Jas. B. Smith Advertising Cover-Philadelphia

Jas. B. Smith & Co. was established in 1837. It published reprints of classics in addition to Bibles. It seems its main concentration was the manufacture of blank books. This is noted in the advertisement included here which was published in 1867 in Freedley's Philadelphia and its Manufactures; A Hand-Book of the Great Manufacturies.

Smith's company was at the South Seventh Street address for many years beginning as early as 1860. Here is a very scarce advertising cover which shows a nice picture of Smith's building.

It is interesting to me (and maybe only me) how at the time these publishing companies sent out their statements and advertising propaganda within envelopes like this one, it probably would have been difficult to know which company would end up being well known in collectors' circles a century later and which would have been relegated to the scrap heap. I guess you just never know.

Lothrop Advertising Calendar

Here is a great calendar broadside advertisement for D. Lothrop & Co. The ad mentions three of Lothrop's magazines: Babyland, Wide Awake and the Little Folks' Reader.

Interestingly the entire 12 months of the year are shown on the one page of the ad with little vignettes of children for each month. What the ad does not reveal is what year it is for. Nowhere on the face of the ad id the year stated. Pretty bizarre, huh.

So what year is the ad for. There are a few hints.

D. Lothrop & Co. was in business from 1868-1887. After that the name was changed to D. Lothrop Co. On the calendar January 1rst is on a Saturday. That happened in 1870,1876, 1881, and 1887.

We can eliminate 1870 as the year because the Wide Awake magazine was introduced in 1874.
The Little Folks' Reader was initially started in 1880 so 1876 can also be eliminated as the year in question. By 1883 the periodical Wide Awake had a yearly subscription rate of $2.50. But in 1881 the yearly price was $2.00 just like on the ad.

Thus, this ad is for 1881.

Advertising Cover for A.J. Holman & Co.

The picture above is an advertising cover for A.J. Holman & Co. This cover is especially nice because it has a picture of the Holman building in Philadelphia and is dated (January 14, 1891).

A. J. Holman was an extremely prolific publisher of Bibles in the 19th century. In the 1850's Holman was employed by Jesper Harding, another huge Bible publishing house, as a superintendent of the manufacture of Bibles. In 1872 he began his own publishing firm which as the cover notes specialized in Bibles, and photographic albums.

Holman competed directly at that time with his former employer, Jesper Harding. In 1883 one of Holman's trusted copartners , Captain J. Parker Martin, left Holman to take over as manager of the Henry Altemus Bible production department. The similarity between the new Altemus Bibles and the Holman Bibles was quite startling. See: http://henryaltemus.com/bibles/bibles.htm .

As the years went on into the 20th century Holman continued to be one of the major Bible publishers.

Holman was still at this address in this building into the middle of the 20th century.

Harper and Brothers Advertising Calendar August 1886

Here is a great little item. Harper and Brothers is one of the really long-lived publishers. Beginning as J. & J. Harper in 1817 and evolving into Harper and Brothers in 1833 it was one of the major 19th century publishers. Harper's Weekly was a hugely popular periodical especially during the Civil War.

This little calendar from August, 1886 advertises a number of books published by Harper. Most publishers produced these little advertising pieces in this era. They are not too easy to find however.

Stratemeyer Advertising Pamphlet from LL&S

Today I wanted to present a great advertising pamphlet from Lothrop, Lee and Shepard.

In my experience pamphlets which advertise juvenile series books are quite uncommon. Clearly a one page or an accordion-like ad is much easier and certainly much cheaper to produce. This 64 page pamphlet is a vehicle for promoting Edward Stratemeyer's juvenile books.



Not only are there excerpts from some of Stratemeyer's books here but there are also numerous ads with book pictures from his various series.


The series noted are:
Dave Porter Series-Volumes 1-3
Pan-American Series
Old Glory Series
Soldiers of Fortune Series
Colonial Series
American Boys' Biographical Series
The Stratemeyer Popular Series (12 volumes)

Excerpts are presented from:
Dave Porter at Oak Hall (Dave Porter Series)
Defending His Flag
Lost on the Orinoco (Pan American Series)
Under Dewey at Manila (Old Glory Series)
Under the Mikado's Flag (Soldier of Fortune Series)
With Washington in the West (Colonial Series)

Also included in this pamphlet are numerous illustrations from the books themselves.

I believe this pamphlet dates from 1907. Both Dave Porter's Return to School and Defending His Flag were published in that year. There are no later books noted.

Altemus Advertising Calendar 1880

This little advertising calendar (3.875 x 2.375) from 1880 from Altemus & Co. points out the company's ability to manufacture whatever type of book the client wanted. At this time Altemus had not been routinely publishing reading books on its own imprint. Bibles, photographic albums and scrapbooks were the mainstay of their own imprint's publishing business but Altemus was very busy publishing for the needs of others.

