Rare Book Monthly Articles - January - 2014 Issue

The AE Top 500 Prices Paid at Auction for Books and Works on Paper in 2013

Another year comes to an end, and once again it is time to look back at the highest prices paid at auction for items in the books and works on paper field. This will again be a year for record volume at auction. At the top end, we saw a record high price paid for a printed book, and a record for a manuscript letter. The former was noted for its age, the latter its content.   All of the AE Top 500 for 2013 sold at prices of $67,950 or higher. That is down slightly from last year's $71,700. Nine items exceeded $1 million in price, versus 11 last year. However, this year's record for a print...

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For the Marcus Bookstore it is now or never

The Marcus Book Store sits in the lower Fillmore section of San Francisco at 1712 Fillmore Street, just north of Geary Boulevard that routes traffic east west from the downtown to the affordable ne...

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AED: the numbers are in the stars

Clarity about the future is rooted in clarity about the past.  The picture that emerges will not always be appealing and will sometimes be inconvenient, particularly in a period of regression to th...

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The Easy Way to Track Lots at Auction

We are now entering the start of the 2014 auction season. The season builds from now through May, when it slows for the summer. There will be many fascinating items offered, great deals for buyers,...

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Book Released on Life of Eccentric Book Thief Raymond Scott

An updated account of the life of eccentric book thief Raymond Scott was recently published. The title is Shakespeare Love. The Inside Story of the Book Crime That Stunned the World. It is a simil...

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Whitmore looking to the Future

It is in the nature of the book trade that the field is always adjusting the relationship between tradition and change.  The percentages will vary through the decades, prosperity is a dampener, for...

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Lady Montagu Naked in a Turkish Bagnio

One day, a bookseller from New York tried to convince me to buy one of his books despite some minor defects: “I’ve been in the business for more than thirty years and trust me, the beauty of a book...

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Mary Poppins & Nelson Mandela the Odd Cultural Couple for 2014

New Movies Highlight Popularity of the Books   A pair of new movies now in wide theatrical release should bring new attention to books by two authors who are already extremely well known.   The...

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Auctions In January

Numbers do not always tell the whole story but when the number is the quantity of scheduled auctions in the books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera category for a specific month we can make compariso...

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Courts Reach Contrary Decisions on Collection of Sales Tax by Out-of-State Retailers

The confusion over which out-of-state companies must collect sales tax in which states was ratcheted up another level as a result of a recent U.S. Supreme Court non-decision. The Supreme Court decl...

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Mr. Munsell: waiting quietly

On a grassy knoll in Albany, New York Joel Munsell rests as he has since 1880 when his printer’s heart ran out of ink.  Mr. Munsell was a local printer who left an outsized mark that was once visib...

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20 New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

This is a busy time of year in the cataloguing business. Twenty new bookseller's catalogues arrived in the past month. A couple of them celebrate anniversaries. From legal specialist The Lawbook Ex...

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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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