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Fine Editions Ltd
Books and Ephemera of Aesthetic Merit
Membership(s): IOBA
Elliot, W. J.; Holden, William Curry The Spurs [offered with] The Espuela Land and Cattle Company : a study of a foreign-owned ranch in Texas
$349.00
Spur, Texas / Austin: The Texas Spur [from 1938] / Texas State Historical Association, 1939. First Edition. Hardcover. Only printing of this western Americana, “now quite difficult to come by.” (Adams) Crown 8vo (176 x 125mm): [16],274pp, with portrait frontispiece from photograph on coated turquoise stock, three further plates, map, and vignettes in text. Publisher’s lime-green cloth, beige end papers, title page printed in green and black; issued without dust jacket. A virtually pristine, apparently unread copy. The second work, originally published in 1934, is offered in the revised and augmented edition of 1970, with five new chapters on the geography and history of the Spur country prior to founding of the ranch, as well as revisions and additions to the original work, which is devoted to aspects of life on the ranch from its founding in the early 1880’s. Demy 8vo (228 x 143mm): xv,[7],268pp, with 12 inserted plates from photographs and full-page map. Publisher’s sand linen printed in black, map end papers, double-page photo-illustrated title page; pictorial dust jacket, priced $9.00. An excellent example, tightly bound and clean throughout. Adams (Rampaging Herd) 757 (“A history of this famous ranch by one connected with it.”) and 1051. Howes E100 and H583. Reese (Six Score) 37. Fine.
According to Reese, “While this book [The Spurs] is rather crudely printed and written, it gives more of the flavor of the Spur Ranch than any other book. The author worked for the Spur outfit, and there are many tales of his own personal experiences and those of his comrades.” (Reese addresses Holden’s near-contemporaneous account in his note to Elliot’s work.) Set on more than half a million acres east of the Southern High Plains, in Garza, Kent, Dickens, and Crosby counties, Texas, some ninety miles north of Colorado City, the Spur Ranch was established in 1883 by the Esquela [Spur] Land and Cattle Company of Forth Worth. In all, the company acquired sixty-one herds and their brands. Two years later the Spur was sold to an English syndicate (English and Scottish capitalists were then investing millions of pounds sterling in the acquisition of American cattle and range privileges), which operated the ranch until 1907, when it was sold again. N. B. With few exceptions (always identified), we only stock books in exceptional condition, carefully preserved in archival, removable mylar sleeves. All orders are packaged with care and posted promptly. Satisfaction guaranteed. (Fine Editions Ltd is a member of the Independent Online Booksellers Association, and we subscribe to its codes of ethics.).
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Rare Bigfoot Movie poster
Slatzer, Robert F. (Director) Anthony Cardoza, Bill Reardon, & Herman Tomlin (Producers BIGFOOT, RARE 1970 MOVIE POSTER
$650.00Gene W. Baade Books on the West
RARE DRAMATIC BIGFOOT MOVIE POSTER, Ellman Film Enterprises. 1970. The over-the-top film, BIGFOOT, produced in 1970 by Anthony Cardoza and Bill Reardon, was panned by everyone, with virtually no one saying it was any good. One wag said that it would be the only opportunity to see John Carradine, Joi Lansing, Judy Jordan, John Mitchum, James Craig, and several other actors all together in one movie, so you better see it anyway! The only poster for this film that one finds for sale is the common one that you can buy on several websites for very little money. But that one is like cheap, 3-year old Scotch compared with 50-year old good stuff that you will find in Edinburgh whisky shops under lock and key and that I cannot afford. I frankly don’t know about this poster in terms of whether it was an advance or trial poster that didn’t make the cut, or wasn’t produced en masse for some other reason. It is far more classical in appearance than the cheap cartoonish one you can still get for a few