BOOKS, PHOTOGRAPHS, EPHEMERA

A Selection Of Rare Historical & Cultural Documents



BOOKS PHOTOGRAPHS EPHEMERA MAPS


ANTIQUARIAN & OTHER BOOKS

9991. HISTORIA SACRA ET PROFANA ARCHIEPISCOPATUS MECHLINIENSIS, 1725. At least 21 full page engravings of persons, cathedrals, and sculptural sepulchers including six foldouts. 717+ pages. 2.25 x 8.5 x 13.5 inches. Rebound in gold stamped cloth, a few pages loose at tops. Some excellent and very detailed architectural engravings.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at the NJ Book Show January, 2000.

$1200.



WORKS OF EPICTETUS THE STOIC PHILOSOPHER

9327. ANTIQUARIAN EPICTETUS. EPICTETI ENCHIRIDIUM CEBETIS THEBANI TABULA, 1723. 1.5 x 5 x 8 inches. 288 pages. Engraved frontispiece and folding plate, engraved chapter headers and initials. Title page printed in red and black. Gold stamped vellum armorial binding. Sound and tight in generally nice condition, damp stains in lower corner throughout. Works by the famous Stoic philosopher Epictetus printed in Greek and Latin side by side.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at the NJ Book Show November, 1999.

$400.



THE ROMAN FORUM 1876

11684. LE FORUM ROMAIN, ET LES FORUMS DE JULES CESAR, D'AUGUSTE, DE VESPASIEN, DE NERVA ET DE TRAJAN, Par Ferdinand Dutert, 1876. Elephant folio 13 x 20 x 0.75 inches. Original leather binding and finely marbled end leaves. 45 pages of text with interspersed engravings including a number of architectural coin reverses. 9 full page engravings, about half double page, one plate missing. Sound and in generally excellent condition with minimal foxing and matching protective leather strips on top and bottom of spine. Cover. End plate marbling.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at the NJ Book Show c. 2005.

$1200.



6590. LES CESARS DE L'EMPEREUR JULIEN, Baron Spanheim, 1728. contempory calf boards, rebacked, gilt stamped, marbled. Contains hundreds examples of Roman and provincial coins with choice engravings of most. 7.5 x 9.5". Generally excellent condition.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at the NJ Book Show February, 1999.

$1000.



TOBACCO ROAD - SIGNED FIRST EDITION 1932

10048. TOBACCO ROAD, by ERSKINE CALDWELL, 1932 First Edition in very fine condition signed February 23, 1971 in a bold hand by Erskine Caldwell with additional notes by my father Dr. Lyle Owen. Certainly no doubt about the signature in this case as I can personally verify it was signed by Caldwell on one of his visits to my father's home outside Branson, Missouri. In excellent clean condition with tight binding.

Provenance: Gift in the 1980's from my father Dr. Lyle Owen, retired head of the Economics Department at the University of Tulsa, Tulsa, Oklahoma.

$4000.



8408. PIERRE LOUYS, ADVENTURES OF KING PAUSOLE, 1933. Erotic classic by the famous French author, illustrated by Beresford Egan, gold stamped leather spine, 312 pages. 6.5x9.5". Nice condition.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at the NJ Book Show April, 1999.

$160.



PHOTOGRAPHS

13051. UNPUBLISHED ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPH OF THE BEAT GENERATION'S NEAL CASSADY, c. 1962-63 San Francisco, just off the Haight Asbury. 7 x 5 inches.

I had an apartment in San Francisco just off the Haight Asbury in the early '60's and I and a couple of poet friends used to hang out with various beat luminaries such as Cassady and Ginsberg and a lot of lesser known poets and artists. Neal generally lived a very spartan life and was not much on possessions. He traveled light and generally gave away all non-essential stuff as soon as he got it. This photo was taken by a group of college kids who had made the pilgrimage into San Fran to meet him. They then gave him this one photo of them and him together leaning on the side of what was I think their car and as soon as they left he promptly gave the photo to me just to get rid of it. Things like that meant nothing to Neal. He always lived very much in the present and never kept anything he didn't need to. This happened on the street in front of the little corner gas station where Neal had a job pumping gas at the time.

We had some good and always very interesting times with Neal. There was our famous arm wrestling bout (Neal won of course), all the wild parties and the time I unwisely let him use the bed in my apartment. A cute college groupie had just tracked him down and was itching to jump into bed with him. He couldn't take her to his place because of his old lady he was living with at the time. (He said she had a terrible temper but we hardly ever saw her since she never went around with him and almost always just stayed in the small apartment they lived in.) Anyway I offered my place and he jumped at the offer. He and the girl were in there for around two hours while I kept trying to keep my buddies from spying on the action from the fire escape. After that the girl stumbled out with a sort of glazed look on her face like she'd just been really worked over and immediately left without a word while Neal just seemed nonchalant like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Problem is I went in a little later and found 5 big wet spots on the bed I had to clean up. Neal had obviously not wasted any time!

