April on the high seas

Hello again from Paul and Callie, your friends at American Trade Bindings and Beyond!  The beginning of spring, and this first day of this new month of April, seemed like a good time to re-introduce the blog after a long hiatus.  During these uncertain and tumultuous times, when so many of us are working from home, it might be soothing to simply enjoy some bindings.  With this in mind, we offer here a selection of designs on nautical themes for your pleasure.

Let’s begin with a delightfully surreal design of a ship inexplicably anchored in a treetop, by George Washington Hood.

It’s hard to fathom what this book might be about, but a brief review in American Motherhood (Dec. 1909) helps a little:

“Hidden treasures and lost children are always fascinating subjects for childhood.  In “The Helter-Skelters” we have both, as well as a dear, lovable little lame girl, an old sailor man, a sea captain and a merry crowd of girls and boys known as “The Scowling Scots,” who are really the “Helter-Skelters”—most lovable and lively.”  

Deep indeed! So, a children’s story ... but what about that ship in a tree?

To provide some context for the following binding designs, I’d like to relate a brief tale passed down through my family for generations.  So, with your indulgence...

Willem Finn loved to sail.  A man of independent means and stout spirit, he was the proud owner of a square rigged three-master that he christened the Petrel.

His greatest pleasure was the sea, and his secret wish was to sail around the world and spend the rest of his days on the water.  But to do this he needed a crew.

Now, Captain Finn was no pirate, but it can't be denied that he shanghaied his crew by promising each a tour of his ship and perhaps a short cruise.  The "short cruise" never ended, however, and perhaps from some defect in character in the crewmen, or perhaps due to some strange power the Captain exercised (or maybe it was the laudanum-infused hardtack he fed them), the crew rarely escaped the ship, either at the outset or when Finn was re-provisioning.

But the Captain now faced a dilemma; his most recent recruit, Benton, was proving immune to the charms of the sea and sailing with him.  Though they often sailed accompanied by dolphins and saw wondrous sea life, it made little difference to Benton.  Where the rest of the crew could be listless, Benton was despondent.

When not moodily attending to his work, he often complained of his situation and loudly wished he was anywhere but on the Petrel.  After several weeks the Captain told Benton to stop his caterwauling, as there might soon be a change in his situation.

 They sailed for many days, through rough seas and smooth, until -- at last -- land appeared on the horizon!  Much of the day was spent approaching the coast, and the Petrel dropped anchor in early evening with the cliffs of the unknown land a short distance off to the west.  


 In the morning they sailed on, rounding a rocky promontory before sighting the low coastline that curved on before them.  They took care in entering the large, open bay as the water grew more shallow, finally anchoring several hundred yards offshore.

Captain Finn took Benton to the rail facing the shore and spoke his piece.  “I know you’ve not been happy, you scurvy dog,” he said affectionately.  “And while I’d hate to lose you, I’ll offer you a choice which everyone has received but few have taken.  You are most welcome to stay on board and we’ll continue our adventure and one day circle the globe.  Or, if you wish, you may leave us now and be taken to shore on the last of our flatboats.” 

“I’ll leave,” Benton replied immediately.


“Consider very carefully—though that gently curving coast may seem peaceful, the waves are rough and there are cliffs inland which must be climbed. It's a long trek before you’ll encounter any inhabited land, though you’ll find sufficient food and water on the journey.  Why take that route when the others remain with me on the Petrel?”



“No, Captain, I’m leaving.  I can’t speak for any of the others, but in my opinion 

your barque

is worse than

your bight.”

Alas, not even the captain's beloved shaggy dog, Jester of Monmouth, could convince Benton to stay.


We hope you've enjoyed this riveting tale on this, the first day of April.  We’ll return before long with a post on a puzzle we encountered recently.  There will be bindings, of course, but the subject falls more in the “and beyond” of our blog...

Until then, we hope everyone is doing well -- and please take care of yourselves!

Guest bindings (in order of appearance) …..

