Ralph Henry Barbour

Ralph Henry Barbour wrote more than 150 books. Sports' books made up most of his writings but he also wrote romance novels, some mysteries , a few stories a involving the sea, and a number on miscellaneous topics. He even published a book about automobile driving-"For Safety". The sports' books were mainly in series form with all sports represented-hockey, football, baseball etc.







Barbour (1870-1944) was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He started work as a reporter after early successes with sales of poems and jingles to weekly magazines. He worked for newspapers in Boston, Philadelphia and other cities.
Toward the end of his newspaper career he began to write novels and eventually made that his vocation.
























A number of publishers printed his books but a plurality were done by Appleton-Century and its D. Appleton predecessor. Early romance novels were mostly published by Lippincott.

As time goes on I will highlight various series and books done by this prolific author. I have including a sampling of his books here with an inscribed book page.

Appleton Book Contest Flyer in 1912

Nowadays I always check through the books I buy thinking I might find a nice advertising flyer or other book ephemera. Usually I come up with nothing or a pressed leaf. Although the likelihood is zero, I am still waiting to find that mint Honus Wagner baseball card. Today while reshelving some books I did find a nice bit of ephemera.

Bucking the Line was written by William Heyliger and published by D. Appleton and Company first in 1912.
Appleton was publishing numerous sports books in this era by Heyliger and the very prolific Ralph Henry Barbour. Barbour was concentrating more on his sports' books by this time than his romance novels. But Appleton was a big time publisher and although their print runs of juvenile books may not have been large, they had an impressive list of publications nevertheless.

Inside the Heyliger book I found a flyer announcing a "Prize Contest for Boys". The contest required the reader to write an opinion of Heyliger's football book. The best opinions would win any one of a number of different Appleton books.

Most of the books were sports' books but there was an historical fiction book by Hezekiah Butterworth and an adventure book by Joseph Altsheler.

Certainly the winner who received 10 books got a nice prize.

Ralph Henry Barbour and Lippincott

Although Ralph Henry Barbour (1870-1944) is best known for the various sport's books he wrote (more than 100), he also penned a number of adult romances, fiction and mystery books.

Of the 14 adult romance books he wrote, 11 were published by J.B. Lippincott Company. The other three were published by Appleton, Richard Badger, and Moffat, Yard and Co.

The Lippincott books are quite exceptional. Cloth with gold gilt designs. Applique pictures on the cover. The pages were all glossy with border decorations and pictures. With a $1.50- $2.00 price tag they were special books.They were published between 1904 and 1915, simultaneously with the publication of Barbour's sports' books.




As is to be expected, Lippincott produced advertising flyers to announce these books. Appreciate that the June 5, 2009 entry in this blog showed some stamps promoting Lippincott books. The Barbour book, Heart's Content, can be seen there.

Shown here is an advertising flyer for An Orchard Princess which was published in 1905. I suspect all of the Lippincott Barbour books had these flyers. This is the only one I have seen

Lippincott Advertising Flyer with Stamps

Book publisher advertisements are fascinating works of industry ephemera. They certainly are among my favorite collecting pieces. Here is an unusual one.

In the mid teens of the 20th century J.B. Lippincott produced "poster stamp portraits" which the purchaser of the named books was invited to use as Book Plates. This little flyer included 6 "stamps" of popular Lippincott authors. The included authors were Hewlett, Barbour, Ingram, Lockhart, Lutz, and Walton. I am dating this piece from 1915 since the Barbour book "Heart's Content" was published in that year.

Most all advertising flyers from this era include only text and information. This one with the "stamps" is quite exceptional.