Book Trade History

6pp, 8vo: with three pages beside one another on each side of a strip that folds in on itself. In fair condition, on lightly worn and discoloured paper. Front page with ‘Michael Fraenkel’ and list of five publications: ‘Death Is Not Enough / (Essays in Active Negation) / Werther’s Younger Brother / (The Story of an Attitude) / Death In A Room / (Poems 1927-1930) / Bastard Death / (The Autobiography of an Idea) / Hamlet, Volumes I and II / with HENRY MILLER’.

In his obituary of Low’s partner Robin Waterfield (Independent, 12 February 2002), James Fergusson describes Low as a ‘Scottish Polish Jewish bouquiniste’. The recipient Andrew Block’s obituary in ‘The Private Library’ was subtitled ‘the doyen of booksellers’; his business was established in 1911. Plain orange-yellow card, with Reynolds Stone oval medallion letterhead. Signed ‘David’ in red ink. Addressed, with postmark and stamp, to ‘Mr. Andrew Block / 30, Barter Street / London W.C.1.’ He enquires whether the ‘coloured drawings on rice paper’ he is sending are ‘merely Chinese’.

See Nicolas Barker’s appreciative obituary in the Independent, 7 April 1999, which notes that after selling his entire stock to the University of Texas in 1968, ‘He moved his business to the other side of Great Russell Street, and briefly opened another shop, selling prints in partnership with Rob Douwma.’ (The British Museum website states that ‘Weinreb & Douwma was on the corner of Great Russell Street and Bloomsbury Way during the 1970s and 1980s.’) The obituary of the recipient Andrew Block (1892-1987) in ‘The Private Library’ was subtitled ‘the doyen of booksellers’; his business w

See his obituary in the Guardian, 26 June 2019. The obituary of the recipient Andrew Block (1892-1987) in ‘The Private Library’ was subtitled ‘the doyen of booksellers’; his business was established in 1911. Plain postcard, with his letterhead and the following printed at the foot: ‘WANTED. Any English book, or any book printed in England, before 1700.’ Signed ‘Cecil Woolf.’ Aged and worn, with central vertical fold. Addressed, with stamp and postmark, to ‘Andrew Block, Esqre., / 20, Barter Street, / Holborn, W.C.1’.

Obl.12mo, 20 x 13cm, foxing but text legible. Dated 6 Oct 1903 with details in Anne Cobden-Sanderson's hand (as other handwritten detail) of two items purchased by Barker, both by J.W. Mackail and printed at the Chiswick Press: Socialism & Politics and Parting of the Ways. I've found no substantial discussion of the Hammersmith Publishing Company. See image for full text.

One page, 4to, fold mark, very good condition, Typed text: [...] I very much enjoyed myself, and so, apparently, did everyone who has written to me - except a somewhat illiterate gentleman who had never heard such drivel in all his life. | I thought John Freeman was extremely kind tp me. He has added in holograph: I've had five offers of copies of 'Sixty Years a Queen' ( whihc is apparently still available, as the Pakenhams immediately bought a copy, & confirmed that the picture in question was the Charge of the Heavy [underlined] Brigade.

Four pages including address panel, 4to, bifolium, edges dulled, a little foxing. He outlines what he has done (sending things?), in a one page letter, and, on the other two pages, given a detailed account of what he has done for the bookseller from December 1787 to May 1788, including "brochures" (pamphlets). The recipient has noted when he replied. See images on my website.

1p., 8vo. On aged paper worn at head. Customary printed Exchequer receipt, completed in manuscript, headed (manuscript text in square brackets): 'Annuities, 3700l. per Week. | Record' [19 Janu. 1715]'. Calculations in right-hand margin and clerical sign on reverse. Recording the payment by Sir Richard Onslow of £100 to 'Awnsham Churchill Attorney for mr ffra: Bennett & for selfe'.

32pp., 8vo. In good condition, lightly aged. A previous owner has thought well enough of this item to have it put in a sturdy binding of black cloth, with title in gilt on spine. The binding is in very good condition, but a bookplate has been removed from the front pastedown. An interesting catalogue (especially when compared with the staid British book catalogues of the period), with each of the 108 items presented, four to a page, each with accompanying photograph of the covers of the book. The most expensive item, at $100, is a 1902 first edition of 'The Cruise of the Dazzler'.

Robinson is the author of Ollier's entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in which he discusses the 'fifty titles' that Ollier and his brother James published between 1817 and 1823, and the others dating from his second stint as publisher between 1846 and 1849. The list is 10pp., 4to. In fair condition, on lightly-aged paper. Subtitle: '(*Indicates that U. of Delaware Library has in original, microform, or photo rpt.)' Robinson has given the date and his details in autograph at the head, and has starred items in 'urgently need' in red ink.