Advertising Cover-The American Garden

There really is no end to publishing and book/author related ephemera. I thought with the new year I would expand the blog a bit and show some items that are not necessarily related to children's literature.

Here is an advertising cover for a magazine called "The American Garden". This magazine was first published with this name in 1873. Its first iteration was as "Flower Garden" from which it evolved. This journal was bought by Beach, Son and Company which was a seed and bulb dealer. At first it was a quarterly but in 1882 it became a monthly. At that point it went on a popularity roll. It acquired Ladies' Floral Cabinet in 1887. In 1888 it took over The Gardener's Monthly and The Horticulturist. In 1892 it changed its name to American Gardening. After a successful run it stopped publication in 1904.

Of course, for those of you up north you have plenty of time to find some old bound copies of these journals and begin to prepare for your planting season in the months to come.

Estes and Lauriat -Laura E. Edwards Advertising Flyer

Here is a great advertising flyer (3.75 x 5.25) for several Laura E. Richards' books. It is dated in 1881. This piece from the Estes and Lauriat publishing house is very similar to others of this same era I have seen from this house. (For the ZigZag books, Knockabout Books, and Travels by Ober.)


Laura E. Richards (1850-1943) was a prolific authoress of children's books. The most famous work was Captain January which was made into a film starring Shirley Temple. She was born in Boston. Her parents were Julia Ward Howe, a very well known writer and author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic and Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe, the managing director of the Perkins Institute for the Blind.


She was married in 1871 to Henry Richards who was still her husband at the time of her death. Her works initially were penned to help with the family finances. Her first work was jingles published by St. Nicholas (magazine). Her first book was Five Little Mice in a Mouse Trap published by Estes and Lauriat in 1880. Although the vast majority of her work was for children, she also wrote several biographies. Her autobiography "Stepping Westward" was published in 1931.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

Today I thought I would show some holiday book covers from various Henry Altemus publications.

Have a great holiday season!!

Gusky's Store and a Henry Altemus Publication

The four volume Shakespeare non series set was first published by Henry Altemus in 1891. Interestingly this set has been discovered with the Gusky Store of Pittsburgh imprint on the title page and Henry Altemus 1891 on the copyright page. With the exception of the imprint and the elegantly decorated end papers in the Altemus book, the four volume Altemus set is identical to the four volume Gusky set. It would appear that Altemus published this set for Gusky to sell in his store. Although I have seen some non-Altemus advertising in several other Altemus books, I have never seen a book that Altemus published for a department store. This is especially interesting considering that the Gusky set potentially could compete with the Altemus set. It is unclear at this time exactly what year the Gusky set was published (I assume in the early 1890’s) and what sort of deal the Gusky Store and Altemus had. Of note is that there are no books with the Gusky imprint listed for sale anywhere that I can find on the web.

J.M. Gusky (1845-1886) bought out a mercantile establishment called S. Cohen in 1882. He renamed it the Gusky Store. The Gusky Store is considered by most to be Pittsburgh’s first department store. The store occupied five stories and sold mainly a variety clothing. After Gusky’s death from pneumonia his wife owned the business and the De Wolf brothers managed it. By 1888 it had more than two million dollars in sales.

Dotty Dimple Series Boxed Set

A previous post on 10/16/2009 reviewed a Lee and Shepard boxed set of the Dotty Dimple Series. The set shown at that time was dated from 1876. The box had nice illustrations and decorations on the appliques on the top and the side. The box was glued together.






















Today I have an interesting contrast. Here is a boxed set of the same series. The books are all dated with the last one having 1870 on the title page. Thus this set most likely dates from that year. There are no ads from any later books. The box as compared to the box from 1876 is quite plain with appliques which just list the books. In addition the sides and bottom of the box are stitched together-not glued. This is an interesting distinction.

Although I am far from an expert on this, I wonder if a new process for making the boxes became common and cheap enough for general use during the 1870's. So the stitching was phased out

Oliver Optic Magazine Broadside 1871

I thought I would stay on the same subject as the last post. 19th century advertising broadsides from book publishers are quite unusual. Here is a wonderful example of one that advertises Oliver Optic's Magazine in 1871. This item is 25" by 20".

It probably was printed around the time of the magazine that it mentions--i.e. January of 1871. For interest I have included a picture of the January, 1871 Oliver Optic's magazine.

Lee and Shepard Advertising Cover

Here is a great advertising cover on which Lee and Shepard advertised Oliver Optic's Magazine. Although the date is not noted anywhere on the envelope, Lee and Shepard was located on Franklin Street from 1874 to 1885. Since Oliver Optic's Magazine was discontinued in 1875, this cover is from 1874 or 1875.

Oliver Optic (William T. Adams) was a prolific author of children's/juvenile books in the second half of the 19th century. In addition to his books he also was associated with children's periodicals. He edited Student and SchoolMate starting in the 1858 and later in 1867 he became the editor of Oliver Optic's Magazine.