Daulton, George.  The Helter skelters.  New York: Frederick Stokes, 1909.  Signed GWH, George Washington Hood.
Hains, T. Jenkins.  The cruise of the Petrel.  New York: A. Wessels Co., 1906.  Signed FP, Florence Pearl England Nosworthy.
Davenport, Charlotte C. Shepherd.  A round-the-word jingle.  Boston: Thomas Todd Company, Printers, 1918.  Unsigned, unidentified.
Frothingham, Jessie Peabody.  Sea-wolves of seven shores.  New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1904.  Signed DD, Decorative Designers.
Page, Thomas Nelson.  Elsket.  New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1891.  Unsigned, by Margaret Armstrong.
Stockton, Frank R.  John Gayther’s garden and the stories told therein.  New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1902.  Signed EWC, Evelyn W. Clark.
Parrish, Randall.  The last voyage of the Donna Isabel.  Chicago: A.C. McClurg & Co., 1908.  Signed GM,  Guernsey Moore.
Masefield, John.  Salt-water poems and ballads.  New York: Macmillan, 1916.  Signed GH, possibly George Washington Hood.
Humphrey, L. H.  The poetic old-world.  New York: Henry Holt, 1909.  Signed BS, Bertha Stuart.
Smith, Francis Hopkinson.  The tides of Barnegat.  New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1906.  Signed BS, Frank Berkeley Smith.
Crosby, Irving B.  Boston through the ages.  Boston: Marshall Jones Company, 1928.  Signed TBH, Theodore Brown Hapgood.
Walworth, Ellen H.  An old world as seen through young eyes, or, Travels around the world.  New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Company, 1877.  Unsigned, unidentified.
Eggleston, George Cary.  The last of the flatboats.  Boston: Lothrop, Lee and Shepard, 1900.  Signed M within circle (unidentified)
Baring-Gould, S.  Winefred.  Boston: L.C. Page & Co., 1900.  Signed with Amy M. Sacker’s monogram.
Wheelright, John T.  A bad penny.  Boston: L.C. Page & Company, 1901.  Signed AB, Alfred Brennan.
Richards, Laura E.  Love and rocks.  Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1898.  Unsigned, by Amy M. Sacker.
Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart.  Loveliness. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1899. Picture by Sarah S. Stilwell, lettering possibly by or after Sarah Whitman.

Marion Peabody update!

Remember our blog post about Marion Peabody, the binding designer, whom we posted about way back in 2015? If not, go check it out! You can even see the photograph of her that we found in passport records.

Anyway, we have an update thanks to the sleuthing of Linda Obora! I was sitting at my desk in November of 2018 when a manila envelope was handed to me. Intrigued, I immediately opened it and pulled out the enclosed papers and letter. The letter was from Linda Obora, a genealogy researcher, and she had traced information about Marion and found her death date. Not only did she provide this information, but also was able to send us a copy of her death certificate and (drum roll, please) her WILL! How awesome is that? Thank you so much, Linda! 

Luckily, her research helped answer some of the unknowns from the previous post. We had found a tombstone that looked very much like it was Marion's, but we couldn't find that one missing link that definitively said that this was indeed "our" Marion. These documents linked everything together. So without delay, I want to share with you what Linda found. 

Marion Louise Peabody died January 9, 1937 at 6:15 pm in her home at Via Mario del Fiori, 16, Rome, Italy. 

There's just something about being able to see the same cobble stone streets she would have walked, probably the same door that she would have opened day in and day out, the same scenery she would have walked past on the way to pick up some things at the market--it makes her life more "real". Thankfully, Google Maps gives us this ability to see these things without physically being there. Check it out!

She died from cancer of the liver which was certified by her physician, Dr. Giulio Brocchieri. She was cremated and then buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Testaccio, Rome (the resting place of John Keats, Percy Shelley). The death certificate even spells out the exact plot in the cemetery where she was buried

Here is her tombstone, courtesy of Find a Grave.

It reads:

Qui le ceneri

lassu l'anima angelica 

di 

Marion L. Peabody

di Boston, Mass., U.S.A. 

