Back to School: Education in America

Labor Day weekend is here, school is nearly back in session, and we are featuring a few of our titles relating to the history of education. The book pictured above is the first American book on pedagogy: Samuel R. Hall's LECTURES ON SCHOOL-KEEPING. Boston: Richardson, Lord and Holbrook, 1829. First edition. xi + 135 pp. + 10 pp. publisher's advertisements. 8vo., quarter cloth with (remnant of) paper spine label and green paper-covered boards, uncut and partially unopened,in custom slipcase with inner chemise. Faint dampstaining to covers with the bottom corner of the first part of the text somewhat affected. Moderate wear, light to moderate foxing throughout. Thirteen lectures, with questions to consider for each. The nature of teaching; children and their behavior; emulation vs. ambition; government of students; appropriate material; more. A scarce and uncommon book, offered at $1,500.00. #80234

We also have books on the histories of Yale, Harvard, Smith, Phillips Academy Andover, Roxbury Latin School, Vassar yearbooks (including one featuring Edna St. Vincent Millay), a Tufts 19th Century photo album, Anna C. Brackett's THE EDUCATION OF AMERICAN GIRLS (1874), 19th century readers, textbooks, elocution and geography texts, and a bound run of the periodical THE RHODE ISLAND SCHOOLMASTER, 1861-1873. You can also visit our website's search page here, and enter the keyword EDUCATION for more material.

Our Beacon Street store, the Boston Book Annex, will be open Labor Day; our Jamaica Plain store will be closed. We wish everyone a wonderful holiday weekend.

1930's Shanghai, album of 111 original photographs

We are pleased to offer a spectacular vernacular photo album, which we feel is quite special:

EXTRAORDINARY DOCUMENTATION OF LOST ARCHITECTURE, TRADITIONS

[PHOTOGRAPHY - 20TH CENTURY]. ALBUM OF 111 ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPHS: SHANGHAI IN THE 1930S. (Photographer unknown) Gelatin silver prints mounted in black photo corners. 111 original photographs, a vernacular album of Shanghai in the mid-thirties. The quality and condition of the photographs are excellent. Although the images range in size from 1 7/8 x 2 3/8 to 5 1/2 x 3 1/8 inches, they contain a world of information: vanished skylines, Deco architecture; people at work, at leisure and with family; temple interiors; waterways and canals; rice fields and farming equipment; and in general, the steady hand and curious mind of the unknown
photographer, who in capturing these moments, would often engage his or her subjects, eliciting smiles and curious glances.

There is evidence of the colonial perspective in some of the neatly hand-lettered captions. While the majority of the images are well-composed and technically very good, there are a surprising number of truly superior photographs which wholly capture the feel, bustle, sights and traditions of 1930s Shanghai. Offered at $7,500.00 #84101 For more images, click here.

We are preparing an electronic catalogue of photography and photographic literature for early next year. To request email notification of the release, please contact us at photographica@rarebook.com.

Japanese Commercial Art: 24 volumes

We have just been cataloging our new acquisitions from Japan. This will be of special interest to those who appreciate Japanese commercial design:

[COMMERCIAL ART] GENDAI SHÔGYÔ BIJUTSU ZENSHÛ THE COMPLETE COMMERCIAL ARTIST 24 volumes. Tokyo, ARS, Shôwa 3 [1928] 24 large slender 8vo. vols., this edition bound in red cloth, gilt, with bi-lingual titling. A remarkable compendium, heavily illustrated in color and b+w, exploring the whole world of commercial art, in Japan and abroad, for the professional. With remarkable articles by the leading proponents of Japanese advertising and commercial art of the day. One occasionally finds odd volumes of this thematically organized work, but it is very unusual thus, complete. Essential reference to late Taishô, early Shôwa culture. Complete, very good. Offered at $4,750.00.



We will be issuing an new Japanese and East Asian catalogue near the end of the year. To receive notification of the publication of the electronic version, please contact us at eacatalogue@rarebook.com with your email address.