Carneigie Book Shop Billhead, New York City 1951

This billhead from 1951 is from the Carnegie Book Shop, one of Midtown Manhattan's premier antiquarian booksellers during the 20th century. During the shop’s lifetime, it specialized in first editions, fine bindings, standard sets, rare autographs, historical documents, and manuscripts.

The customer’s purchase reflects an example of the shop’s inventory with the notation Burns, likely referring to the works of the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns. The volumes were priced at $3.75 and $3.00, bringing the total order to $6.75, or $80 in today’s dollars.

The shop's address on the bill, 140 East 59th Street, was across the street from Bloomingdale’s in a Midtown hub for high-end dealers for much of the 1900s. David Kirschenbaum, the book shop's proprietor, was a legendary figure in the New York rare book trade. He operated the Carnegie Book Shop for the majority of the 20th century. Kirschenbaum opened for business in 1928 on West 57th Street next door to Carneigie Hall and used the Carneigie name for his business, given its proximity to the famous concert hall. A few years later during the Great Depression, he moved the business to a more affordable location (the billhead address) but kept the name because he had established himself as a reputable dealer of rare books under that name. 

During his tenure, Kirschenbaum handled some important and rare manuscripts and documents such as a heavily annotated second draft of the United States Constitution from 1787, purchased for $160,000 at a 1970 auction. He also bought and sold George Washington's personal copy of The Federalist. He also handled a significant historical document of his own times—the original flight log of the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, which led to the end of World War II.

The Carneigie Book Shop closed when Kirschenbaum died in January 1994 at the age of 99, having operated from pushcarts in the early 20th century to brick-and-mortar stores throughout most of the remainder of the century. He plied his trade for more than 80 years among the elite of New York antiquarian booksellers.

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