Space Flight … When? [and] Space Flight. Westwood, New Jersey, 1946

This rare fanzine was printed in tiny numbers. We have found traces of the 1946 number on the Internet, but the 1947 number appears to be even more rare. Each number publishes the result of the author’s survey of science fiction writers, editors, and aficionados concerning the likelihood of space travel for humans.

two volumes: $750

OLD PLAYS; being a continuation of Dodsley’s collection, with notes, critical and explanatory. London: Rodwell and Martin, 1816

Contains the following:  Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus and Lust’s Dominion; John Lyly, Mother Bombie, Endymion, and Midas; Middleton, Women Beware Women, A Trick to Catch the Old One, The Spanish Gypsy, The Changeling, More Dissemblers Besides Women; Dekker, Wonder of a Kingdom, Old Fortunatus; Rowley, A New Wonder, a Woman Never Vext; Webster, Appius and Virginia; Chapman, May Day, Monsieur D’Olive, Bussy D’Ambois; Webster and Rowley, Thracian Wonder; Marston’s Antonio and Mellida, What you Will, and Parasitaster: or, the Fawn; Heywood, The English Traveller, The Royal King and Loyal Subject, A Challenge for Beauty.  According to the title-page, this is a continuation of Dodsley’s Collection of Old Plays (1744).

$750

Chinese Currency. Shanghai: Presbyterian Mission Press, 1901

FIRST EDITION of this standard work on the history of Chinese currency. Edkins was a British Sinologist and Protestant missionary who spent 57 years in China, 30 of them in Beijing.

$700

Horse-Hoeing Husbandry: or, An Essay on the Principles of Vegetation and Tillage. Designed to Introduce A New Method of Culture; whereby The Produce of Land will be Increased, and the Usual Expense Lessened. Together with Accurate Descriptions and Cuts of the Instruments Employed in it … fourth edition, very carefully corrected. London: Millar, 1762

The edition that Thomas Jefferson owned.  Jefferson wrote from Monticello in 1817, “While I was an amateur in Agricultural science (for practical knowledge my course of life never permitted me) I was very partial to the drilled husbandry of Tull.”

$600

At the graveside of Walt Whitman: Harleigh, Camden, New Jersey, March 30th and Sprigs of Lilac.. Philadelphia, 1892

First edition. Presentation copy inscribed by Whitman’s friend and literary executor Horace Trouble to W. W. Clews and further inscribed by Traubel: “Edition: 750 / Number 382 / Horace L. Traubel.”

$500

A complete set of the 1955 Library of Congress Whitman Centennial Recordings. Library of Congress, 1955

This is a complete set of these recordings of talks by leading scholars at the Library of Congress during the 1955 Leaves of Grass centennial celebration.

$450

“Allgemeinen molekulare Theorie der Wärme” in Annalen der Physik, 4. Folge, Band 14. Leipzig, Annalen der Physik, 1904

FIRST EDITION of Einstein’s fifth published paper, “On the General Molecular Theory of Heat” (pp. 354-362). Weil 5.

$400

Albert Einstein: the Human Side. Princeton: University Press, 1979

FIRST EDITION. Presentation copy inscribed by Einstein’s longtime assistant Helen Dukas: “For Lisa Ben Samuel with kindest regards and Shalom Helen Dukas Princeton N.J. March 1980.”

$350

Reports Regarding Sir William Thomson’s Compass and Sounding Machine. Glasgow: University Press [for Thomson], 1877

An important early offering brochure regarding the sale of the first modern compass and early navigational aids. This is a price list and an extensive collection of reports and testimonial letters from ship captains concerning Thomson’s sounding apparatus (the first to use wire instead of hemp) and compass. “The modern compass dates from 1876, when Sir William Thomson patented his dry-card compass” (Singer, History of Technology V). Thomson was deeply interested in the application of science to industry, and he apparently prepared this rare, ephemeral publication to promote his products, which helped to make him a wealthy man. This brochure includes a detailed price list for Thomson’s navigational instruments.

$350

The Works. London: Tonson et al., 1766

This handsome edition includes The Ambitious Step-Mother, Tamerlane, The Fair Penitent, Ulysses, The Royal Convert, Jane Shore, Jane Gray, and various poems.

$250