An Autumn Miscellany from L & T Respess Books

L & T Respess Books has released their List 356: An Autumn Miscellany, Books, Manuscripts, and Ephemera. This truly is a miscellany as there are not any common threads I can discern. Both the types of material and the subject matter are widely varied. So, we will stick to describing a few specific items with the caution that they are just samples, not representatives of the many other things to be found in this collection.

We will start with one of the most important medical treatises ever written. It came from an English country doctor named Edward Jenner, rather than a famed physician or scientist. He was familiar with an old piece of country wisdom that milkmaids who had contracted cowpox, a non-fatal disease, did not catch the more deadly disease of smallpox. He decided to take some pus from a diseased cow and inject it in a nine-year-old boy named James Phipps. After this, he similarly injected the boy with smallpox cells (Phipps must have been incredibly brave). The boy did not become ill. Jenner wrote up his findings in this book, An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the Variolae Vaccinae, a Disease Discovered in some of the Western Counties of England, particularly Gloucestershire, and Known by the Name of the Cow Pox. This is a first American edition of 1802, which was taken from the expanded second London edition. Jenner's findings became the basis of the many vaccines we have today that have saved so many lives. The term “vaccine” comes from this book. Something for those who are “anti-vaxers” to think about - this terrible disease, that killed an estimated 300-500 million people worldwide in the 20^th century alone, has now been completely eradicated, thanks to vaccination. Item 51. Priced at $1,500.

P. T. Barnum could rightly be called the greatest showman on Earth. No wonder people were always asking him to speak. This is a letter he wrote to a Mr. J. A. Woodward (?) on February 15, 1868. He declines the invitation as it would take three days of his time when adding travel. He notes that he does not “feel the ambition to go so far.” In case the recipient might consider trying to coax him to make the journey, Barnum adds that he would require a fee of $150 plus expenses. That amount, in 1868, he must have felt would be sufficiently discouraging. The letter is framed with a color caricature of Barnum by “Spy” for an 1889 issue of Vanity Fair. Item 19. $850.

Dwight Eisenhower held two historically important positions. He was the leader of Allied forces during World War II and President of the United States from 1953-1961. In that later role, he led the country through the heart of the Cold War era, the Supreme Court ruling ordering desegregation of schools, and the beginning of the space race. Perhaps his most lasting contribution used by millions of Americans every day is the interstate highway system. This book relates to his second position. It is a copy of his book The White House Years, two volumes, the first Mandate for Change 1953-1956, the second Waging Peace, 1956-1961. They were published in 1963 and 1965. Each volume contains Eisenhower's Gettysburg Farm bookplate and each is inscribed by Eisenhower “For Henry Roemer McPhee / with warm regards / from his friend / Dwight D. Eisenhower.” McPhee served in the White House as as Associate Special Counsel to the President, and as such, was part of the White House staff. Item 32. $1,750.

Here is another medical discovery book, one based on unusual circumstances. The title is Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice, and the Physiology of Digestion. The author is William Beaumont, an army physician, the publication date 1834 (second issue). Beaumont was stationed on Mackinac Island in the Michigan Territory when Alexis St. Martin, a Canadian woodsman, walked in. He had was in poor condition, having suffered an accidental gun shot wound to the stomach. Beaumont was able to save his life and fashioned a flap of skin to cover the hole in St. Martin's stomach. The physician then made an unusual request of his patient. He asked if St. Martin would allow him to lift the flap and observe what was going on in his stomach. Not being in shape to go back to the woods, St. Martin consented and became Beaumont's assistant for the next several years. Among his methods of study, Beaumont would put food on a string and put it in St. Martin's stomach, then pull it out again to see the effect on it of the gastric juices. That explains the book's title. One thing Beaumont learned was that emotions can affect the gastric juices. That was a precursor to later discoveries of Pavlov with his dogs. As for St. Martin, he eventually returned home, got married and had six children, and lived to age 78. Item 50. $750.

This is a campaign poster for the ticket of Roosevelt and Johnson. The Roosevelt in this case was Theodore, and his running mate Hiram Johnson. This was for the presidential election of 1912 and they were running on the Progressive or “Bull Moose” Party ticket. The mostly forgotten Johnson was the Governor of California and later served as a senator from 1917 until his death in 1945. Teddy Roosevelt needs no introduction. He had declined to seek reelection in 1908, but when his chosen successor, William Howard Taft, did not live up to his progressive ideals, Roosevelt sought the Republican nomination against him. When Roosevelt failed to get the nomination, he decided to mount a third-party campaign. Below a picture of the candidates is a quote from Rudyard Kipling: “For there is neither East nor West / Border nor Breed nor Birth, / When two strong men stand face to face / Though they come from the ends of the earth.” The popular Roosevelt mounted the strongest third-party campaign the country has seen, gathering more votes than the incumbent President, but it wasn't enough. In splitting the Republican vote, it opened the door for Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic nominee, to win the election. Item 34. $275.

L & T Respess Books may be reached at 413-727-3435 or respessbooks@cstone.net.