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1839ref. 2039Providence: Geo. P. Daniels 1839. JUVENILE CHAPBOOK. First published in 1835 by Cory & Daniels in Providence. 24mo 5 11/16" x 3 ½"; 24pp; yellow wrapper front printed with decorative printer's ornament borders surrounding the title and a vignette of a girl reading while another stands beside a round bookcase rear wrapper features publisher's ad for twelve "Children's Books"; engraved fp and vignette of boy's playing tops on the title page; decorative alphabet printed on verso title page; 8 small wood engravings illustrating text; light handwear to wrapper widely scattered foxing; near fine. There are three small stories in this lovely chapbook "The Two Cousins" "The Water-Cress Girl" and "Oh! I Forgot It." An interesting addition to the decorative alphabet and numbers is punctuation marks. Geo. P. Daniels unknown books
1970ref. 36444New Delhi: S. Chand & Company 1970. First printing. Near fine. Scarce illustrated ABC of everyday objects from noted Indian textbook and educational publishing house S. Chand. S. Chand & Company was founded in the late 1930s as part of a national effort to support Indian authors and reduce dependence on imported books from the UK. Among this booklet's alphabetical nouns of childhood Apple Bicycle House Hockey is C for Carrom board the popular game of Indian origin. 10.5'' x 7.25''. Original glossy color pictorial wrappers. 6 glossy full-color illustrated pages. Trace wear. Bright. (S. Chand & Company) unknown books
1889ref. 1993No place listed: No publisher listed 1889. EPHEMERA POETRY VICTORIAN GIFT BOOK LOVE TOKEN. ANONYMOUS. 7 ¼" x 8 7/8"; 5 leaves; stiff board with a calendar style easel backing easel back has pencil inscription "From Samuel Danforth 1889"; 3" x 3 ¾" booklet bound with a pink silk ribbon affixed to a 4 ¼" x 6" color printed card that is encircled by a twisted decorative cord; booklet has 5 leaves printed verso only; light soiling small chip to pictorial booklet onlay; very good plus. A lovely and unusual commercially produced Valentine or love token card with an easel backing for standing it up. Layers of decorative paper the outer one with deckle edging and folded corners is hand-lettered in gold ink with the words "Affectionate Regards." Blue and white twisted silk cording surrounds a layer printed with gilt branching. The small onlaid booklet contains a broken-hearted love poem. The last verse reads "Had we ne'er met sae kingly Had we never loved sae blindly Never met or never parted We had ne'er been broken-hearted.". No publisher listed unknown books
1895ref. 1890Pennsylvania: Not stated 1895. Ephemera no binding. Near fine. EPHEMERA PHOTOGRAPHS. Each are 8 ½ " x 5 ¾" and mounted on 10" x 8" card stock. Three wonderful hand-colored photographs of two men and a woman from a family in the Lancaster County Pennsylvania area. older man with a large Shenandoah or "whaler" style beard is identified on the verso as "Eli Eichelberger Harriet E. Simons father. Born Feb. 2-1821 died Oct. 12-1895." The younger man is painted with startling blue eyes a neatly trimmed Shenandoah or "chin curtain" beard and is identified as "Grandpa Simon age 62 written by Fay." He has a small gold-colored pin on his vest lapel and what appears to be a gold watch chain across his chest. The woman in a front buttoned black dress with a fancy scarf or lace shawl at her neck is identified on the verso as "Grandma Simon at the age of 52 years. Written by Fay. John W. Simons Mother.". Not stated unknown books
1885ref. 1776Cincinnati O.: Peter G. Thomson 1885. Cloth. Fine. Copyrighted 1885 by Peter G. Thomson. 24mo 5 ½" x 4 1/8"; 8pp; glazed cloth wrapper chromolithographed portrait vignette of a young girl set inside decorative borders on the front rear wrapper has a vignette of a young girl with a cat; two staple binding; an alphabet and the numbers one through zero are lithographed on the verso of the front wrapper; the alphabet is printed in black with three letters to each page excepting the last which is the recto of the rear wrapper; fine. This small ABC book with a bright and charming wrapper is decorated in the aesthetic style with large flowers at the corners and a stylized branching flower on the rear wrapper. Each letter is illustrated with a word from A Anchor through Z Zedu. Peter G. Thomson unknown books
