Bibliophemera

Gabe Konrad, of Bay Leaf Books in Sand Lake, Michigan, has informed me of a new Web site he's launched devoted to bookseller labels. He writes, "I wanted a place where I could post interesting label news and keep a current list of links." Have a look at www.booksellerlabels.com and see if you agree with me that he's off to a fine start. I'll certainly be checking in regularly to see what's new. He has some great examples and helpful information on this diminutive paper collectible. From time to time, I feature a few bookseller labels on this blog--those tiny, stamp-sized stickers that advertise a bookseller's business. You usually find them in older books affixed to a lower corner of either the front or rear endpaper. Some examples from my small collection are shown below. Here's a few other collections that I've referenced before, which you'll also find on Konrad's site: Seven Roads Gallery of Book Trade Labels and the massive collectio...

This blog has only been around a few years, so there's not many posts here related to Christmas. Below are three that seemed appropriate for past Christmases and for reposting today on Christmas Day. To all who follow, subscribe, or otherwise stumble across this blog and also celebrate Christmas... Merry Christmas! Christmas books from Amarillo, Texas The Christmas Cove Library Dutton's Books for Children: A Christmas handbill circa 1900

Here's an interesting picture of an African bookseller who is in danger of losing his business. The economy has nothing to do with it. Progress is about to do him in. The year is 1961 and the reverse side of this Associated Press wire photo (below) indicates that this bookseller keeps shop on a ferry that transports passengers across the Niger River (country not named). In the near future, within the next five years, a bridge will be built across the river in the location where this ferry boat runs. Modern times and technology, circa 1965, will eliminate the need for water transport of people. No ferry, no book shop for this enterprising young man. His books appear to be used and antiquarian in nature, with perhaps a few newer titles in the mix. The titles that are legible are in English (and the newer looking books). A dictionary, a book about manners, and one about the dangers of drinking and smoking. With the much older looking books on the table, the stock certainly appears ec...

Does this look like a haunted building? The Holmes Book Company was located here at 274 Fourteenth Street in 1931 according to the postmark date on the postal cover below. And according to some, a ghost roamed the stacks mischievously throwing books and making some of the patrons feel uneasy. An article on haunted Oakland touches on this phenomenon. You can search the Internet, using the keywords Holmes Book Company ghost , and find the same or similar references to the spooky goings on in the old book shop building. Holmes was Harold C. Holmes, who lived from 1877-1965. A brief biography of Holmes is found at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, where his papers are archived. He was born in Toronto, Canada, but his family moved to the San Francisco Bay Area when he was about five years of age. There, his father started the Holmes Book Company, which had several antiquarian book shops in San Francisco and Oakland and offered the opportunity for Harold Holmes to enter the busine...

As the Thanksgiving Day holiday is upon us in America, where celebratory gatherings and dinners take place in honor of the pilgrims' first Thanksgiving feast, here's a (tenuous at best) pilgrim-themed piece of book trade ephemera for the occasion. Well, this was as close as I could get to something Thanksgiving related--a blotter for a book shop with the name "Pilgrim." Were it located in Plymouth, Massachusetts, it would add a degree more of appropriateness. However, this book shop appears to be in Brooklyn, according to the dealer who sold me the card, as well as a google map search on the address . Brooklyn is the only place I've been able to locate an intersection with the two street names indicated on the blotter. Locating any other details about this book shop has hit a dead end. These pilgrims seem to have vanished without a trace. All I have is what's on this roughly 3-by-6-inch blotter, which dates about 1930s. October 2nd was the grand opening of th...

Here's an ad cover from 1890 for a Lancster, Pennsylvnia bookseller who used a little creativity with the advertising on the envelope. Most ad covers, or postal covers, contain a standard return address in the upper left corner that includes the essential business information of name and address ( example ). Some add a logo or cameo ( example ) to catch attention. Some add to these things information about their business or inventory ( example ). And some have stretched their creativity to include illustration of the cover's front, back, or both ( example ). S.H. Zahm combined some of the above with a twist that is an effective eye-catching design. He chose to use a triangular shape in the lower-left portion of the cover to disseminate business information down to the point of the lower-left corner. It's finished with a decorative border. Zahm lived from 1840 to 1892, a short 52 years by today's standards. He appears to have been an accomplished bookman and antiquarian ...

The two ornately designed bank drafts below, with what appears to be revenue stamps, were drawn on the account of a prominent Cuban bookseller, Ricardo Veloso, in Havana in 1920 and 1921. Each paper is approximately 5 X 9.5 inches (12.5 X 24 cm). From the book, Havana Deco , by Alejandro G. Alonso, Pedro Contreras, and Martino Fagiuoli (W.W. Norton & Company, 2007), I gleaned a few facts about Veloso and his Libreria Cervantes. Ricardo Veloso's full name was Ricardo Veloso Guerra and he founded Libreria Cervantes in 1910. Eventually boasting the largest inventory of books in Havana, Libreria Cervantes also distinguished itself as the first bookstore in the city to sell books on credit. Veloso (Guerra is dropped in most references) also edited and published books for Cervantes. In 1926, Veloso merged his company with Cultural S.A. and they expanded their business in Cuba as well as abroad. In the process, they assumed a prominent role in Havana's literary and cultural circle...