July 2012 |
Voyager Press Rare Books & Manuscripts
Catalogue Review: Voyager Press
I have had the pleasure of talking with Voyager's president, Bernhard Lauser, at book fairs in California and New York. So when his new catalogue of manuscript Americana landed in my inbox (in PDF), I was glad to take a look. Lauser, a Vancouver-based bookseller, specializes in travel and exploration, and this catalogue manifests that with unique whaling, trading, and sailing items.
An 1860-1890 archive of mining deeds, gold bullion receipts, and camp photographs from Idaho is a compelling collection ($5,750). Another nugget (pun intended) is a set of two letters and an 50-page manuscript inquest related to an American consul's death on his way to the Klondike Gold Fields in 1898 ($2,250).
I have always been taken by nineteenth-century herbaria/scrapbooks. Here we have one that belonged to Julia T. Buck, an Englishwoman who traveled far and wide collecting plant specimens between 1890-1893 ($975). On a related note, famous naturalist Louis Agassiz appears in a signed carte-de-visite from 1860 accompanied by a letter dated 1921 describing its provenance ($975).
The topic of war is explored through two Revolutionary War journals ($9,750), a rare New Jersey Gazette from August 1778 ($1,750), and an American Civil War "passport" signed by William H. Seward ($575). A 45-page manuscript account of the Austrian military campaign in Mexico in 1867 is a surprising find ($7,500).
Fellow travelers can visit Voyager here and request a catalogue.
I have had the pleasure of talking with Voyager's president, Bernhard Lauser, at book fairs in California and New York. So when his new catalogue of manuscript Americana landed in my inbox (in PDF), I was glad to take a look. Lauser, a Vancouver-based bookseller, specializes in travel and exploration, and this catalogue manifests that with unique whaling, trading, and sailing items. An 1860-1890 archive of mining deeds, gold bullion receipts, and camp photographs from Idaho is a compelling collection ($5,750). Another nugget (pun intended) is a set of two letters and an 50-page manuscript inquest related to an American consul's death on his way to the Klondike Gold Fields in 1898 ($2,250).
I have always been taken by nineteenth-century herbaria/scrapbooks. Here we have one that belonged to Julia T. Buck, an Englishwoman who traveled far and wide collecting plant specimens between 1890-1893 ($975). On a related note, famous naturalist Louis Agassiz appears in a signed carte-de-visite from 1860 accompanied by a letter dated 1921 describing its provenance ($975).
The topic of war is explored through two Revolutionary War journals ($9,750), a rare New Jersey Gazette from August 1778 ($1,750), and an American Civil War "passport" signed by William H. Seward ($575). A 45-page manuscript account of the Austrian military campaign in Mexico in 1867 is a surprising find ($7,500).
Fellow travelers can visit Voyager here and request a catalogue.