1891ref. 1775New York: McLoughlin Bro's 1891. First Edition. Boards. Very good. PICTURE BOOK. First edition. 4to 12 ½" x 10"; 120pp; glazed color pictorial boards red cloth shelf-back; b&w vignette two lions on the title page; 52 full-page lithographed illustrations with titles other illustrations in text; scuffing to edges corners bumped with loss some age toning; pg 93/94 with closed tear through ¾ of the page now with an archival repair; very good minus. OCLC locates this first edition in 4 libraries 3 in the U.S. and 1 in Canada. Scarce in the marketplace in any condition this large-sized McLoughlin picture book was printed with at least two different cover illustrations. The detailed black and white lithographic illustrations picture animals in their natural environment many of them shown hunting and eating. McLoughlin Bro's unknown books
1882ref. 1740New York and London: Thos.Nelson & Sons and S.W. Partridge & Co 1882. Wraps. Very good . New York: Thos. Nelson & Sons 42 Bleeker Street and London: S.W. Partridge & Co. 9 Paternoster Row 48mo 3 11/16" x 2 7/8"; 22pp; stiff color pictorial wrapper title on front series and publisher on rear wrapper; gift inscription on recto fp dated 1882; color fp; silhouette vignette of a bird on title page; text and 12 illustrations printed in blue; light hand-soiling; very good plus. OCLC locates 2 copies one in the U.S. and one in Canada. Eleven blurbs with corresponding illustrations on the facing page. Two have a religious theme one cautioning against drink. Four of the illustrations are silhouettes. Probably written and first published in the U.K. as some of the text has British subject matter. Thos.Nelson & Sons and S.W. Partridge & Co unknown books
1886ref. 1739New York and London: Thos. Nelson & Sons and S.W. Partridge & Co 1886. Wraps. Very good . New York: Thos. Nelson & Sons 42 Bleeker St. and London: S.W. Partridge & Co. 9 Paternoster Row 48mo 3 ½" x 2 15/16"; 22pp; stiff color pictorial wrapper title on front series and publisher on rear wrapper; gift inscription on verso front wrapper dated 1886; color illustrated fp small silhouette vignette on title page; text and 12 illustrations printed in green; light crease to front wrapper light hand soiling; very good plus. OCLC locates 5 copies. A small sized book containing eleven blurbs with corresponding illustrations on the facing page. Two of the themes are religious. Three of the illustrations are silhouettes. Most likely written and first published in the U.K. as some of the text has British subject matter. Thos. Nelson & Sons and S.W. Partridge & Co unknown books
1875ref. 1561New York: McLoughlin Bro's 1875. Wraps. Very good. 4to; 8pp; 4 chromolithographed plates; pictorial wrapper printed in yellow red black and green; front wrapper features a decorative border of leaves surrounding a vignette of a girl playing with dolls and a pet cat looking on publisher's ad on rear; publisher's string binding; light staining and hand soiling some offsetting of color illustrations 1" split to foot of spine; very good. Included in this title are seven stories five told in rhyming verse many with moralistic or religious overtones. A charming poem titled "Visiting" begins with "'Good morning Monday! / Tell me how is Tuesday' / 'Very well Dame Wednesday. / Please to tell Miss Thursday / To bring Master Friday / Also little Saturday / To call on Mister Sunday.'" Four bright chromolithographed plates illustrate the stories. Probably a pirated edition of a title published by Frederick Warne. AAS 393070. McLoughlin Bro's unknown books
1870ref. 1563New York: McLoughlin Bros. & Co. Publishers 1870. Wraps. Very good. 12mo 7 ½" x 6"; 8 1pp; pictorial wrapper printed in yellow green and red; front wrapper features two swans within fancy printed borders publisher's ad on rear wrapper; publisher's string binding; gift inscription in neat pencil on recto first plate; 3 chromolithographed plates; scattered spotting on front wrapper dark brown stain to foot of all leaves not encroaching on text or illustrations; very good minus. Three stories with color illustrated plates are included in this book from McLoughlin Brothers' Natural History Series The Swan The Hen and Chickens and Mother Duck. A fourth short story included is titled The Duck. The Hen and Chickens and Mother Duck are told in rhyming verse. Despite staining in the bottom margins it is a lovely copy with intensely colored plates. McLoughlin Bros. & Co., Publishers unknown books