Diletta dal signore

nella bontae nella sofferenza

le sia premio

la vita eterna

Roma 9, Gennaio 1937

(transcription from Find a Grave; "bontae" should read "bonta e")

Her brother in law, Lionel Simeon Marks (husband of Josephine Peabody, the famous author), was notified of her death by a telegraph sent to Harvard University, where he was employed, on January 9, 1937 and January 10, 1937. Josephine had died in 1922, so it's telling that her brother-in-law was the one notified. Marion's passport was destroyed on January 11, 1937, a scant two days after she passed. J. Wesley Jones, the vice consul of the United States of America, signed off on her death certificate which was officially filed February 5, 1937.  Her effects were left in the care of a Mr. Luigi Trombetti, the executor of the will. 

It never ceases to amaze me that you can find so much information on a death certificate. 

But now I was curious about Mr. Luigi Trombetti. Who was he--a friend? Simply her lawyer? My attention turned to the translated three page copy of the will that Linda included with the death certificate and letter. You can glean so much information from a will. You find out who was most important or closest to the deceased--well, important enough to warrant leaving them something at any rate. You can peer into their personal lives a little more and find out what things were dear enough to them to want the items to go to someone instead of just being disposed of.

Remember, Marion never married and was a self-sufficient woman who was living in Italy in 1937. Why is that important? Italy was living under the rule of Benito Mussolini. The Rome-Berlin Axis was established in 1936, but Italy had been living under a fascist government long before that. What was that like for her? 

Anyway, back to the will. 

Marion made her will on December 31, 1936, which, as the document points out, is the 15th year of the Fascist Era, at her home on the second floor of number 16, Via Mario del Fiori. Five people, in addition to Marion, were present to serve as witnesses while the will was created:

-Igino Clementi, an Italian notary; 

-John Wesley Jones, who we've already established was the Vice Consul of the United States of America and signed her death certificate; 

-Graham Erskine, an American architect;

-Giovanni Bizzarri, an Italian clerk;

-Pasquale Blasi, an Italian clerk.

The will identifies Marion as "Miss Marion Louise Peabody, daughter of the late Carlo". We learned in the first blog post that she was, in fact, the daughter of Charles (thus Carlo) K. Peabody who died in 1884 when Marion was 15. The will states that she's "ill in bed", so we know the cancer was debilitating at this point, and that Marion died just over a week later. 

The will starts with her niece Alison Peabody Marks, daughter of her sister Josephine Peabody Marks and Lionel Marks. Marion left her several rings (which were thoroughly described), a heart studded with diamonds, silver spoons, and a color picture of Josephine. 

Lionel Peabody Marks, her nephew, was left four decanters with a stand which belonged to her great, great grandmother 

Miss Dora Ohlfsen received two furs and 5000 lire. Say what?! Dora Ohlfsen-Bagge was a fascinating character who was a pianist, sculptor, painter, medallist, and had a brief stint (that we know of) as a spy. A spy, y'all! She and her lifelong companion met an untimely death in 1948 when they were found in their gas filled studio. Police ruled it accidental deaths, but some suspect it was a suicide pact.

Baroness Hélène de Kuegelgen, the companion of Dora Ohlfsen-Bagge and the individual who died with her, was left 5000 lire. 

Marion left Countess Frances du Besse two writing desks.

Mrs. Lia Trombetti Lardel received  a table from the drawing room and an ornate piece of furniture from the hallway.

The Reverend of the American church in Rome, Samuel Tyler, was left Marion's copies of books written by her sister, Josephine.  

The owner of the "Felix" library, Mr. Michele _________ was left the rest of her book collection. 

Mr. Alfredo Cifani was left a writing desk, his choice of chest of drawers or writing desk, and a bureau with the American coat of arms on it. 

Marion remembered her maids in her will as well. To Firmina Ferrari, "Irma" she left all of the kitchen contents including the furniture and utensils, all the contents of the entrance hall, the wardrobe in her bedroom, half of the table service, and half of her clothes and underclothes, though she did specify that Irma couldn't have the silk underclothes. She additionally left her 800 lire. To her other maid, Elvira Ruggieri, she left the other half of her clothes and underclothes (specifying again to not touch the silk) and 800 lire. 

