New Catalogue of Rare Often Unique Items from Primary Sources

Primary Sources has published their Catalog 9 Fall 2025 of Uncharted Americana. By uncharted you can think of unusual, unique, extremely rare. These aren't just items you don't see everyday, they are ones most people don't see in a lifetime. Primary Sources finds uncommon items and then carefully explains what they are. There are 135 pages used to describe just 25 items. When you're finished reading, you will have a better understanding of American history and where this material fits in. This is America.

You know a lot about the South's "peculiar institution," but nothing can make you understand slavery like the words of a slave. You may have read the works of eloquent ex-slaves like Frederick Douglass, but few slaves were as educated, well-spoken, and brilliant as he. This book comes from a slave you never heard of, one who did not receive much of an education until he was an old man, but who still can paint a picture of the difficult life he lived. It was not the paternalistic life slavery's apologists claim. The author is John Thomas, his book Thirty-five Years in Slavery. It was published, though likely only for a handful of family and close friends. This is the only known copy of this unrecorded account. He begins as a baby in 1827, "a little darkie babe," noting "the whites would come in and talk about it the same as a man in this country would talk of his stock, of a horse or cow." That was how he would be treated for the next 35 years. As a boy, he would watch other slaves beaten by his master. He did his best to steer clear of trouble. Then, when he was 14, he was sold to an old man. He was separated from his mother "and never been able to speak to her since." However, he hears some news, and with the election of 1856, when Republican Fremont made a good run at the presidency, his hopes began to rise. He writes that the Republicans are checking attempts to extend slavery and "Miss Stowe is using her power in writing." He adds, "At this time I want you to know I was not reading her book in 1858." He then hears about John Brown. He points out that a workman on the railroad cautions him to keep still and not run away. He predicts the Republicans will win the next election and the South will split from the union. Thomas bides him time. The Republicans win, the union splits, and he hears that Grant is advancing. Finally, Thomas implements his plan, escapes, and is free. He moves to Illinois, finds work, and lives until 1907. Item 23. Priced at $22,500.

If you collect firsts and rarities, this item is both. It is the only known copy of the first Midwestern gardening book. Ava Lee Davison was born in Connecticut but came to Ohio via New York in 1822. He was an assistant surgeon at the time. He developed a notably strong interest in gardening, particularly growing fruits and vegetables. He was amazed to find the cultivation of such crops grossly lacking in Ohio, which surprised him, as he believed the soil in Ohio to be superior to that of New England. He writes critically, "An observing traveler cannot but be surprised and astonished, on visiting the western country...from the eastern states, to see the superior richness of its soils, and the fineness of its climate, with the scarcity and inferiority of its garden vegetables. There are many excuses for this remissness and deficiency, but good reasons, at this late date, there are none." He decided to write a gardening guide to make sure there were even fewer excuses for this poor gardening. He wrote this book, The Gardiner's Manual, published in Mansfield, Ohio, in 1831. He points out that northern, southern, and western markets are all easily accessible to Ohio farmers. I don't know whether Davison had any success in his mission, but based on the book's extreme rarity, it seems unlikely many copies were sold, unless they were all so heavily used, they were destroyed (improbable). Item 7. $2,750.

One only known copy of a first edition deserves another. This one isn't even recorded. However, this doesn't come from an obscure author (even if most people don't know him today). The writer was George Thompson, very popular in the 19th century. Some of his obscurity comes from his using various pseudonyms, best known being Greenhorn. After writing for newspapers and other short forms, he moved to Boston in the 1840s. He then became extremely prolific, writing at least 60 novels in the 1840s-1850s. No one gets that many books published without a sizable audience, though none of them is easy to find today. Perhaps people threw out their copies for fear of embarrassment. He wrote in a popular 19th century genre known as city mysteries. They explored the ugly underbellies of the big cities. Crime, poverty, corruption, and worse yet, sex were the subject of Thompson's novels. You weren't suppose to write about sex in those days but Thompson wrote about it in all sorts of varieties, gay, lesbian, transvestism, group sex, child pornography. It was sensationalist stuff, but people have always wanted to read books of this sort. Item 11 is one of Thompson best-known novels but which, nevertheless, is very difficult to find today. The title is Venus in Boston, published in 1849. Until recently, only three copies were known to have survived, all from the New York edition. This copy was recently discovered and is from the Boston first edition, which preceded the New York one by a few days. By the end of the 1850s, Thompson seems to disappear, no more novels under his name or any of his previously used aliases. Item 11. $3,500.

To continue the flow, here is another first and rarity. We need to go far north for this one. This is the first newspaper printed in the Yukon. In fact, it's the first anything printed in the Yukon. There were not enough people there to justify printing until 1898. Then, in a short period of time, the territory was saturated with prospectors there to make their fortune. Gold was discovered. While most came to find gold, a few sought to make their fortunes selling to the prospectors. George B. Swinehart had been a publisher and editor in Juneau and headed for Dawson to publish that city's first newspaper. Unfortunately, he, his brother, nephew and a small printing press they carried weren't able to make it all the way. They were iced in where they were in a small place called Caribou Crossing (now Carcross). With nothing else to do, Swinehart set up his press on the ice and published the one and only issue of The Caribou Sun on May 16, 1898. Whatever the print run was, it couldn't have been too long. Only one other copy of The Caribou Sun is known, now in the Beinecke Library at Yale. Unbeknownst to Swinehart, another party learned of his plan and tried to beat him to publishing the first newspaper in the Yukon, but Swinehart still managed to get his Yukon Midnight Sun out first by five days. Item 21. $4,000.

Primary Sources can be reached at 734-355-2986 or primarysources25@gmail.com. Their website is found at www.psamericana.com.