Neal was a fascinating character. Once I asked him how he managed to do everything so perfectly and precisely. He simply responded 'I never aim to miss.' But he could take reasonable precautions too when the situation warranted. On one of our trips to visit Ken Kesey down in Carmel he was driving down along the Coast Highway in his old rattletrap and we kept trying to get him to do some sideways drifts for us. He did just one little one just to show us he could and then told us it was too risky.

Provenance: Given to me by Neal Cassady around 1962-63 just off the Haight Asbury in San Francisco.

$2500.



13051. UNPUBLISHED? ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPH OF THOMAS HART BENTON, Taken August, 1939 near Branson, Missouri by photographer Frank Lauder. 5 x 4 inches, black and white.

Thomas Hart Benton visited my father Dr. Lyle Owen several times at our home near Branson, Mo. On this trip he was accompanied by photographer Frank Lauder of Kansas City who took this picture of Benton and my father smiling at each other seated on a typical old fashioned Ozark's porch. My father loved Benton's works and kept a framed copy of his painting Persephone over the fireplace mantle. Persephone depicts the goddess as a beautiful nude Ozark girl sleeping beside a river being spied on by the God Hades depicted as a middle-aged Ozark's hillbilly. Benton cultivated the image of an Ozark hillbilly, yet he was the first artist to have his self-portrait on the cover of Time magazine. He hated art museums, saying he'd rather have his work hanging in a brothel, but he became Missouri's most renowned 20th-century artist. The original Persephone hangs in a gallery at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.

Frank Lauder was a well known Missouri area photographer in the mid-20th century. A large collection of his autochromes is housed in the Kansas City Public Library.

Provenance: Given to my father by Frank Lauder or Benton. Given to me by my father c. 1970's.

$1500.



10030. AMBROTYPE OF A WELL TO DO YOUNG MAN IN AN EXCEPTIONAL H.W. HAYDEN GUTTA PERCHA CASE, c. 1850's-60's. Exquisite 'Union" case signed by H.W. Hayden produced by S. Peck with molded girl and infant with exceptional detail and artistic rendering - certainly the finest I've carried. Slight flake at clasp & crack at lower hinge. Inside the hand-tinted image in an ornate brass mat with some spotting & separation near hands. 3.8". Provenance: Acquired by the current owner at an upscale New Jersey estate auction.

Gutta-Percha, a rare natural bioinert inelastic latex-like sap from SE Asia which became rigid upon drying and took very fine detail, was the chosen material for fine cases and plaques in the late 1800's prior to the development of plastics.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at Berman's Auction, NJ, December, 2000.

$650.



10038. FINE VICTORIAN GUTTA PERCHA PLAQUE, c. 1850-1870. Depicting a semi-nude maiden reclining in her bed embracing a dove which kisses her neck. 4 x 7 inches. Gutta Percha was also used in the exquisite 'Union' cases of top quality daguerrotypes which takes extremely fine detail. See our lot 10030 for an example of such a case. Excellent condition.

Gutta-Percha, a rare natural bioinert inelastic latex-like sap from SE Asia which became rigid upon drying and took very fine detail, was the chosen material for fine cases and plaques in the late 1800's prior to the development of plastics.

Provenance: A private American collection, acquired at Berman's Auction, NJ, May, 2001.

$1750.



EPHEMERA

10072. THE SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER, JANUARY 16, 1901. Stories on everything from a grizzly charging on Teddy Roosevelt to the burning of a negro by a white crowd. All sorts of ads for everything from corsets to patent medicines to gold dental crowns for $5 to steamship schedules from the east. A truly fascinating view back into early American history! Note this is an original newspaper, not the usual reprints. 17 x 23 inches.

Provenance: A private American collection. Acquired in the early 1960s from a San Francisco book dealer.

$200.



10071. THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, NOVEMBER 16, 1898. Stories on everything from the Dreyfus trial, Spanish American War, US volunteers in Manila, the story of a boy captain navigating his ship, meteor showers, plans to measure the earth, mortal feuds of Chinese Tongs in San Francisco Chinatown, meeting of the anti-Saloon League, and many fascinating ads for patent medicines and tonics to cure every ill. A truly fascinating view back into early American history! Note this is an original newspaper, not the usual reprints. 17 x 23 inches.

Provenance: A private American collection. Acquired in the early 1960s from a San Francisco book dealer.

$100.



10070. THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, JULY 5, 1892. Stories on everything from 4th of July celebrations, election news, to the drowning of aeronauts in a balloon accident. All sorts of ads for everything from corsets to patent medicines and liquor. Railroad schedules and even news of the discovery of cuneiform tablets referencing a Pharaoh's daughter. A truly fascinating view back into early American history! Note this is an original newspaper, not the usual reprints. 17 x 23 inches.

Provenance: A private American collection. Acquired in the early 1960s from a San Francisco book dealer.

$100.



MAPS