Then, finally, we discover a little bit more about Mr. Luigi Trombetti. Marion left twenty-five lire apiece to Maria Letizia and Maria Immacoleta Trombetti, daughters of Avvocato Luigi Trombetti. So he definitely was a lawyer, but Marion goes on to give hints to their relationship later on in the paragraph saying, "as a token of gratitude for the brotherly and disinterested assistance their father has given me during the last seven years and of the esteem and friendship which I have felt and always shall feel for him." So in answer to my earlier questions, we now know he was both a lawyer and a friend. 

She closed her will with "I remember with affection all my relatives and friends." 

Marion was truly an interesting and fascinating character. She kept company with countesses, baronesses, painters, sculptures, lawyers, and most interestingly to me, a spy. We know her best here at Jackson Library as an accomplished binding designer and didn't want to end this post without a look at some of her work. 

Thanks again to Linda Obera, who did the leg work which offered us a glimpse into Marion Peabody's personal life. I love the fact that we can connect with people we otherwise wouldn't have through this blog. 

Paris and the social revolution : a study of the revolutionary elements in the various classes of Parisian society

Published by Small, Maynard & Company in 1905.

Caleb Trench

Published by Little, Brown, and Company in 1910.

Little Brother o' Dreams 

Published by Houghton, Mifflin Co. in 1910.

Appropriately, we'll end this post with a binding she created for her beloved sister, Josephine Preston Peabody's, book The Wayfarerers.  Published by Copeland and Day, 1898.

To Autumn: John Keats and Margaret Armstrong

"Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;”

-- autumn has come and, unbelievably, is nearly past.  Outside it's overcast with not much of autumn's characteristic crispness, and only a few leaves remain on the trees.  But inside we have a crisp binding to share:  The Poetical Works of John Keats, edited with notes and appendices by H. Buxton Forman.  Complete edition.  New York:  Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., c1895.

Before we take a closer look at the design, I hope you’ll bear with me for an anecdote about finding this particular book.  I’ve been travelling to bookstores in search of trade bindings for several decades and browsing for them is not as daunting as it might seem at first.  Although they are generally not displayed with the front covers out, and you’re usually confronted by shelf after shelf (or wall after wall) of book spines, it becomes almost second nature to recognize the look of a book published before 1920, and more often than not to be able to tell in what decade, the 1890s for example, the book was published.  Sliding the book out – not by the headband please! – and glancing at the cover only requires a few seconds, after which the book is either in your pile or back in position and you’re on to the next.  I was once in a bookshop in a small town in northeast Ohio which specialized in small press fantasy and horror titles, comics and ephemera, older paperback science fiction and some general stock, with much of the non-genre books gathered in one place on a range of shelves.  Since trade bindings can be found in almost any subject I glanced over the shelves and, to my great surprise, I spotted a likely candidate almost immediately.  Keats, of course, described my feelings perfectly in his sonnet “On first looking into Chapman’s Homer”:

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies 

When a new planet swims into his ken; 

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes 

He star'd at the Pacific—and all his men 

Look'd at each other with a wild surmise— 

Silent, upon a peak in Darien. 

I remember the scene in that small town bookstore looking something like this:

New “Finds” (A guest post by Mark Schumacher)

In the last few weeks, we have come across several new illustrators and artists, most of them women, who also contributed to the world of binding design. Most of the books involved are volumes aimed at children—readers, introductions to geography, and tomes of fairy tales or familiar legends, like Robin Hood. Although these designs may not always have the elegance of other covers [see http://libcdm1.uncg.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/tb1/id/2042/rec/1], they do show us artists heretofore unknown as book designers.


Charlotte Harding (1873-1951), a student of Howard Pyle at the Drexel Institute in Philadelphia, worked as an illustrator for several popular magazines in the early 20th century, and was a member of The Plastic Club, an organization for female artists, also in Philadelphia. She also worked with Alice Barber Stephens (1853-1932). Her cover for Eva March Tappan’s Robin Hood, his book (1903) reflects the style of her illustrations for the volume. The illustrations won a Silver Medal at the International Exposition in Saint Louis in 1904! A 1982 exhibit of her works included eight books and scores of magazine illustrations.

