New York Antiquarian Book Fair 2020 Americana An American History, Written by a Woman in the 18th Century 1. Adams, Hannah: A SUMMARY HISTORY OF NEW-ENGLAND, FROM THE FIRST SETTLEMENT AT PLYMOUTH, TO THE ACCEPTANCE OF THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. COMPREHENDING A GEN- ERAL SKETCH OF THE AMERICAN WAR. Dedham, Ma.: Printed for the Author, by H. Mann and J.H. Adams, 1799. 513,[3]pp. Antique-style calf, spine tooled in gilt, gilt leather labels. Titlepage, subscriber’s leaf, and two contents leaves worn at the foredge, with small tears. Even tanning. Good plus. Hannah Adams is considered probably the first professional female writer in the United States, and this is her most important book. An autodidact with a thirst for knowledge and a need to bring money in for her family she set about writing, first producing a survey of various religions, and then the present history of New England. “For her SUMMARY HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND (1799), Adams undertook serious primary research, delving into state archives and old newspapers, causing serious injury to her eyesight. The material, which covers events from the sailing of the MAYFLOWER through the adoption of the Federal Constitution, is presented in a clear, straightforward manner...” – AMERICAN WOMEN WRITERS. A subscribers list at the rear includes the names of several New England women. EVANS 35075. HOWES A50. SABIN 215. AMERICAN WOMEN WRITERS I, p.12. $2500. “Innocent Diversions of Slavery Days”: An Unrecorded African-American Troubadour Broadsheet 2. [African Americana]: “HOT TIME IN THE OLD TOWN TONIGHT.” GRAND CONSOLIDATION! THE ALABAMA TROUBADOURS, AND C.H. PERKINS VIRGINIA – TEXAS JUBILEE SINGERS, A BAND OF SABLE CELEBRITIES PRESENTING IN A TRUE AND REALISTIC MANNER “LIFE IN THE SUNNY SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR” [caption title]. [N.p., likely Boston. n.d., ca. 1896]. Illustrated broadsheet, 14½ x 10¼ inches. Uniformly toned. Mild edge wear, a few short closed edge tears, soft horizontal center fold, a few tiny chips and soft creases. Faint ink advertising stamp in top margin. Very good overall. An unrecorded illustrated broadsheet advertising the “Grand Consolidation” of the Virginia and Texas Jubilee Singers and the original Alabama Troubadours, both rather obscure minstrel troupes managed by C.H. Perkins, an African-American tenor from North Carolina. The Celebrated Colored Virginia and Texas Jubilee Singers were organized between 1876 and 1882 by Perkins, himself a tenor who had earlier performed with the North Carolina Jubilee Singers. The Virginian performers were made up largely of singers from Norfolk, while the Texas performers mostly hailed from Waco. The group was most active from about 1883 until about 1895. Perkins also founded a minstrel group composed of Alabama performers during this time, called the Alabama Troubadours, and this broadsheet advertises performances by all three groups together. Like his previous group, and though composed mostly of southern African-American artists, Perkins’ original Alabama Troubadours performed mostly in New England in the 1890s and early-20th century, specifically Connecticut, Vermont, and Massachusetts, though advertisements for them go back at least to 1891 in Lincoln, Nebraska. They are not to be confused with a slightly later minstrel group by the same name, managed by J.W. Gorman. The original Alabama Troubadours had moderate success putting on shows in churches, public halls, and other spaces, offering admission at 15 to 25 cents, with reserved seats available at 35 cents. The present broadsheet offers “Innocent Diversions of Slavery Days Faithfully Depicted” and “Darky Diversions in Dixies Land by Genuine Colored People” and performers such as Madame Perkins, the “’Southern Nightingale.’ Prima Donna and Soprano Soloist.” C.H. Perkins touts himself here as “The Great Tenor Songster, in his Tenor solos, Plantation Melodies, and Motto songs of the day.” The troupe is composed of “15 Genuine Colored Artists...emancipated by President Lincoln’s Proclamation.” The faint ink stamp in the top margin advertises a performance for the troupe at the Westbrook Town Hall on Monday, February 21; the year was most likely 1898. The verso of the broadsheet advertises the group’s “Old-Fashioned Cake Walk” by “A Band of Afro-American Celebri- ties” and other performers and performances enumerated as “Buck Dancers, Jubilee Singers, Banjoists, Plantation Dances, Specialists, Pickininny Dancers, Guitarists, Male and Female Quartettes, Old Time Plantation Scenes [and] Campmeeting Shouters.” The five illustrations on the broadside show the Cake Walk, a trio of comedic minstrels, and three scenes of a group of performers in a plantation setting. The latter four illustrations are marked “Libbie Show Print, Boston” and are quite likely taken from photographs. Scant mention of the original Alabama Troubadours appears in periodicals of the time. The July 12, 1900 issue of THE MORNING JOURNAL-COURIER of New Haven praises the