1830ref. 1443No place listed: Not stated 1830. Full leather. Fine. FASHION ALBUM. Spine title: Coloured Plates of the Latest Fashions 8vo; horizontal ribbed brown Morocco with gilt borders and ornaments; 5 banded spine with gilt ornaments red leather title label; all edges gilt; gilt dentelles heavy marbled endpapers; frontispiece 54 hand-colored engraved plates 50 mounted to cream-colored stock with tissue guards 5 larger plates not mounted but bound-in; fine. The album appears to have been compiled as a personal collection of women's fashions with each plate carefully excised and mounted on heavy cream-colored paper stock with a debossed border plate line. Twelve prints with dated titles on the illustrations begin with "Morning Dress for Jan.y 1801" and end with "Afternoon Dress for June 1801." These are followed by fifteen plates dated 1805-1807 printed by Vernor Hood and Sharp Poultry. This publisher is sometimes identified as only Vernor & Hood and later as Vernor Hood and Sharpe and was located at 31 Poultry in London from 1799-1809. One plate is hand-dated 1826 and two are dated 1831 in small neat pencil. Eleven plates follow with no date or publisher then five more lacking dates but marked with the printer's name Joseph Robins Bride Court London. There are four illustrations from Ladies Pocket Magazine 1831. The album concludes with five bound-in plates lacking date but marked "Invented by Mrs. Bell No. 26 Charlotte Street Bloomsbury." Mrs. Bell was the proprietor of Magazine des Modes as well as a milliner dress and corset maker. Allen 2020 The album is an extraordinary collection of early 19th century fashions of well-dressed English women. Not stated unknown books
1888ref. 1464Epinal France: Imagerie D'Epinal 1888. Boards. Very good . HUMOR RACIST CARICATURE. Folio; 56pp; pages numbered 1-60 printed recto only on very thin paper stock lacking pp15 16 17 and 19-SEE NOTE BELOW; red pictorial boards on front rear has green and white patterned boards green cloth shelf-back; "Printed expressly for the Humoristic Publishing Company Kansas City Mo." on the foot of each page; cartoon-style hand-colored lithographed illustrations; light scuffing to boards at edges and bumped corner age-toned paper fragile 3pp with closed tears extending into text: 9&10 from fore-edge and 31 from bottom; very good plus. OCLC only locates two copies in English at Yale and Princeton and two in France in French. Although the cover title is in French the cartoon text is all in English. Published in France by the old and revered Imagerie D'Epinal founded by the Jean-Charles Pellerin family in 1796 and continuing today it was printed for the Humoristic Publishing Company in Kansas City Missouri. Famous stories and tales many moralistic are included in comic strip form one story to a page. Included are: William Tell Little Tom Thumb Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella. Fifty-six hand-colored cartoons printed one side only. Overstreet states that "All copies known only have 50 of the 60 known of these broadsheets." And "All known copies were collected with sheets 15-20 23 24 47 and 48 missing." In this volume pages 15 16 17 and 19 only are lacking. Overstreet 366. Imagerie D'Epinal unknown books
ref. 40620n.p.: n.p. 1990. Very good plus. Stunning and extensive collection of original artwork album covers and two lengthy reference books - all describing a vast imaginary world of 20th century rock-and-roll that never existed. Introducing the auto-fanfictive outsider art of The Indoor Kid - a Henry Darger of Greil Marcuses Syd Barrett of Daisy Ashfords Robert Christgau of Richard Dadds - who fell through the pages of ten thousand music magazines into a wonderland of his own making. The anonymous creator hereafter The Artist fashioned an entirely fictitious musical universe. From dozens of albums drawn and collaged over actual LPs as well as what might perhaps best be described as concept art for those albums to extensive accompanying commentaries whose tone owes a great deal both to zines of old and the once-popular Encyclopedias of Rock the impression is one of carpeted suburban bedrooms and children longing to escape both backwards into lost decades and forwards into the autonomy and sexuality of imagined adulthood. The Artist's mock-authoritative assertions of judgment and offhand omniscience speak of a child raised by a stacks of ROLLING STONE and CREAM in lieu of the foundling's traditional pack of wolves. His major fascinations - psychedelia the particular flavor of British whimsy that preceded it and hippie-tinged heavy metal of the Zeppelin-Black Sabbath era- are all in line with this lineage and with the character of the solitary late-'80s adolescent. THE DREAM OF FAME BEATS FAME ITSELF: The Artist's record collection most immediately calls to mind the work of Mingering Mike the D.C.