Kenny's Choice: March Binding of the Month Club

Welcome to the March 2016 Binding of the Month Club!

Did you know that the University of North Carolina Greensboro digital projects website is not the only place to view our collection of American trade bindings?  If you haven’t discovered them yet, let me encourage you to visit the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) (1). Headquartered at the Boston Public Library, the DPLA was launched in April 2013 after years of planning.  Their website gives this summary of their purpose:

"The vision of a national digital library has been circulating among librarians, scholars, educators, and private industry representatives since the early 1990s.  Efforts led by a range of organizations, including the Library of Congress, HathiTrust, and the Internet Archive, have successfully built resources that provide books, images, historic records, and audiovisual materials to anyone with Internet access.  Many universities, public libraries and other public-spirited organizations have digitized materials, but these digital collections often exist in silos.  The DPLA brings these different viewpoints, experiences, and collections together in a single platform and portal, providing open and coherent access to our society's digitized cultural heritage." (2)

The UNCG Libraries are a contributing institution to DPLA through the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center, one of DPLA’s partners, and our American Publishers’ Trade Bindings (APTB) collection can be viewed in its entirety on DPLA.

Why bring up DPLA on American Trade Bindings and Beyond?  In addition to my personal respect for what they’re doing and the quality of the product (11,776,547 digital items as I write this), and that you can find our bindings on their site, and to celebrate their third anniversary, I was delighted to find that one of their staff is a big fan of APTB!  Let me introduce you to Kenny Whitebloom, Manager of Special Projects at DPLA.  According to his bio, Kenny “works to build DPLA’s network of users and supporters through events and programs, communications, partnerships, strategic initiatives, and other projects that promote growth and innovation. He previously worked at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. Kenny holds a MLIS from Simmons School of Library and Information Science and a BA in History and Italian from Vassar College. Kenny’s current favorite DPLA items are the bindings for A Kentucky Cardinal and Aftermath (1900), Like a Gallant Lady (1897), The Tent on the Beach (1899), and The Legatee (1903).”

In addition to his accomplishments, Kenny also has great taste in bindings.  The titles he lists have binding designs by Hugh Thomson, Will Bradley, Margaret Armstrong, and the Decorative Designers respectively--all very heavy hitters in the world of binding design, and innovators in illustration and design.  Hugh Thomson (1860-1920) was born in Coleraine, County Londonderry, Ireland and died in London.  He was known for his work in periodical and book illustration.  In our context, he illustrated a number of classic authors, including Shakespeare, Austen, Dickens, and Oliver Goldsmith, as well as contemporary authors such as James Barrie and James Lane Allen.  In the 1880s and 1890s he created binding designs (and illustrations) for a number of books for Macmillan and Kegan Paul.  These are instantly recognizable by their elaborate pictorial scenes, stamped in gilt, and usually on dark cloth (we have five of his covers in the collection).  

Will H. Bradley (1868-1962) was an artist, book, magazine and graphic designer, illustrator, typographer, writer, and was considered one of the pre-eminent poster artists in the United States.  He started his own publishing firm, the Wayside Press, in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1895.  He designed covers for both small presses (H.S. Stone and Way & Williams of Chicago, R.H. Russell of New York) and large publishing firms (Frederick A. Stokes, John Lane, Dodd, Mead and Company (3)).  We've met Margaret Armstrong (1867-1944) in several earlier posts and her work will be featured again; many consider her among the best, if not the best, of the binding designers.  For this post, however, my choice from Kenny's favorites is The Legatee, by Alice Prescott Smith (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1903), with a binding by the Decorative Designers--I'm an unrepentant fan of designs on black or charcoal gray cloth...