Advertising Cover- Webster's Dictionary-1880's

Here is a great advertising cover for Webster's Unabridged Dictionary. The front and back of the envelope utilize almost all of the space not necessary for an address. In addition a flyer was found within the envelope with a price list for various editions.

It is an interesting project to date this item.
Key points in the ad that I worked from were
1. The number of words in the dictionary-118,000
2. Number of state superintendents recommending it-36
3. It is unabridged not international

In 1880 the number of words in the ads was noted to be 118,000. But other 1880-1881 ads note that only 35 state superintendents recommended this dictionary. In a June, 1882 ad in Literary World the number of superintendents is 36.

In 1890 the Unabridged Dictionary was revised and enlarged to become the International Dictionary.

Thus, I believe the date of this item is between 1892 and 1889.

Elmer Gregor and his juvenile series

The author Elmer Gregor (1870-1954) wrote a number of children's booksabout Indians and the frontier. Included in his output were four juvenile series that are listed in Mattson's bibliography. He was a world class ornithologist. He was one of the founders of the the Buckskin Men of America which was a predecessor of the Boy Scouts.

His series books were published by Appleton and Harpers. Even though they were quite popular and reprinted a number of times, they are still on the somewhat scarce side.

The four series are:

1. Camp Life Series- Harper and Bros. 1912-1913
2. Eastern Indian Series- Appleton 1918-1930
3. Jim Mason Series- Appleton 1923-1928
4. Western Indian Series- Appleton 1917-1927

Here is a nice inscription found in White Otter which is a book from the Western Indian Series. In the next blog entry I will review that series.

Dick Arnold Series by Earl Reed Silvers

Today's series is the Dick Arnold Series This three book series was written by Earl Reed Silvers and published by Appleton. These books highlight the life and athletic adventures of our here-Dick Arnold-at the fictional Raritan College. The stories of his athletic prowess are quite entertaining. I especially was interested in some of the times run by the athletes. In Dick Arnold of the Varsity, Dick runs a mile in 4:21. Now, of course, most decent high school boys can beat that but in 1921 that time was really good.

These books are quite uncommon. Appleton did not have high volume print runs. I remember a researcher found that the 1922 Andy Blake juvenile book had less than 1000 copies leave the factory. Although possibly overreaching, I am of the mind that most all of the Appleton juvenile series books of the early 1920's had similar low print runs. That makes these series very hard to find with or without jackets. That also accounts for dealers' high prices.

Earl Reed Silvers was an educator as well as a relatively prolific author. He was born in New Jersey, educated at Rutgers University and went on to become the Dean of Men at his alma mater. He died from a heart attack at the age of 57 in 1948. He wrote more than 25 juvenile books for boys as well as over a 1000 short stories.

His book for boys frequently revolved around college life and athletics. This is understandable as Silvers was a great athlete at Rutgers starring in track, baseball basketball and football.

He wrote five juvenile series (including this one) listed in Mattson's guide. He also wrote the Carol Series which is about a girl in camp and high school. All of these series were published by Appleton and thus are relatively scarce.

This series was reprinted by Appleton-Century

The Dick Arnold Series
1. Dick Arnold of Raritan College 1920
2. Dick Arnold Plays the Game 1920
3. Dick Arnold of the Varsity 1921

Unknown Series

Here is the cover applique for a juvenile series.

Today's hints:
1900-1930
Author was the dean of men at a well known university.

Dick Series by A.W. Dimock

The Dick Series by A.W. Stokes is a four book series written by A.W. Dimock. In many respects it can be considered a companion series to the Jack Series also published by F.A. Stokes. Both series involved adventures of boys in the wild.

This four book series chronicles the adventures of Dick and his buddy Ned in different outdoor scenarios. The title of the book tells of the adventure. The books have photographs done by Dimock.


Anthony Weston Dimock (1842-1918) was an interesting fellow. Well educated at Phillips Academy and George Washington University, he made a fortune in the gold market while working on Wall Street. He subsequently spent time in the West with ranchers and Indians and later was a real estate developer in Elizabeth. New Jersey. He wrote a number of books including Florida Enchantments and this series.

The great stories about Dimock include how he made and lost millions several times. In the 1860's he had invested heavily in Pacific Mail stock . The company went down the toilet so fast that it broke Dimock. Subsequently he remade his fortune in real estate in New Jersey. The financial crash of 1872 wiped him out for the second time. At the age of 41 after making another fortune on Wall Street his investments failed him during "financial disturbances"in 1884.

He was living the good life in 1894 even in significant debt in Kingston, New York when he and his family were served with papers. Dimock was forcibly removed from a rental house with his furniture and family during a rainstorm.

The Dick Series
1. Dick in the Everglades 1909
2. Dick Among the Lumberjacks 1910
3. Dick Among the Seminoles 1911
4. Dick Among the Miners 1911