-based self-made recording artist who constructed scores of fake albums by "unheard artists such as Joseph War the Big 'D' and Rambling Ralph on labels such as Fake Records Inc. Decision Sex and Mother Goose" Hadar. Discovered at a flea market in the early 2000s Mike's work found instant cult and early online fame. The present collection however can be dated with a great deal of confidence to the mid-late 1980s through perhaps the very early 1990s from the issue dates of the original repurposed albums as well as triangulating particular contemporary references coupled with certain early laser-print fonts. Thus while it is almost certainly impossible that the one could have influenced the other the similarities of technique imagination and single-minded dedication in their respective oeuvres are striking. Their art styles however are highly individuated. Though both may be placed under the broad umbrella of outsider art our Artist abhors a vacuum; he does not have Mike's appreciation of negative space. Lacking any formal skills or apparent training and with a representational style much younger than his assumed years he works in blasts of color in layers of collage and pen and children's marker in puns and allusions and call-backs both verbal and visual. And whereas Mingering Mike's invented record labels and bands lent verisimilitude to his own fantasied career in which he was the star The Artist is self-effacing to a fault. His dream is pure and strange. Not so much the protagonist of this created world but its chronicler publicist. In short that most reviled and necessary of creatures: the rock journalist. "OPIUM: ONE OF THE MOST POTENT DRUGS. NOW THE NAME OF A NEW ROCK AND ROLL BAND." Clearly a deep reader if only of music journalism the artist scatters little gems in the corners. Little clusters of mini-trends pop up in band names: the exquisitely named Sand Witch Witch-ita Falls Witching Hour and Witches Comettee sic; Mezzanine Anecdote and The Syntax Man; Tar-O and the O-CULT Band. Elsewhere there's a knowing nod to the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band clearly a source of inspiration; a song called "Austin Osmanspare" described as a "creepy tale of a black magic practitioner"; a reference to vocals vocals! like H.P. Lovecraft. Well-versed in the style of Bangsian word-omelettes "a sound full of ponderous organ pounding plodding rhythms screaming operatic vocals fast blitzkrieg-Bach-inspired guitar runs" some of the song titles are undoubtedly jokes on purpose: "Who When And Where Is Our Love Machine" "Soldier Sentry Squabbie Cockleshell Army" "666 All in the Name of Satan" Death Banquet's "Let Me Bludgeon You" followed by "No No No Don't Break The China" and the magisterial "Surrender Your Arms Sexual Metaphor." Meanwhile the real world does exist but is kept resolutely peripheral: nods to Timothy Leary praise from George Harrison glowing comparisons to Ozzy Osbourne and sneering ones to Michael Bolton creep in. Occasionally a deep-cut cover appears like "Magic Handkerchief" Bown/Bannister always scrupulously attributed. In a stroke of crossover genius one of the two encyclopedic notebooks explains that the imaginary band Iron Maiden had to change its name when the other real Iron Maiden got too famous. Poets too feature not only in certain liner notes "The group are heavily into Shelly sic Byron Keats William Blake and Sigfried Sasoon sic" but also most intriguingly in one unique piece of album art: "Strange Games" by "WILLIAM BLAKE." Unlike all the others however this album incorporates actual photographs of a teenage boy sulking theatrically for the camera in a red-collared black cape heavy bangs and incipient wispy mustache. We suspect the subject of being the artist and if we are correct his choice of pseudonym is impeccable. ENTRANCE TO THE SOLAR MINE What became of the creator is unknown and likely unknowable. Perhaps like Mingering Mike he decided that "the dream of fame beats fame itself" Washington City Paper. Perhaps he put away childish things and went on to be a sober and square maker of spreadsheets and never reminisced about a single song no one else had ever heard. Or perhaps he struggled when abruptly deposited in an adult world more real but less beloved than his own - a sadly more likely scenario as this collection was rescued from a storage locker auction. What is known for certain however is that the most compelling of pasts is the dream-past just before one's own birth well-remembered by parents and better-known to cool older siblings but eternally opaque to oneself. It is tragically the strangest history of all farthest away yet tantalizingly close. One cannot remember it so one invents. Wasn't Satanic Brittanica's "Moanin' Alone If You Leave Me Girl" a banger And that the song "Bastard" by Dallas sure rocks. Tune the FM dial of the aimless drives of youth. You remember. Collection includes the following 101 items: 52 original hand-colored and collaged record album sleeves. Two handwritten clamp-bound journals. Six color xerox reproductions and 41 original color marker-and-collage artworks for a subtotal of 47 different images; the color xeroxes do not reproduce any of the original works present and though some band names and iconographic motifs recur no images repeat from the album covers. Collaged materials include one piece with several original photographs of a young man tentatively identified as the anonymous artist. All materials show minor wear with occasional glue separation of artwork from original album cover; on the whole spectacularly well preserved. A complete inventory is available as well as a document with further sample quotes. n.p. unknown books
