Post-Revolutionary War to Civil War
1815 "George Washington" Portrait Philadelphia Almanac With "Charles E. Goodspeed" Boston Massacre Bookplate !
1815-Dated, "The United States Almanac; Being the Third After Leap Year... Calculated by William Collom," with George Washington's Printed Portrait, Philadelphia, by Thomas M. Longstreth, With "Charles E. Goodspeed" (1867-1950), Boston Massacre Engraved Bookplate, Very Fine.
This "The United States Almanac..." with "Charles E. Goodspeed" Boston Massacre Bookplate on inside cover in this original 1815 Almanac, 48 pages, Complete, measuring 7.5" x 4.5" nicely illustrated with a large 3.5" x 2.75" engraved oval Portrait of President George Washington on its title page. Text on its Bookplate reads: "Engrav'd printed & sold by Paul Revere, Boston, ex libris, Charles E. Goodspeed." Etching was engraved by artist Sidney Lawton Smith (1845-1929), printed on paper, image size 105 x 71 mm.
In addition, there are some useful tables on the Value and Weight of Coins, other Foreign Coins and Federal Money, Rates of Exchange for Pennsylvania Currency, the American Standard of Money Approved by Act of Congress, April 10, 1806 including Gold Eagles and other Silver coins and an outstanding woodblock engraved figural print titled: "The Anatomy of the Man's Body as Governed by the Twelve Constellations."
This Almanac features its original wrappers, is nicely rebound inside hard pictorial boards, with a paper spine label and new endpapers. The head of the spine is slightly chipped, foot and corners bumped, and overall very clean and nice. Throughout the contents are a bit darkened with faint foxing, and there is light dampstaining to the title page. One series of original ink notations by an original owner along the bottom selvage of several internal pages reads:
"I put my Cow to pasture to Arthur St. Clairs the 22nd of May 1815 - The Cow took the Bull the 1st of July 1815 - Left pasture with A St Clair 19th and put to Peter Dager the 20th of Sept. 1815 - Quit pasture with Peter Dager the 26th of November 1815." (General and Governor Arthur St. Clair died August 31, 1818 and his wife Phoebe died a week or so later.)
Charles Eliot Goodspeed, (1867-1950), was an American Antiquarian bookseller and writer, was born in Massachusetts on May 2, 1867, the son of Abbie Ellen Dana and Elliott Freeman Goodspeed. He married Leila May Pinkam in 1894, and in 1898 he founded Goodspeed's Book Shop at 18 Beacon Street, Boston.
For nearly a century, Goodspeed's was one of the world's preeminent rare book shops. He published his memoirs, Yankee Bookseller, in 1937. SEE: "YANKEE BOOKSELLER, BEING THE REMINISCENCES OF CHARLES GOODSPEED" With Many Illustrations. Hardcover Book " January 1, 1937, by Charles E. Goodspeed (Author). An autobiography by the man who established Goodspeed's in Boston.
Arthur St. Clair was a President of the Continental Congress, Major General in the Continental Army, first Governor of the Northwest Territory. St. Clair commanded large force of Americans that was badly defeated by the Miami Indians in crucial battle near Ft. Wayne on Nov. 4, 1791. He died in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, August 31, 1818.