90pp., 8vo. Eleven plates and one full-page illustration in text. In good condition internally, on lightly-aged paper, in worn blue cloth gilt. Inscribed on front free endpaper: 'With the Author's compliments | March 5 1917'. Beneath the inscription in another hand: 'Presented to The Library of The Bookseller's Retreat. Abbots Langley.'

16pp., 12mo. Stabbed and unbound. In fair condition, on lightly-aged paper. The books, from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, are such as would adorn the shelves of a gentleman's country mansion. BBTI only has Bellchambers active in 1846, and there is a hint of desperation about the pricing, with the published price often given along with Bellchambers', and Ritson's 'Ancient Poetry' being offered at 'a very reduced price'. Scarce: no copies traced either on OCLC WorldCat or on COPAC.

Lucas's letter is 1p., 4to. In fair condition, lightly spotted. He informs Wilber that when he arrives at the office the following morning, he will find that 'the two portrait tablets of the late Sir Algernon Methuen, the founder of our firm, have been unveiled'. He explains that the tablets are 'a gift to the firm from Lady Methuen, whose wish is that each member of the staff should possess a copy of the accompanying Memoir'. The booklet is 13pp., 4to. With three plates including collotype frontispiece portrait of tablet of author.

24pp., 8vo. Pagination includes the wraps, which carry the last two pages. With frontispiece plate: 'Oscar Wilde | Unpublished Caricature | By Finch Mason | [item 31]'. In fair condition, on lightly-aged paper, in worn and chipped wraps. Wilde's name has been underlined in red pencil on cover.

16pp., 12mo. Stabbed and unbound. In good condition, on lightly-aged paper. Dated in pencil in a modern hand at head of first page. Eighteenth and nineteenth century items in alphabetical order between A and G (but complete, nineteenth-century booksellers' catalogues often being issued as parts of series), The entry for the new edition of Dugdale's 'Monasticon Anglicanum', offered at £31 10s 0d, takes up more than half a page of small print. For more on Bohn see his entry in the Oxford DNB. Now scarce.

8pp., 12mo. Stabbed and unbound. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn. The main descriptions are for 'Knight's Shilling Weekly Volume' (covering the first four pages), and 'The New Orbis Pictus' (covering three pages), the latter described as '12,000 Engravings on Wood, 72 on Steel, 40 Illuminations, and 13 Coloured Maps.'

[8] + 224pp., 8vo. Seven plates. In good condition, on lightly-aged paper, in blue cloth binding, in worn and nicked dustwrapper. Inscribed on front free endpaper: 'For Graham | part author of these pages | R. H. M. June '56.' Pollard's partner in the unmasking of the Wise forgeriers is the book's dedicatee, and the pair's efforts are described in Chapter 8, 'Sherry and Shibboleths'. Pollard's small label ('From the Library of | GRAHAM | POLLARD') is at the head of the front pastedown, which also carries Spicer's owl and moon bookplate.

[3] + viii + 112 + 51pp., 4to. Internally fair, on lightly-aged paper, in binding with heavily-damaged leather spine and worn green cloth covers. The author states that the volume is the second edition in his preface, 'the First having been published by the late Arthur Gyles, in 1886'. The object 'is primarily to supply a work of convenient size for the use of Second-hand Booksellers, which may facilitate intercourse with their confreres in our own and other countries'. Three pages of advertisements at front, and a further fifty-one at rear.

326pp., 4to. In green cloth binding with title in black on front cover. Internally good and tight, on aged paper, in worn binding with staining to front and back covers. In eighteen sections, including 'Auctioneers of Literary Property - United States', 'British Publishers', 'American Representatives of British Publishers' and 'Book Clubs in the United States'. Scarce.

4pp., 12mo. Two pages on bifolium with two-page postscript on loose leaf. In good condition, lightly aged. He thanks him for his 'kind note and opinion respecting my "Many Thoughts" [ anthology of 1857 ] of which nearly 267 - tons have been sold, an odd way of putting it you will say, but such is the fact.' He is working on a 'curious and suggestive book now on Aphoristic Wisdom'. He thinks he may 'gather something' from Girdlestone's 'Collection', which he undertakes will be 'most carefully and thankfully returned'.