1960ref. 43382np 1960. Very good. An extraordinary and unique handmade artist's book elaborately assembled by an anonymous artist. A kinky but lighthearted celebration of female flagellantism the book appropriates quintessentially 1960s fashion models and recontextualizes them in dozens of original collages so that they are weilding whips switches and various similar tools. Paired with self-referential and irreverant texts as well as black-and-white hand-penned drawings presumably by the assembler of bondage spankings and other S&M-themed scenes the book humorously imagines Mod Girls as doms - a perhaps intentional visual pun. The collages many spanning across page spreads and including one fold-out exhibit a strikingly skillful and stylish retraint suggesting an ambition and audience beyond the merely pruriently personal. An outsider book of rare sophistication and wit: the Swinging Sixties meets Dada. Yeah baby. 6.5'' x 9.25''. Likely commercial scrapbook but possibly ad-hoc collages boards. Containing 66pp. plus covers and one fold-out all mounted both recto and verso with color collages consisting mainly of magazine models with occasional textual elements in German many typed. Spine appears perished. But otherwise sound and apparently complete. Very good. Housed in custom Talas archival clamshell box. hardcover books
1900ref. 1427London: Ernest Nister 1900. Boards. Very good. POETRY. New York: E.P. Dutton & Co. Printed in Bavaria. 12mo square; 12pp; glazed color pictorial front board; tan shelf-back; textured paper stock; 4 full page chromolithograph illustrations b&w illustrations in text; light wear to boards age-toning to paper old repairs to 3 staple binding but holding; very good minus. Located in one OCLC library. Scarce. Delightful illustrations of cats and kittens with seven stories told in verse. Ernest Nister unknown books
ref. 1269No place identified: No photographer identified No date c. late 19th c. No binding photograph. Very good . TINTYPE PHOTOGRAPH MELAINOTYPE FERROTYPE. 3 ½" x 5"; image is clear; japanned verso; light scratching to surface; very good plus. A tintype or ferrotype photograph of five young women and three young men most likely taken during the 1890s based on the clothing style. Three men two in Bowler or derby style hats and suits buttoned high. First introduced in England in the 1840s and considered formal wear the Bowler was worn by working classes by the late 19th century. The women are dressed in suits with short jackets a style that emerged in the late 1880s and went on to be a men's wear craze during the 1890s and well into the 1910s. Each person's outfit suggests the wealth of the upper class. Other types of photography had been developed and perfected by the late 19th century but the tintype remained a sturdy inexpensive and quickly developed alternative. No photographer identified unknown books
1915ref. 1303Cincinnati Ohio 1915. Boards. Good . SCRAPBOOK. 8vo 9½" x 6½"; 34 unnumbered leaves; three-quarters green calf; blind-stamped "Scrap Book" and hubs on spine; marbled boards; sewn-in bindings; commercially sold scrapbook with Daniel Slote & Co. book trade label on front endpaper; 1 ½" split to spine; fragile without wrinkling or odors; good plus. Approximately 200 newspaper clippings 170 pasted or laid-in; 16 loose clippings covering topics of household and garden presumably collected by a young woman circa 1915. Among tips for raising fowl pork and dairy cows recipes for all seasons and "Comforts for Sick People" and "For the Invalid's Tray" two laid-in clippings offer competing remedies for "blackheads miscalled 'flesh worms' by many a young miss." Eleven of the loose clippings document a record-breaking cold snap in Cincinnati in summer 1915. Each leaf contains two columns of gummed lines on the front and back. The scrapbook was produced by Daniel Slote & Co. under a patent held by his close friend Mark Twain see Slote featured as Twain's roommate in The Innocents Abroad 1869 and advertised as "the only gummed Scrap Book made: always ready for use without extra gum or paste." This particular scrapbook highlights articles of note and hints helpful to a young woman some of which remain timeless. unknown books