The dramatic pictorial cover shows a forest in flames.  The somber black cloth becomes silhouetted pines against a background of swirling multicolored flames reaching (by implication) far up into the sky.  This cover is a good example of the switching of foreground image (the only inked portion of the design) into background, with the illusion of background black cloth becoming the foreground image.  The extremely restrained lettering in the center of the cover completes the design.  At first glance the darkened portion of the flames in the upper right might be mistaken as intentional, representing smoke among the flames.  After a more careful look at our copy and comparing it to the copy at the University of California, this “effect” turns out to be nothing more than the result of aging and the thousand natural shocks that cloth is heir to.

UNCG copy





                          University of California copy

The Legatee is a story of the lumber districts and lumber trade in the northeastern peninsula of Wisconsin in the early 1870s.  With references to Lake Michigan and the beaches and bluffs around the town of Wilsonport, the location must be the southern coast of the Door Peninsula, though this is not specifically mentioned.  A young Virginian comes to the area after inheriting a lumber mill from his deceased uncle.  There is an immediate clash between the rural, isolated upper Midwest villagers and young Robert Proctor, our hero, who until the Civil War had been a slave owner.  Neither understands the other and hostility grows.  He comes to love Katherine Edminster, the daughter of the local doctor, and her initial animosity gradually turns to affection.  The novel culminates with an account of the Great Peshtigo Fire (though not called this in the book) of October 8-10th, 1871 which devastates the entire region.  A very favorable review in the San Francisco Call of April 26, 1903, draws particular attention to the creation of original characters and the relationships among them, and that the “The catastrophe is worked up with dramatic skill and is described with a genuine intensity of feeling and vividness of pictorial effect.” (4)  

From the November 25, 1871 issue of Harper's Weekly magazine

The fire which climaxes The Legatee was “the worst recorded forest fire in North American history.” Coincidentally (or is it?  There are theories, including aliens …), a much more famous fire broke out the same night, October 8th, in Chicago.  Although the Great Chicago Fire is now part of our shared culture, the Peshtigo fire, which killed between 1500 and 2500 people (the devastation was so great that local records were destroyed and an accurate count was impossible), and burned 1.2 million acres, is little known today.  The fires were caused by a prolonged drought coupled with high temperatures and sudden cyclonic western winds which turned small fires, set to clear forest land, into a firestorm, with “fire tornadoes,” winds over 100 miles per hour, and temperatures of 2,000 degrees. (5)

Little information about the author is readily available.  Alice Prescott Smith wrote four novels in the early part of the twentieth century, The Legatee (1903) being her first.  The next two, Off the Highway (1904) and Montlivet (1906), followed quickly, with her final book, Kindred, appearing in 1925.  The first three novels were published by Houghton, Mifflin and Company and the last by Houghton Mifflin Company, which took this new form of name after incorporating in 1908.   A “List of United States citizens (for the immigration authorities)” dated Dec. 14, 1927 (6), gives her name as a passenger on the S.S. “President Van Buren”, sailing from Marseilles, France, Nov. 30, 1927 and arriving at the port of New York, Dec. 14, 1927.  The same source gives her age as 58 years, 1 month, and her place and date of birth as St. Paul, Minn., Nov. 1, 1859.  Her U.S. address was at 992 Green St., San Francisco, Calif.  The review of The Legatee mentioned above tells us further that Alice grew up among the people and scenes she described.  Her father, a Congregational missionary, had a large parish of widely scattered farms and villages, and Alice accompanied her father on his many long drives from farm to farm and “there was not a village she did not know.”  During these visits she heard many stories of the great fire of October 1871.  The review further states that before The Legatee, she had been “content to write short stories,” and that she had been a resident of San Francisco for the past thirteen years (i.e. since 1890, so she arrived in California at roughly age 31).

"All that's very well--and who doesn't want to know about a huge fire--but what about the binding designer?"  That’s a fair question.  I apologize for treating the main course like dessert, but when it’s the Decorative Designers you really have both in one.  Much is known about the firm, in large part because of the pioneering work of Charles Gullans and John Espey (7) who had the good fortune to interview one of the co-founders of the firm, Lee Thayer, in the early 1970s.  UCLA’s Special Collections holds a substantial “Collection of Materials by and Relating to the Decorative Designers” donated by Gullans and Espey (8). 

