pages. 8vo, publisher's limp cloth gilt, minor spotting and wear; hinges split, minor foxing, minimal dampstaining on top edge, 2 pencil corrections made to Everett's speech on page 24. New York: Baker & Godwin, 1863

Estimate $20,000 - 30,000 

 

Lot 215

VERY EARLY PRINTING OF THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION LINCOLN, ABRAHAM. By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation. 2 printed pages, 13 x 8 1/4 inches, on one folding sheet; stab holes in margins, minor soiling and a spot of dampstaining along the lower margin; signed in type by Lincoln and William H. Seward, with a printed transmittal note on second page addressed in manuscript and signed by William H. Seward as Secretary of State. [Washington], 3 January 1863

Estimate $15,000 - 25,000 

 

Lot 219

LINCOLN, ABRAHAM. A bound compilation of political speeches and tracts, including Lincoln's inaugural and Cooper Union speeches. 128 pamphlets in one volume. 8vo, contemporary 1/2 calf, moderate wear; intermittent foxing; early Australian bookplate and later notes on front pastedown. Vp, 1856-61

Estimate $600 – 900

 

Lot 225

(MARITIME.) [Applebee, Mary.] A Narrative of the Wreck of the Schooner New Connecticut on Lake Erie. Illustrated title page. 14 pages. 8vo, stitched; dampstained, worn, crudely trimmed touching three letters; modern bookplate on verso of title page. Buffalo, NY: H.A. Salisbury, 1834

Estimate $300 - 400

 

Lot 231

(MARITIME.) Witted, James G. A Particular Account of the Loss of the Packet Ship L.Z. of New York. 48 pages. 8vo, original printed wrappers, moderate soiling and wear; foxing; early gift inscription on verso of title page, modern bookplate on inside front wrapper. Buffalo, NY: Jewett, Thomas & Co., 1850

Estimate $200 - 300 

 

Lot 247

(NATURAL HISTORY.) Hough, Romeyn Beck. The American Woods, Volumes I through XII (of 14), and The American Woods, Commercial Woods, Volumes I and II. Together, 14 slipcases, containing a total of 14 descriptive pamphlets and 1062 wood samples mounted in 354 cards. 8vo, publisher's cloth, moderate wear, the final 2 cases in 1/2 morocco as issued, upper backstrip worn on Volume X, lacking clasps on Volumes I and X; the sample cards generally quite well preserved, a few wood samples with minor splits or chips; the first 12 volumes with original owner's full or partial paper spine labels and bookplates. Lowville, NY, 1893-1916

Estimate $8,000 - 12,000 

 

Lot 248

(NATURAL HISTORY.) Peale, Rembrandt. Account of the Skeleton of the Mammoth, a Non-Descript Carnivorous Mammal of Immense Size found in America. 16mo, disbound and resewn; tightly trimmed, minimal dampstaining. London, 1802

Estimate $600 - 900 

 

Lot 257

(NEW YORK.) Hosack, David. Memoir of De Witt Clinton. Hand-colored map of the Erie Canal, 2 plates. 4to, contemporary 1/2 morocco, moderate wear; large-paper copy; foxing, redolent of fine cigars; signed gift inscription on half-title from the author to Secretary of the Treasury Richard Rush. Howes H654; Sabin 33088. New York, 1829

Estimate $300 - 400

 

Lot 258

(NEW YORK.) Colden, Cadwallader D. Memoir . . . of the Completion of the New York Canals, bound with the 1826 appendix as issued. 5 maps, 40 plates, 8 facsimile plates. 4to, 1/4 calf, attractively rebacked over early marbled boards; minor foxing, closed tears to both folding colored maps; inked owner's stamps on title page, page 101, and the verso of the first map. New York, 1825-26

Estimate $1,000 - 1,500 

This volume was issued to commemorate the opening of the canal. A grand celebration was held in which a bottle of water from Lake Erie was poured into the Atlantic. Among the facsimile letters are responses to the committee from John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, just weeks before their deaths. Howes C562 ("aa"); Sabin 14279. with--engraved invitation to the Canal Celebration Ball, 7 November 1825, completed in manuscript.

 

Lot 304

(SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING.) Greatest Wonder of the Age! Prof. Morse's Electro Magnetic Telegraph!! Letterpress broadside, 8 1/2 x 5 3/4 inches; minor toning, laid down on later board; date completed in manuscript. Albany, NY, 6 February 1845

Estimate $500 - 750 

 

And there is more.  Bystanders who may wonder what is interesting about American history can, in this sale, see first hand why so many scholars, institutions, collectors and dealers find the material fascinating.

 

Flickering Images:

21.   Rinehart photograph

41.   Officer's diary and portrait

129.  Bottomly CW Archive

178.  India Ghristina

197.  1683 Hennepin

203.  Kennedy memoir

293.  Haymarket martyrs

327.  Sumner portrait

356.  Whaling log

383.  Gage Narrative 

 

Links:

 

To AE auction search

 

 

To the Swann Catalogue

 

 

Swann contact info:

Rick Statler

212 254-4710, Ext. 27

rstatler@swanngalleries.com

 

 

 

Rare Book Monthly

  • Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Alken (Henry). Sporting Notions, first edition, T.McLean, 1832-33. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Bardi (Lorenzo). Nuova Raccolta delle piu interessanti Vedute della Citta di Firenze…, Florence, Lorenzo Bardi, [c.1840]. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Crawfurd (John). Journal of an Embassy from the Governor-General of India to the Court of Ava..., first edition, 1829. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Dawe (George, engraver). The Life of a Nobleman, first edition, Geo. Henderson, [c.1825]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: [Doyle (John)], "H.B.". Political Sketches &c., 10 vol. including The Descriptive Key to H.B., Thomas McLean, [1829-51]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Eben (Adolphus Christian Frederick, Baron von) and Nicolaus Heideloff. Modèles de l'Uniforme Militaire Adopté dans l'Armée Royale de Suède, Rudolph Ackerman, 1808. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Geissler (J.G.G.) and Friedrich Hempel. Mahlerische Darstellungen der Sitten, Gebrauche und Lustbarkeiten bey den Russischen, Tartarischen…, 4 parts in 1, Leipzig and Paris, [1804]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Hunt (Charles). Portraits of Winning Horses...of the Derby, Oaks, & St. Leger, from the Year 1842 to 1849…, Rock Brothers & Payne, 1849. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Kunike (Adolf Friedrich). Zwey hundert und sechzig Donau-Ansichten nach dem Laufe des Donaustromes…, Vienna, Leopold Grund, 1826. £3,000 to £5,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Lasinio (Carlo). [Matrimony], Florence, 1790. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Reinhardt (Joseph). A Collection of Swiss Costumes, in Miniature, second English edition, James Goodwin, [1828]. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Wengen (Gottfried Durst von). Die Öffentliche Maskerade Bamberg am Fastnachts-Montage 1833…, Bamberg, [1833]. £2,000 to £3,000.
  • Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
    Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ian Fleming. Live and Let Die. First Edition. 9,500 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter Series. Finely Bound First Printing Set of Complete Series. 5,650 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell to Arms. First Edition, First Printing. 4,200 USD

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