1959ref. 40770Schweinfurt Germany: n.p. 1959. Contents near fine housed in very good album. Affectionate photo album memorializing the mostly harmless exploits of an Army coterie of proto-Beatniks stationed in peacetime Europe and making the most of it. Photo album of a young man in the most fortunate of midcentury micro-generations coming of draft age after the war in Korea and before the American war in Vietnam: able to treat their tour of duty as a lark an adventure; an excuse to drink Bavarian beer and go to motorcycle shows; wear Converse and coke-bottle glasses and sign each other's good-bye cards like an affectionate graduating class. This album records the work and play of soldiers and locals in and around U.S. Army Garrison Schweinfurt: home to several thousand U.S. soldiers and personnel in the years after 1945 and clearly remembered with great affection by those lucky enough to see no combat a little adventure and a lot of hanging out. A good decade younger than the iconic Beats who wrote the formative texts and dreamed the formative dreams for their disciples and imitators the soldiers pictured here are just the right age to be formed by the late '50s popular notion of carefree bohemian youth so sternly corrected by the Beat originals in question: The "foul word Beatnik" wrote Ginsberg is nothing but a "journalistic sneer." Kerouac meanwhile expressed a dour miserablism over the whole business: "Nothing can be more dreary than coolness . a kind of sociological coolness soon to become a fad up to the mass of middle class youth." Well: they were both right but they were both over 30 by then. The Beat ethos and vestiges of a Beat aesthetic could not be contained; as the album proves even in barracks even under Army discipline and orders the youth with their shabby blazers and glasses of absinthe-substitute knew what cool was. Shot by a remarkably skilled amateur photographer or photographers with a fine eye for composition the photographs are technically accomplished with a fine sense of contrast and a keen sensitivity to the opportune moment. At a uniformed military exercise he captures some curious civilian onlookers; out in the surrounding town he takes sensitive candid photos of an impish local toddler strangling her brother. More than this though is the tone of bohemian youth captured both real and aspirational. The heart of the album documents a core group of friends: smoking wearing sunglasses indoors drinking Pernod taking photos reading French newspapers. Throughout the photographer finds time to hunt beauty: men silhouetted against a bleak sky; a young and grim-faced pregnant woman gazing at a leafless tree; cynical children clambering over tank; and of course European women. A captivating series of moments as perfectly framed as any film still. 11'' x 16''. Original oblong photo album lacking original string ties otherwise intact. Paper label mounted to front cover: "Schweinfurt - 1959 / Boudreaux Kites" in pen. 36 album leaves laid in each with black and white photographs mounted to rectos and versos and intact spiderweb tissue guards. Bayonet receipt card for a Francis C. Welch mounted beneath a portrait photo. One greeting card also mounted to first leaf and one additional large 10'' x 8'' photograph laid in. 181 photographs in total. Wear and some warping to album cover; interior leaves largely unaffected. Photos fine. n.p. unknown books
ref. 40620n.p.: n.p. 1990. Very good plus. Stunning and extensive collection of original artwork album covers and two lengthy reference books - all describing a vast imaginary world of 20th century rock-and-roll that never existed. Introducing the auto-fanfictive outsider art of The Indoor Kid - a Henry Darger of Greil Marcuses Syd Barrett of Daisy Ashfords Robert Christgau of Richard Dadds - who fell through the pages of ten thousand music magazines into a wonderland of his own making. The anonymous creator hereafter The Artist fashioned an entirely fictitious musical universe. From dozens of albums drawn and collaged over actual LPs as well as what might perhaps best be described as concept art for those albums to extensive accompanying commentaries whose tone owes a great deal both to zines of old and the once-popular Encyclopedias of Rock the impression is one of carpeted suburban bedrooms and children longing to escape both backwards into lost decades and forwards into the autonomy and sexuality of imagined adulthood. The Artist's mock-authoritative assertions of judgment and offhand omniscience speak of a child raised by a stacks of ROLLING STONE and CREAM in lieu of the foundling's traditional pack of wolves. His major fascinations - psychedelia the particular flavor of British whimsy that preceded it and hippie-tinged heavy metal of the Zeppelin-Black Sabbath era- are all in line with this lineage and with the character of the solitary late-'80s adolescent. THE DREAM OF FAME BEATS FAME ITSELF: The Artist's record collection most immediately calls to mind the work of Mingering Mike the D.C.