Rare Book Monthly Articles - April - 2011 Issue

On the Road to Damascus

For someone who will visit a book fair it may be an act of premeditation or whim.  Plans will be made and unmade, commitments adjusted, weather and health considered.  Some collectors will fly across the country and others take a subway.  Once inside the Park Avenue Armory at 67th in New York they will become part of a sprawling mass of enthusiasms that leap to life as thousands of the faithful and addicted make their way in.  For collectors the New York Antiquarian Book Fair is a measure of their year.  Made money, sold some investments?  The fair is a place to reap tangible rewards conver...

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Auctions in New York in April

A cottage industry of Newport Mansions has grown up around the ABAA Book Fair in New York over the past twenty years.  The leading dealers, collectors and institutions come together in April for a ...

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AbeBooks Purchases ZVAB/Choosebooks

A major combination, and contraction in terms of the number of companies engaged in the book listing business, occurred on March 2 when AbeBooks announced that its European division had purchased G...

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

Part I – Eighty Years and Counting On April 1, 2011, perhaps just as you are clicking on this file, I will celebrate my 32nd year as antiquarian dealer based on Maui. It was not my original goal ...

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eBay:  Innocents Abroad

A recent article in Kingston, New York’s daily newspaper, the Freeman about an early [1777] copy of the New York State Constitution offered on eBay ignited the passions of members of the Ulster Cou...

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Court Strikes Down Google Settlement and Part of Google Books

"The benefits of Google's book project are many.  Books will become more accessible. Libraries, schools, researchers, and disadvantaged populations will gain access to far more books. Digitization ...

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Let the Bunting unfurl  in April:  an auction for charity

On April 20th, in Los Angeles and New York, the collections Charles Williamson and Tucker Fleming go up for bid.  Mr. Williamson was a long time PADA member and sometime actor.  Anyone who has ever...

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My Account:  Here's Your Scoreboard for AE Services

This month we are going to take a look at your "My Account" page here at AE. Everyone is entitled to one. Access comes by signing up for any level of membership, including free, and then logging in...

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Old Guides as Maps to the Future

Ten years ago, David Gerstel of Montreal, Canada, a long time collector of travels and voyages, searching for a less costly collecting opportunity began to collect American Stranger’s Guides, books...

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Books and Libraries:  The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

These are apocalyptic times in the book and library world as we know them. The year 2000 may not have been the beginning of end of the world for humanity, but for the book and library world, in hin...

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Sixteen Catalogues Reviewed This Month

This month we review 16 catalogues in Section Two of AE Monthly. Peter Harrington offers 75 important works. Pages of Yesteryear has some uncommon items, Garrett Scott, Bookseller, unusual ones. Jo...

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Rare Book Monthly

  • Fonsie Mealy’s
    Summer Rare Book
    & Collectors’ Sale
    July 30-31, 2024
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: U.S. / European Shipping Archive 1800-1814. The Widow Bermingham & Sons Collection. €7,000 to €10,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Bunreacht na hÉireann. Constitution of Ireland. An important copy of the First Printing of De Valera’s new Constitution, approved in 1938. Signed by the Constitution Cabinet. €7,000 to €9,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: A Rare Complete Run of the Cuala Press Broadsides. €7,000 to €9,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s
    Summer Rare Book
    & Collectors’ Sale
    July 30-31, 2024
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Grose (Francis). The Antiquities of Ireland, 2vols. folio London (for S. Hooper) 1791. Magnificent Hand-Coloured Copy - Only 25 Copies. €3,000 to €5,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Cantillon (Richard). Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en General, Traduit de l'Anglois, Sm. 8vo London (Fletcher Gyles) 1756. €3,000 to €4,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Gregory, (Lady Augusta). Spreading the News: The Rising of the Moon: The Poorhouse (with Douglas Hyde). Being Vol. IX of the Abbey Theatre Series. €3,000 to €4,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s
    Summer Rare Book
    & Collectors’ Sale
    July 30-31, 2024
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Lavery (Lady Hazel). A moving series of three A.L.S. and a Telegram to Gen. Eoin O'Duffy, July-August 1927, expressing her grief at the death of Kevin O'Higgins. €3,000 to €4,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Dampier (Wm.) Nouveau Voyage Autour du Monde, ou l'on descrit en particulier l'Isthme de l'Amerique…, 2 vols. in one, Amsterdam, 1698. €800 to €1,200.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Howell (James). Instructions for Forreine Travel Shewing by what Cours, and in what Compasse of Time…, London, 1642. €800 to €1,200.
    Fonsie Mealy’s
    Summer Rare Book
    & Collectors’ Sale
    July 30-31, 2024
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: Rowling (J.K.) Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 8vo, L. (Bloomsbury) 1999, First Edn., First Printing of Deluxe Collectors Edn. Signed. €800 to €1,200.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: James (Wm.) A Full and Correct Account of the Military Occurrences of The Late War Between Great Britain and The United States of America. 2 vols. Lond. 1818. €650 to €900.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, July 30-31: The Laws of the United States, Published by Authority, 3 vols. Philadelphia (Richard Folwell) 1796. €600 to €800.

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