bucks. Unrolled to a size of 27 ¼” x 39 ¾”, it takes up almost all of my golden oak antique kitchen table and half of my standard-size bed! It is professionally backed on linen. In spite of one long tear and several short tears, all of which are professionally and archivally repaired, this poster ends up being showy, good-looking, and impossible to ignore, a poster that would dominate the conversation of any beer and brats forest cookout-“Have you seen that poster?!” It will bust the balls of any hairy-chested man-cave dweller and, because it is also a “biker” film, salt the seats of Harley-Davidson rally-goers on their way to Sturgis! Bigfoot filmography author David Coleman in his massive book, 2012 book, The Bigfoot Filmography: Fictional and Documentary Appearances in Film and Television, devotes two quarto pages to description of the film. He includes these gems: “Bigfoot is perhaps the most entertainingly bad Bigfoot movie of the entire ‘cycle’ . . . given the strange blending of motorcycles, ridiculously bad Bigfoot costumes, has-been actors, bikini babes, and a mutant music score, the entire enterprise is truly a slow-paced, stupefying descent into all things torpid, but with a camp sensibility that redeems Bigfoot from total boredom. Then, from a historical perspective, he concludes: the film “marks the beginning of a new era in the genre that draws a clean dividing line between the earlier film incarnations of the ‘wild man’ cryptid appearing mostly in snow settings as a Yeti (and) set(s) the stage for the plethora of Big-foot focused movies to follow in the 1970s.” This is an essential poster for few people who have the wall-space to hang it. It would be one the poster you would frame and hang front and center over your giant fieldstone fireplace at one end of your room with the 20-foot vaulted ceiling. Unquestionably rare.
Offered for Sale by: Gene W. Baade Books on the West -
Three Scarce Princeton Triangle Club Scores
Booth Tarkington, E. Harris Harbison, Erdman Harris, Eric Barnouw, et al Princeton University – The Triangle Club: Three Early Musical Scores, 1919–1928
$750.00Cincinnati and Princeton: The John Church Company and The Triangle Club of Princeton University, 1919-1928. 4to., 77 pp., 49 pp., 55 pp. Three volumes. Original pictorial wrappers. All very good or better copies, showing only mild wear and handling. A rare trio of early Princeton University Triangle Club musical scores, documenting one of America’s oldest and most storied collegiate theatrical traditions. Founded in 1891 [evolving from the earlier Princeton Dramatic Association], the Triangle Club quickly became a cultural institution—known for its original musical comedies, cross-country tours, and alumni who would go on to shape the American stage and screen. Included here are: The Hon. Julius Caesar [1919] – a ‘travesty with music’ revised by John Biggs, with lyrics by Erdman Harris, F. Warburton Guilbert, Booth Tarkington, Post Wheeler, and Edward Hope. OCLC records only three institutional holdings. Napoleon Passes [1927] – music and lyrics by E. Harris Harbison, Frank A. Baker, Austin P. Leland, and others. OCLC lists just seven copies worldwide. Zuider Zee [1928] – lyrics by Erik Barnouw and Joshua Logan. Logan, later a celebrated Broadway and Hollywood director (South Pacific, Mister Roberts), performed in this production, which toured major U.S. cities. OCLC notes only two holdings. Together, these volumes form a vivid snapshot of Jazz Age Princeton’s creative life between the wars, when Triangle productions launched the early careers of figures like Booth Tarkington, Logan, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Jimmy Stewart. Their scarcity—each title surviving in only a handful of libraries—underscores both their ephemeral nature and their growing appeal to collectors of American collegiate theatre and cultural ephemera. Condition ranges from Very Good to Near Fine, with minor edgewear or small ownership marks noted. A handsome and historically important ensemble, seldom offered together, tracing the formative decades of Princeton’s legendary Triangle Club.