-based self-made recording artist who constructed scores of fake albums by "unheard artists such as Joseph War the Big 'D' and Rambling Ralph on labels such as Fake Records Inc. Decision Sex and Mother Goose" Hadar. Discovered at a flea market in the early 2000s Mike's work found instant cult and early online fame. The present collection however can be dated with a great deal of confidence to the mid-late 1980s through perhaps the very early 1990s from the issue dates of the original repurposed albums as well as triangulating particular contemporary references coupled with certain early laser-print fonts. Thus while it is almost certainly impossible that the one could have influenced the other the similarities of technique imagination and single-minded dedication in their respective oeuvres are striking. Their art styles however are highly individuated. Though both may be placed under the broad umbrella of outsider art our Artist abhors a vacuum; he does not have Mike's appreciation of negative space. Lacking any formal skills or apparent training and with a representational style much younger than his assumed years he works in blasts of color in layers of collage and pen and children's marker in puns and allusions and call-backs both verbal and visual. And whereas Mingering Mike's invented record labels and bands lent verisimilitude to his own fantasied career in which he was the star The Artist is self-effacing to a fault. His dream is pure and strange. Not so much the protagonist of this created world but its chronicler publicist. In short that most reviled and necessary of creatures: the rock journalist. "OPIUM: ONE OF THE MOST POTENT DRUGS. NOW THE NAME OF A NEW ROCK AND ROLL BAND." Clearly a deep reader if only of music journalism the artist scatters little gems in the corners. Little clusters of mini-trends pop up in band names: the exquisitely named Sand Witch Witch-ita Falls Witching Hour and Witches Comettee sic; Mezzanine Anecdote and The Syntax Man; Tar-O and the O-CULT Band. Elsewhere there's a knowing nod to the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band clearly a source of inspiration; a song called "Austin Osmanspare" described as a "creepy tale of a black magic practitioner"; a reference to vocals vocals! like H.P. Lovecraft. Well-versed in the style of Bangsian word-omelettes "a sound full of ponderous organ pounding plodding rhythms screaming operatic vocals fast blitzkrieg-Bach-inspired guitar runs" some of the song titles are undoubtedly jokes on purpose: "Who When And Where Is Our Love Machine" "Soldier Sentry Squabbie Cockleshell Army" "666 All in the Name of Satan" Death Banquet's "Let Me Bludgeon You" followed by "No No No Don't Break The China" and the magisterial "Surrender Your Arms Sexual Metaphor." Meanwhile the real world does exist but is kept resolutely peripheral: nods to Timothy Leary praise from George Harrison glowing comparisons to Ozzy Osbourne and sneering ones to Michael Bolton creep in. Occasionally a deep-cut cover appears like "Magic Handkerchief" Bown/Bannister always scrupulously attributed. In a stroke of crossover genius one of the two encyclopedic notebooks explains that the imaginary band Iron Maiden had to change its name when the other real Iron Maiden got too famous. Poets too feature not only in certain liner notes "The group are heavily into Shelly sic Byron Keats William Blake and Sigfried Sasoon sic" but also most intriguingly in one unique piece of album art: "Strange Games" by "WILLIAM BLAKE." Unlike all the others however this album incorporates actual photographs of a teenage boy sulking theatrically for the camera in a red-collared black cape heavy bangs and incipient wispy mustache. We suspect the subject of being the artist and if we are correct his choice of pseudonym is impeccable. ENTRANCE TO THE SOLAR MINE What became of the creator is unknown and likely unknowable. Perhaps like Mingering Mike he decided that "the dream of fame beats fame itself" Washington City Paper. Perhaps he put away childish things and went on to be a sober and square maker of spreadsheets and never reminisced about a single song no one else had ever heard. Or perhaps he struggled when abruptly deposited in an adult world more real but less beloved than his own - a sadly more likely scenario as this collection was rescued from a storage locker auction. What is known for certain however is that the most compelling of pasts is the dream-past just before one's own birth well-remembered by parents and better-known to cool older siblings but eternally opaque to oneself. It is tragically the strangest history of all farthest away yet tantalizingly close. One cannot remember it so one invents. Wasn't Satanic