Circulating Library Labels. See scan of all on my website. Good-very good condition unless otherwise stated, undated:Wilson's (late Dutton's) Circulating |Library, 46 Gracechurch Street,[City of London] with terms, daily papers, catalogue.T.Clerc Smith (late with Mr. Ebers), Public Circulating Library, 36 St James Street, London, giving terms, c.

Two APCSs, sl. worn, but text clear and complete. The subject of both cards is the William Beckford letters which "disappeared" during an auction of the contents of The Mere, the Bentley house near Slough. First postcard (to Hyde): "My old friend Mrs Bentley has asked me to look into the question of other letters & papers, including the William Beckford lot w[hi]ch she tells me you saw; and I have had a talk today with her lawyer. I should much like to know just what you saw & heard. Could you possibly telephone me tomorrow morning or Sunday?

49pp. In 4to notebook with red cloth spine and black cloth boards. Internally in good condition, lightly aged, in aged and worn covers. An alphabetical list, with entries covering two facing pages, divided into three columns: 'Name of Book', 'Description' and 'How disposed of'. Almost all the entries in the last column are 'H[enr]y Hall', but one item is recorded as being 'Sent to Julia Hall'. The serious library of an educated Englishman, with almost no fiction present. Nearly all the books date from the period 1770-1900, although 'Gloucestershire Visitation of 1623' is also present.

Total 48pp, 8vo, including alternate blanks for notes,with handwritten information about prices, etc. (seller's marked copy presumably), marbled wraps, worn, contents sl. worn at edges but complete, with ill-defined stamps at beginning and end (one has phrase Noord Holland). REST Of title-page: "Op Zaturday den XVIII Junij 1842, | zullen Nayler & Co. met hunne | Ongebonden- Verkooping | een aanvang maken, | in het Logement DE ZON, op Nieuwen-Dijk, No. 234, | te Amsterdam [...] Uren van Verkoop: | 9 tot 12 - 1 tot 4 - 6 tot 10 - met Klokstage.

List of customers of bookbinder, Stoakley & Son, pre-1920(?)(from the list Professor Oppenheim died in 1919), 3pp., c.16 x 25cm, bifolium, 132 names listed alphabetically in pencil, most with ticks (bills paid?). Customers include A.C. Benson, Deighton Bell, Sir James Dewar, "Gaselee", "Gladstone", "Dr Greg" (W.W.?), Dr Keynes, J.M. Keynes, Bishop of Gibraltar, Alfred Milner, Lord Rayleigh, Sedgwick Museum, Sir J.J. Thomson, and several colleges. WITH: 21 Autograph Letters from a later incarnation of the Stoakley business, Signed, "H.T. Penn Young", Medical Officer H.M.

1p., 12mo. Attractively printed within a decorative border, on the recto of the first leaf of a bifolium. The letter reads: 'Dear Sir | The Specimen Book sent you herewith, of which I have much pleasure in asking your acceptance, contains a history of the Caslon Foundry printed with the justly celebrated types engraved by its founder in the early part of last Century.

The text is engraved in copperplate on one side of a piece of card, with plan on reverse of the the premises at 18 Paternoster Square, with Newgate Street, Warwick Lane, Rose Street and Paternoster Row also shown. In fair condition, on lightly-aged paper, with unobtrusive vertical crease. A nice piece of nineteenth-century London book trade ephemera. The text reads: 'Publication Committee | Presbyterian Church of England, | 18 Paternoster Square.

[4] + 47pp., 8vo. In printed wraps. Internally in fair condition, on aged paper, with slight staining to the corners; in worn and chipped wraps. A handsome production, as one might expect from one of the nine founders of the Grolier Club, with a two-page introduction followed by a full-page reproduction of the Ascensius printer's device, and 47 examples of pages set in various point sizes of Cushing, Ancient Roman, Jenson, Satanick, Louis XV, and Century Roman. No copy on COPAC, six American and one French on WorldCat.

One page, 12mo, laid down on larger piece of paper, after formation of a 2" closed tear. text complete and clear. [Cadell] "If the game sent with this tolerably good send it to [Mrs] Grignion with my love. You will tell them it may be Sunday before we arrive as the weather is so uncertain." [Lawless adds] "Madam | I am afraid these are bad, but I believe it is only when it was shot" [whatever that means]. Lawless earned an obituary in the Annual Register.

Bookplate, c.8 x 14cm, marks show it was tipped onto an album page once, ow good. Image of Virgil's head. 3cm diameter, followed by calligraphic "This Book | is to be sold at the Shop of | Abraham Vandenhoek | AND | George Richmond. | the sign of Virgill's Head. | Opposite Exeter Exchange in the | STRAND."