FIFTIES

['We weren't very angry either': Arnold Wesker, radical English Jewish playwright.] Autograph Letter Signed to Paul Furness, about the part played by the pub and drinking for Jews, the ‘angry young men’, David Mercer, and in his own life.

Author: 
Arnold Wesker (1932-2016), radical English Jewish playwright, one of the 1950s ‘angry young men’
Publication details: 
9 October 1982. On his letterhead, 27 Bishop’s Road, London.
£120.00

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 2pp, 4to. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded for postage and in stamped and postmarked envelope (with Wesker’s address printed on it), addressed to Furness in Battersea. One of a number of letters from British poets in response to enquiries from Paul Furness with regard to their pub memories. Addressed to ‘Dear Mr Furness’ and signed ‘Arnold Wesker’.

[Deborah Kerr, Hollywood film star from Scotland, six-time Oscar nominee.] Autograph Inscription Signed, beneath pencil sketch portrait of her by Kenneth Sephton, with a second portrait overleaf.

Author: 
Deborah Kerr, stage name of Deborah Jane Trimmer (1921-2007), Hollywood film star from Scotland, nominated six times for the Academy Award (Oscar) for Best Actress [Kenneth Sephton]
Kerr
Publication details: 
No place or date.
£100.00
Kerr

See her entry in the Oxford DNB. The inscription, firmly-written in pencil, reads, ‘With best wishes / Deborah Kerr.’, and is written beneath a pencil portrait of a smiling Kerr’s face and shoulders, competently-executed in typical fifties style. On recto of 10 x 12.5 cm leaf of a tracing paper bifolium, the verso of the second leaf carrying, upside-down, an outline sketch of Kerr. The paper is somewhat creased and worn.

[Dame Anna Neagle [Florence Marjorie Wilcox], English star of stage and film.] Typed Letter Signed to ‘Mr. Lazenby’ concerning photographs and a party.

Author: 
Anna Neagle, stage name of Dame Florence Marjorie Wilcox [née Robertson] (1904-1986), English star of stage and film
Publication details: 
22 January 1938; from the London Palladium.
£38.00

See her entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. On grey paper. In fair condition, with a few light creases and two punch-holes to inner margin. Good large signature (‘Anna Neagle.’) in black ink. She thanks him for his letter and kindness in sending the photographs: ‘I think they are excellent.’ She is glad that she was ‘able to get along to the Party’, and thanks him ‘and the Committee’ for making her visit so pleasant.

[ 'The Higher Butterfatters' League'; MS. ] Anonymous humorous manuscript poem titled 'Nanette', with illustrations, in praise of the Guernsey cow.

Author: 
[ The Guernsey Gazette; The Higher Butterfatters' League; dairy farming in the United Kingdom ]
Publication details: 
In manuscript, but laid out as a printed book ('A "Guernsey's Own" Publication') said to be 'Specially printed by the "Guernsey Gazette"' and sponsored by the non-existant 'Higher Butterfatters' League'. Undated [ 1950s? ].
£80.00

28pp., 4to. Sewn into a booklet, and bound in cream boards, with 'A "Guernsey's Own" Publication' on the front cover, and 'Sponsored by the Higher Butterfatters' League' on the back. There is no indication that the manuscript has been published. It is laid out as a printed book, with title-page (with charming illustration of the smiling cow) and dedication page reading: 'To V, M., the Honorable Patroness of the foster Mothers' Welfare Group, This book is respectfully dedicated.' The poem consists of 36 four-line stanzas, with fifteen charming vignettes.

[Manuscript notebook of an anonymous English plane spotter, containing detailed entries of planes coming in to various airports in southern England between 1947 and 1950. In notebook containing publicity material for the Ingersoll-Rand Co. Ltd.]

Author: 
[British plane spotting in the 1940s; Ingersoll-Rand Co. (air compressors and pneumatic tools)]
British plane spotting in the 1940s
Publication details: 
Compiled between 1947 and 1950. [Ingersoll-Rand Co., Limited, 165, Queen Victoria St., London, E.C.4]
£450.00
British plane spotting in the 1940s

12mo, 133 pp. Hundreds of neat entries, in a small hand, written lengthwise on graph-paper pages in a red-cloth 'Memoranda' book ('Compliments of Ingersoll-Rand Co., Limited, 165, Queen Victoria St., London, E.C.4.'). Good: with text clear and complete on lightly-aged paper, in the original worn red binding. Many entries are dated (with a few also giving the dates on which various planes crashed), and among the airports referred to are Northolt, Yeovil, Radlett, Cowes, Rochester, Guernsey, Jersey, Peterborough, White Waltham, Hanworth Park, Elstree, Cranfield, Luton.

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