Brittanica's "Moanin' Alone If You Leave Me Girl" a banger And that the song "Bastard" by Dallas sure rocks. Tune the FM dial of the aimless drives of youth. You remember. Collection includes the following 101 items: 52 original hand-colored and collaged record album sleeves. Two handwritten clamp-bound journals. Six color xerox reproductions and 41 original color marker-and-collage artworks for a subtotal of 47 different images; the color xeroxes do not reproduce any of the original works present and though some band names and iconographic motifs recur no images repeat from the album covers. Collaged materials include one piece with several original photographs of a young man tentatively identified as the anonymous artist. All materials show minor wear with occasional glue separation of artwork from original album cover; on the whole spectacularly well preserved. A complete inventory is available as well as a document with further sample quotes. n.p. unknown books
1970ref. 1028Zurich: Max Künzli Verlag 1970. Stiff wraps. Near fine. 12mo 6 5/16" x 7"; 12pp; chromolithographed pictorial of anthropomorphic insects on stiff wrapper a butterfly wedding on the front and a queen bee riding on a flower petal on the rear; 2 staple binding; produced as a coloring guide book with text color pictorial to one page and the facing page in black outline; light crease to bottom corner; near fine. Not recorded. The publisher Max Künzli of Zurich Switzerland had a long history of high quality chromolithography. The family was in the printing business from before 1880 and established several companies in Zurich. After his father's death Max took over the management of the business Carl Künzli-Tobler and changed the name to Max Künzli. Max's son Raymond took over the business in 1965 and it closed in 1974. Alan Petrulis Metropostcards dot com. During its heyday it was known as a printer of viewbooks greeting cards and postcards most notably what became known as the Mainzer Cat series after Alfred Mainzer Inc of New York acquired the rights of these humorous drawings by artist Eugen Hartung. The dressed anthropomorphic cats continue to be a highly collected postcard series today. Following in this vein of humorous anthropomorphic animals this little coloring book features insects reptiles birds and small mammals involved in play. Not in any WorldCat library and not found in the marketplace. Max Künzli Verlag unknown books
1900ref. 686Roma: Antonino Greco tu Carmelo 1900. Wraps. Very good. 18mo; unpaginated 24pp; photographic illustrations with guard sheets; tan paper wrapper with stamped gilt design and title on cover; light age toning of paper stain to last illustration recto and verso and to back wrapper; very good. Scarce only one listed in WorldCat. Antonino Greco tu Carmelo unknown books
1958ref. 704Mt. Vernon New York: Peter Pauper Press 1958. Boards. Very good. Ruth McCREA. First edition. 12mo; 62pp; illustrated paper over board with title and publisher in front cover cartouche title on spine; illustrated throughout text in black and green; clipped dust jacket; light soiling to dj light bumping to cover corners; very good. Peter Pauper Press unknown books
1890ref. 705New York: McLoughlin Brothers 1890. New Edition. Stiff wraps. Good. J.H. HOWARD design. 18mo; 48pp; color illustrated glazed paper wrappers; 43pp black and white illustrations; spine has ½"split at bottom 3 leaves have a crease soiling and creasing to back wrapper; colors remain bright; good. McLoughlin Brothers unknown books
1930ref. 726London: Ward Lock & Co. Limited 1930. First Edition. 1/4 cloth. Very good. First edition thus. 8vo; 30pp; quarter-bound red cloth with color pictorial glazed paper over board; color and b&w illustrations every page with titles; pumping to cover corners with loss scuffing to edges light soiling a few closed tears to pages; very good minus. In 4 WorldCat libraries. Part of the Rainbow Picture Books series. Printed by LTA Robinson Ltd. The Botolph Printing Works London. Illustrators include popular contemporary British cartoonists and artists: Cha Charles Crombie Norman Keene W. William Luker Guy Lipscombe Thomas Maybank Will Owen James Allen Shuffrey Laurie Tayler Harry Wolley and unidentified artists who signed their work as: GES Shuffers and Lendon. Illustrations also contributed by Crossley Motors Ltd. And Wolseley Motors Ltd. as well as Central Press Fox photos and Pacific and Atlantic. Ward, Lock & Co., Limited unknown books
1950ref. 019790New York 1950. Minor surface wear ink light at a few points with "Bill" on the dark portion of his suit but still visible. Near Fine. A scarce 8" x 10" Black-and-White Formal Photograph SIGNED by Bill Wilson: "To Martie C--/With affection/and thanks/Bill/NY -- 9/50." unknown books
