• Sotheby’s
    New York Book Week
    12-26 June
    Sotheby’s, June 25: Theocritus. Theocriti Eclogae triginta, Venice, Aldo Manuzio, February 1495/1496. 220,000 - 280,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, June 26: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby, 1925. 40,000 - 60,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, June 26: Blake, William. Songs of Innocence and of Experience, Printed ca. 1381-1832. 400,000 - 600,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, June 26: Lincoln, Abraham. Thirteenth Amendment, signed by Abraham Lincoln. 8,000,000 - 12,000,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, June 26: Galieli, Galileo. First Edition of the Foundation of Modern Astronomy, 1610. 300,000 - 400,000 USD
  • Finarte
    Books, Autographs & Prints
    June 24 & 25, 2025
    Finarte, June 24-25: ALIGHIERI, DANTE / LANDINO, CRISTOFORO. Comento di Christophoro Landino Fiorentino sopra la Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta fiorentino, 1481. €40,000 to €50,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: ALIGHIERI, DANTE. La Commedia [Commento di Christophorus Landinus]. Aggiunta: Marsilius Ficinus, Ad Dantem gratulatio [in latino e Italiano], 1487. €40,000 to €60,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: ALIGHIERI, DANTE. Il Convivio, 1490. €20,000 to €25,000.
    Finarte
    Books, Autographs & Prints
    June 24 & 25, 2025
    Finarte, June 24-25: BANDELLO, MATTEO. La prima [-quarta] parte de le nouelle del Bandello, 1554. €7,000 to €9,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: LEGATURA – PLUTARCO. Le vies des hommes illustres, grecs et romaines translates, 1567. €10,000 to €12,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: TOLOMEO, CLAUDIO. Ptolemeo La Geografia di Claudio Ptolemeo Alessandrino, Con alcuni comenti…, 1548. €4,000 to €6,000.
    Finarte
    Books, Autographs & Prints
    June 24 & 25, 2025
    Finarte, June 24-25: FESTE - COPPOLA, GIOVANNI CARLO. Le nozze degli Dei, favola [...] rappresentata in musica in Firenze…, 1637. €6,000 to €8,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: SPINOZA, BARUCH. Opera posthuma, 1677. €8,000 to €12,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: PUSHKIN, ALEXANDER. Borus Godunov, 1831. €30,000 to €50,000.
    Finarte
    Books, Autographs & Prints
    June 24 & 25, 2025
    Finarte, June 24-25: LIBRO D'ARTISTA - LECUIRE, PIERRE. Ballets-minute, 1954. €35,000 to €40,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: LIBRO D'ARTISTA - MAJAKOVSKIJ, VLADIMIR / LISSITZKY, LAZAR MARKOVICH. Dlia Golosa, 1923. €7,000 to €10,000.
    Finarte, June 24-25: LIBRO D'ARTISTA - MATISSE, HENRI / MONTHERLANT, HENRY DE. Pasiphaé. Chant de Minos., 1944. €22,000 to €24,000.
  • Bonhams, June 16-25: 15th-CENTURY TREATISE ON SYPHILIS. GRÜNPECK. 1496. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: THE NORMAN COPY OF BENIVIENI'S TREATISE ON PATHOLOGY. 1507. $12,000 - $18,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: FRACASTORO. Syphilis sive Morbus Gallicus. 1530. $8,000 - $12,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: THE FIRST PUBLISHED WORK ON SKIN DISEASES. MERCURIALIS. De morbis cutaneis... 1572. $10,000 - $15,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: BIDLOO. Anatomia humani corporis... 1685. $6,000 - $9,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: THE NORMAN COPY OF DOUGLASS'S EARLY AMERICAN WORK ON INNOCULATION AND SMALLPOX. 1722. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: LIND'S FIRST TREATISE ON SCURVY. 1753. $15,000 - $20,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: RARE JENNER SIGNED CIRCULAR ON VACCINATION. 1821. $4,000 - $6,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: MOST BEAUTIFUL OF MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS. BRIGHT. Reports of Medical Cases... 1827-1831. $10,000 - $15,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE PRESENTATION COPY TO HER MOTHER. 1860. $6,000 - $8,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: LORENZO TRAVER'S MANUSCRIPT JOURNAL OF BURNSIDE'S NORTH CAROLINA EXPEDITION. TRAVER, Lorenzo. $2,000 - $3,000
    Bonhams, June 16-25: ONE OF THE EARLIEST PHOTOGRAPHIC BOOKS ON DERMATOLOGY. HARDY. Clinique Photographique... 1868. $3,000 - $5,000
  • Bonhams, June 16-24: KELMSCOTT PRESS. RUSKIN. The Nature of Gothic. 1892. $1,500 - $2,500
    Bonhams, June 16-24: ASHENDENE PRESS. The Wisdom of Jesus. 1932. $2,000 - $3,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: CHARLOTTE BRONTE WRITES AS GOVERNESS. Autograph Letter Signed, 1851. $15,000 - $25,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: FIRST AMERICAN EDITION OF WUTHERING HEIGHTS. BRONTE, Emily. New York, 1848. $3,000 - $5,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: IAN FLEMING ASSOCIATION COPY. You Only Live Twice. London, 1964. $7,000 - $9,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: DELUXE EDITION WITH ORIGINAL PAINTING. BUKOWSKI, Charles. War All the Time. 1984. $3,000 - $5,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: EINSTEIN'S MOST POWERFUL STATEMENT ON THE ATOMIC BOMB. Original Typed Manuscript Signed, "On My Participation in the Atom Bomb Project," 1953. $100,000 - $150,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: EINSTEIN ON SCIENCE, WAR AND MORALITY. Autograph Letter Signed, 1949. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: SOCIETY OF THE CINCINNATI. WASHINGTON, George. Engraved document signed, 1786. $8,000 - $12,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: AN EARLY CHINESE-MADE 34-STAR U.S. CONSULAR FLAG. $8,000 - $12,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: SIGNED PHOTOGRAPH OF LINCOLN WITH HIS SON TAD. 1864. $60,000 - $90,000
    Bonhams, June 16-24: MALCOLM X WRITES FROM KENYA. Postcard signed, 1964. $4,000 - $6,000

