Rare Book Monthly

Book Catalogue Reviews - January - 2007 Issue

Recent Acquisitions from John Michael Lang Fine Books

Actress/author Eva Le Gallienne.

Actress/author Eva Le Gallienne.


Item 17 is a very scarce Oregon history, Brown's Political History of Oregon, by Henry J. Brown. It is so scarce because apparently almost the entire issue was lost, some saying it were lost at sea, others in a fire (John Howell says possibly the San Francisco earthquake and fire, but that occurred 14 years after the publication date). Only those copies shipped to the author, estimated by some as around 20, survived. Howes rates it as a "b." Though published in 1892, it only runs through 1848. It is labeled "volume 1," as evidently more were planned. However, there were no more, perhaps the seagoing disaster discouraging further volumes. Brown did extensive research in compiling his history, digging through official records, newspapers, correspondence and private records, some not available anywhere else. $1,500.

You may reach John Michael Lang Fine Books at 206-624-4100 or jmlbooks@isomedia.com.

Rare Book Monthly

  • Heritage Auctions
    Rare Books Signature Auction
    December 15, 2025
    Heritage, Dec. 15: John Donne. Poems, By J. D. With Elegies on the Author's Death. London: M[iles]. F[lesher]. for John Marriot, 1633.
    Heritage, Dec. 15: Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan of the Apes.
    Heritage, Dec. 15: F. Scott Fitzgerald. Tender is the Night. A Romance.
    Heritage, Dec. 15: Bram Stoker. Dracula. Westminster: Archibald Constable & Co., 1897.
    Heritage, Dec. 15: Jerry Thomas. How to Mix Drinks, or the Bon-Vivant's Companion, Containing Clear and Reliable Directions for Mixing All the Beverages Used in the United States…
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    Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Letter Signed ("T.R. Malthus") to Economist Nassau Senior on Wealth, Labor and Adam Smith. $20,000 - $30,000.
    Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides Finely Bound by Michael Wilcox. $20,000 - $30,000.
    Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: First Edition of Lewis and Clark: Travels to the Source of the Missouri River and Across the American Continent to the Pacific Ocean. $8,000 - $12,000.
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    Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Hooke, Robert. Micrographia: or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses. London: James Allestry for the Royal Society, 1667. $12,000 to $15,000.
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Chappuzeau, Samuel. The history of jewels, first edition in English. London: T.N. for Hobart Kemp, 1671. $12,000 to $18,000.
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 12: Sowerby, James. Exotic Mineralogy, containing his most realistic mineral depictions, London: Benjamin Meredith, 1811, Arding and Merrett, 1817. $5,000 to $7,000.

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