Offered for Sale by: 32.1 Rare Books + Ephemera -
Scarce 1857 Dred Scott decision, Grolier Club #68
Scott, Dred Report of the Decision of the Supreme Court of the United States And the Opinions of the Judges Thereof in the Case of Dred Scott Versus John F. A. Sandford. December Term, 1856
$495.00Gene W. Baade Books on the West
Washington DC: Benjamin C. Howard, 1857. First Thus. Soft cover. Poor. Item #2507047 1857 Washington printing said to be issued at or about the same time as the New York edition. Original string-tied printed wraps. LACKING ORIGINAL PAPER COVERS, TITLE PAGE, AND LAST LEAF (page 239) the last two of which have been replaced by your bookseller as new pages. In this famous and convoluted case Scott, a slave who had also lived in free Wisconsin Territory and Illinois, sued for his freedom (as did his wife). A lower court in Missouri ruled in his favor. This ruling was reversed by the Missouri Supreme Court, whereupon Scott appealed to the US Supreme Court where he lost in a 7-2 decision when the winds of slavery politics blew to smithereens the up-to-then accepted “doctrine” that, “once free” (as in having lived in a free state or territory), “always free.” This decision has come down through US history as one of the biggest failures of the US Supreme Court. As noted above, the title page is missing. I have supplied. cutting to proper dimension, a modern page of the same, which is laid in. This copy is also missing the last page (p.339), but I have supplied the entire text of the last page and also cut it to proper dimension and laid it in. Otherwise the copy, string-tied as noted, has water tidelines upper half of the first leaf, which tideline extends to a decreasing degree into the 63pps. Clarity of readability is not compromised. Quite minor foxing to a few margins. Minor edge chipping to first and last pages. To be obviously handled with care, but a quite serviceable reading copy if you desire this text in its original form pps (3) – 228. Very scarce. This document in book form is #68 in the famed Grolier Club’s One Hundred Influential American Books Printed before 1900 published in 1947.
Offered for Sale by: Gene W. Baade Books on the West -
Rare 1841 frontier narrative, last sold in 1920
Pritts, Joseph Incidents of Border Life Illustrative of the Times and Condition of the First Settlements in Parts of the Middle and Western States Comprising Narratives of Strange and Thrilling Adventure – Accounts of Battles – Skirmishes and Personal Encounters with the Indians – Descriptions of Their Manners, Customs, Modes of Warfare, Treatment of Prisoners, etc. etc.
$1,000.00Gene W. Baade Books on the West
Lancaster: G. Hills, 1841. 2nd Edition. Hardcover. Good. Item #2401049 2nd edition, 1841 title page, with 1839 first edition pagination. Original boards, but rebound with new spine and leather-looking material extending past the joints and on the board fore edges covering the entire fore edges. Title stamped in gilt on spine. New endpapers. 507pp. The 1841 edition calls for 511pp, so I don’t know why the 1839 pagination is in this volume. Howes P619 lists variant issues. This copy has seven engravings. The double page foldout of Braddock’s defeat is bound in upside down & is missing about 1/5 of the lower right of the image. Two of the illustrations are full page and we believe include the essential visual information, but in each case there may have been a foldout extension with additional visual material or border. Engravings include portraits of Brant and Danial Boone. One interesting fold out engraving shows three Indian women bathing a white man in a river or pool of some sort. It is quite fetching. Title page near gutter was previously repaired with what may be thin archival tape and a minor loss of paper at the bottom edge. General foxing/browning. Tidelines (water stains) on many pages but not very dark in my opinion. The publisher essentially compiled dozens of reports and narratives from military and civilian sources from the western border of western New York, eastern Pennsylvania, and adjacent areas from the War of the Revolution. Sample chapters: “Devastation of Wyoming Settlements” (Penn.), “Singular Prowess of a Woman,” Incidents attending a Desertion,” “The Lost Sister,” Trial of Mamachtagea,” “War in the North-West — Gen. Harmar, St. Clair, Wayne,” “The Widow Scraggs.” The last recorded copy for sale of this book was in 1920. Several copies of this book appear in world libraries, mainly in the UK. Only a couple in US libraries. Overall good condition and nicely rebound. Rare.
Offered for Sale by: Gene W. Baade Books on the West