 The firm was unique in several ways, first of all because it was a firm.  It was founded in 1895 by the architect Henry Thayer (1867-1940) who quickly hired Emma Reddington Lee (1874-1973), who was trained in the decorative arts.  Emma later married Thayer (1909) and changed her name to Mrs. Lee Thayer.  Two other artists were hired, Rome K. Richardson, (born 1877) and Adam Empie.  Later Charles Buckles Falls (1874-1960) and Jay Chambers (1877-1929) were added.  Most binding designers worked as individuals, whether by contract or commission by publishers, or as art directors for the publishers.  

Another unique feature of the firm was division of labor.  Henry Thayer, trained as an architect, was responsible for a great deal of the lettering on book covers or other work (the firm also did illustration, dust jacket design, advertising, and other design work).  Lee Thayer was responsible for decorative designs and borders.  Richardson, who was with the Decorative Designers from 1896-1901, and Adam Empie transferred the designs to brass plates and engraved them.  Charles Buckles Falls and Jay Chambers, the latter working for the firm from 1902-1913, provided the figurative drawings used for “narrative” designs.  Although work for the firm was either unsigned or signed with their distinctive interlocked DD monogram, with the second “D” reversed, all of the artists working for the firm produced covers that were largely or completely by the single artist.  Falls, Richardson and Empie also signed these solo efforts with distinctive monograms.  Examples of these single designer bindings and monograms are given below (except Empie, as we have no examples of his solo work).  In all, the firm produced an astonishing output of around 25,000 pieces of design work, an unknown number of which were book covers, though they were certainly in the thousands.  The firm was dissolved in 1931 and Lee and Henry Thayer’s marriage ended in divorce the next year.  Our digital collection includes 120 covers by the Decorative Designers at this time.  Only somewhere between 10 and 100 times that number to go!

Cover designs by Lee Thayer (left) and Henry Thayer (right) and Jay Chambers (below)(9)

Cover designs by Rome Richardson (below left) and Charles Buckles Falls (below right)

And their monograms

Thanks again, Kenny, for your interest in the American Publishers’ Trade Bindings digital collection, and for a fine selection of favorites.  And to our visitors, don’t forget that your’s could be the next selection for Binding of the Month.  Just drop us a comment.

(1) Wikipedia article, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Public_Library_of_America for a brief overview.

(2) http://dp.la/info/about/history/ viewed March 30, 2016.

 (3) A nice site with brief biography, checklists of his artistic output and writings, timeline, etc. is at http://willbradley.com/

(4)  “Tale of ‘The Legatee,’ by Alice Prescott Smith, Is Strong in its Types.” Review:  San Francisco Call, Volume 93, Number 147, 26 April 1903.  http://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SFC19030426.2.54

(5) Deana C. Hipke. The Great Peshtigo Fire of 1871. http://www.peshtigofire.info/  Also see “The Peshtigo Fire” (http://www.weather.gov/grb/peshtigofire ) and “The Great Midwest Wildfires of 1871” (http://www.weather.gov/grb/peshtigofire2)

(6) “New York, New York Passenger and Crew Lists, 1909, 1925-1957," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1942-21741-32740-69?cc=1923888), 4184 - vol 9331, Dec 14, 1927 > image 184 of 486; citing NARA microfilm publication T715 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).

(7) For a useful short account of the firm, see:  Gullans, Charles and John Espey. “American Trade Bindings and Their Designers, 1880-1915.” In Peters, Jean, ed. Collectible Books: Some New Paths. New York: Bowker, 1979, p. 32-67.

(8) Online finding aid at: http://pdf.oac.cdlib.org/pdf/ucla/mss/deco1182.pdf
(9) Attributions by Lee Thayer as reported by Gullans and Espey in Collectible Books.  The image for The Yellow Van is from the invaluable website Publishers Bindings Online (PBO) with my thanks.  We have a copy in our collection but it's in poor condition.