Rare Book Monthly

Articles - April - 2011 Issue

Two Generations in the Book Trade - Looking back with the dealer’s daughter

Pete at an Asia studies meeting.

Pete at an Asia studies meeting.

Enter Susan – the dealer’s daughter

I was the original Daddy’s girl, so I naturally fell in love with the buy side at an early age. I went along with him on many of his foraging expeditions which were more or less continuous until the day he died. We were never happier than crawling around the lowest dustiest shelves of some of the grimiest warehouse basements of the most decayed Goodwill sites within a hundred mile radius of Detroit. Neither one of us ever met a box of old paper that didn’t contain a priceless (or soon-to-be-priceless) treasure.

 

My preference for my dad’s side of the business did not deter my mother from insisting I learn how to type … the better to type her invoices, her mimeograph stencils…her Cellar Arrivals, which was a by-subscription list to paying clients giving an early heads up as to what was “current and choice” on their shelves. 

 

She also was of the firm opinion that children should learn how to pack books, even if that meant they spent long hours in a drafty basement working on a couple of boards slung across a washtub in a place that smelled strongly of garlic because the early packing rooms co-existed side by side with shelves of her home made pickles.

  

Sayonara Detroit, Aloha Berkeley

The truth was I couldn’t wait to get out of Detroit. I came of age in the 1960s and by the time I was 25 I’d held a whole series of classic training jobs. In college I worked at the Archives of American Art. Later I was a curator at the Herron Museum in Indianapolis.

 

My favorite beginner job was at the Rare Books Room at the University of California in Berkeley where our stacks were in common with the Bancroft Library. My only duty there was to watch the readers and make sure they did not bring a pen into the room. The rest of the time was mine with full access to two brilliant collections.

 

We had everything and often in manuscript. I read endlessly. In addition to ‘rare’ books we had Western Americana and Fine Press books and other smaller unique collections. We were also the repository for all the X-rated material which was kept in our stacks for “safety” from prying young eyes. In the farthest back corner was an antique magician’s trunk filled with tricks and apparatus.

 

I have never again been near anything nearly that fine. Spending time with the really good things gave me an enduring frame of reference and helped me measure, understand and value some of the interesting but lesser goods that later came my way.

Rare Book Monthly

  • Case Antiques
    Two-Day Summer Auction
    July 12 & 13, 2025
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Winston Link Signed Photograph, Hotshot Eastbound, Iager, West Virginia, July 1957. $3,400 to $3,800.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Alexander Hamilton ALS, Whiskey Rebellion. $2,800 to $3,200.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Civil War Canteen and Letters, Thomas Tabb Jr. CSA. $1,800 to $2,200.
    Case Antiques
    Two-Day Summer Auction
    July 12 & 13, 2025
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Archive of Capt. William Tabb of MS, CSA, Killed Atlanta. $1,000 to $1,400.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Rudyard Kipling Collection, 29 Volumes, First Editions; Zaehnsdorf Bindings. $1,000 to $1,200.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Artist Andrew Wyeth & Family Signed Letters, Cards. $1,000 to $1,200.
    Case Antiques
    Two-Day Summer Auction
    July 12 & 13, 2025
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Augusta Resolves Silk Broadside, Revolutionary War RelateD. $800 to $1,000.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: 1894 Map of Nashville. $800 to $900.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: CSA Navy Appointment, Semmes and Mallory plus Photo of Lt. Armstrong. $600 to $800.
    Case Antiques
    Two-Day Summer Auction
    July 12 & 13, 2025
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Slave Colonies of Great Britain, 1825, Macaulay, First Edition, plus Debate on Abolition, 1792. $600 to $800.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Signed Photo of 3 Presidents: Nixon, Ford, Carter. $600 to $800.
    Case Antiques, July 12-13: Slave Ledger, Merrill Plantations, Natchez, MS & Concordia, LA. $1,000 to $1,200.
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