group as “without doubt the best colored organization now before the public.” The September 19, 1899 issue of the Barre, Vermont EVENING TELEGRAM includes a brief mention of the troupe, describing them as “a company direct from the South and there is no better on the road.” Also, Madame Perkins is pictured in the August 1900 issue of COLORED AMERICAN MAGAZINE above a caption reading, “Madame Perkins of Boston, Mass. A Soprano Singer of Professional Note.” No copies of the present broadside appear in OCLC, nor in any source we can locate. A truly rare, and perhaps unique surviving record of the merging of two minstrel groups composed mostly of southern performers from Virginia, Texas, and Alabama, managed by an African-American tenor from North Carolina. $4250. Military Code of Alabama in 1838 3. [Alabama]: Crabb, George W.: Bradford, J.T.: THE MILITARY CODE OF THE STATE OF ALABAMA, WITH AN APPENDIX.... Tuscaloosa: Ferguson & Eaton, 1838. 136pp. Antique-style half morocco and marbled boards, spine gilt, leather label. Ownership inscription on titlepage. Light foxing and soiling. Very good. The rare military code for the state of Alabama. The text includes constitutional provisions, organizational guidelines, training and exercises, regulations for war, duties and privileges, penalties and fines, information on courts martial, as well as oaths against dueling. Scarce, with about ten copies in OCLC, but none recorded in commerce. AII (ALABAMA) 271. $4750. A Classic American Color Plate Book 4. Allen, John Fisk: VICTORIA REGIA; OR THE GREAT WATER LILY OF AMERICA. WITH A BRIEF AC- COUNT OF ITS DISCOVERY AND INTRODUCTION INTO CULTIVATION: WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY WILLIAM SHARP, FROM SPECIMENS GROWN AT SALEM, MASSACHUSETTS, U.S.A. Boston: Printed and published for the author, by Dutton and Wentworth, 1854. Elephant folio. Letterpress titlepage, dedication to Caleb Cope, 12pp. text (numbered [5]-16), 1p. index, plate list, note and errata. Six chromolithographic plates by Sharp & Sons of Dorchester, Massachusetts, five after William Sharp, one after J.F. Allen. Original printed brown front wrapper, rear wrapper lacking. Expertly bound to style in half green morocco and marbled paper covered boards, spine gilt with raised bands. Very good. A monument to American color printing, a work which launched the age of chromolithography as an art in the United States, and one of the most beautiful flower books ever produced. This work is one of the very few truly great American botanical works, a match for anything being produced in Europe at the time. This copy is offered in wonderful condition and free from the staining that often mars the exquisite plates. The VICTORIA REGIA; OR THE GREAT WATER LILY OF AMERICA… provides an appropriate showcase for this gigantic water lily, first discovered along the Amazon River and then taken to Britain for cultivation. The so-called “vegetable wonder” was first described by Sir R.H. Schomburg in 1837. From the details he gave, botanist John Lindley suggested that the lily was a new genera and put forward the name “Victoria Regia,” in honour of Queen Victoria during the first year of her reign. “The giant water-lily is a spectacular flower; nineteenth century commentators describe with amazement the vast dimensions of its floating leaves, which could exceed two meters in diameter, and its great white flower, which opened in the evening and closed again at dawn in a truly lovely spectacle” – OAK SPRING FLORA. In 1853, Allen, a well-respected horticulturist and author of a treatise on viticulture, cultivated a seed from the lily given him by Caleb Cope, president of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, and the man in whose garden the lily first flow- ered in America on August 21, 1851. Working at his home in Salem, Massachusetts, Allen tended the seed from January to July when, on the evening of July 21, the flower finally bloomed. Motivated by his success, Allen hoped to make the glory of the water lily available to a wider audience, and engaged the services of William Sharp, a British-born artist and pioneer of chromolithography then working in Boston. Sharp had been practicing with the new technique of chromolithography as early as 1841, the first person to do so in the United States. His amateur effort is evident in Mattson’s THE AMERICAN VEGETABLE PRACTICE (1841), but, as McGrath states, those chromos are merely “passable.” Fortunately, Sharp improved in his craft, and his next major project, the plates for Hovey’s THE FRUITS OF AMERICA (1852), announced to all who viewed them the colorful and dramatic potential of chromolithography. Still, the process was in its infancy, and it would take a work of tremendous ambition to satisfactorily popularize the technique. Allen’s proposed book on the water lily provided such a vehicle. Though the first plate of the VICTORIA REGIA... is based on a sketch Allen composed himself, the remaining six plates, which show the plant in gradual stages of bloom, are wholly attributable to Sharp.