Search
The Rare & Early Newspapers Hobby
Receive the Newsletter
Buy Historic Newspapers
I’m New Here, Weeks Five & Six…
March 22, 2019 by Stephanie Williams · Leave a Comment
It’s a great day when you locate an issue that someone is wanting, particularly when they really want it. Usually the request begins with, “There’s probably no chance you have this title, but…” Because of our significant database I can now ascertain the general direction a new search will go, and have learned to further diminish expectations with words like, “Well, you are correct — that is a highly desirable date…” Occasionally, my computer will display little notes or other indicators that this is possibly something I (with assistance) can find. Without raising hopes I mention that it doesn’t look promising but there is something I want to double-check before I give a definitive “no”.
This morning’s call from one of our cheery customers delivered a query for a Harper’s Weekly from 1863. He was looking for Emancipation Proclamation content, although many collectors want that particular issue for the full page Winslow Homer print or the double-page Thomas Nast “The War in the Border States”. I reverently turned the pages to investigate the text in question, and found it free of foxing or damp stains or tears. And then I found something else.
Just beside the historical, monumental words, the Harper’s editor placed or approved a first installment of Wilkie Collins’ No Name. Although I have read his fifth book, I didn’t know that Collins was another contemporary of Dickens and Whitman. I didn’t even know that “Wilkie” was a man. And these little rabbit trails clamored for my attention and had me skimming the assertion by William Makepeace Thackeray on The Woman in White: that it had him “transfixed” – a book that I’d found lengthy and melodramatic upon personal encounter.
I particularly enjoy this multi-layered discovery aspect of collecting/perusing early newspapers, and I grin over the notes back from purchasers describing the bonus treasures. One that came this week included an exclamation over a Gentleman’s Magazine: “R is over the moon as we discovered a paragraph about an intercepted letter from Alexander Hamilton complaining about congress and money! It’s just stunning to read these things as contemporary accounts.”
So, feel free to join the conversation and comment about the amazing things you unexpectedly have in your collection that you never intended to purchase. My own W.C. search is ongoing, as all the commentary I can find is that Collins was serialized in Dicken’s “All The Year Round”, with nary a mention of the great Harper’s. Incidentally, if you are new to this world it might either interest or frustrate you to know the brand encompasses “Harper’s Weekly”,” Harper’s Monthly” (which is also sometimes called “Harper’s New Monthly”), and then the non-newspaper titles of “Harper’s Bazaar” and the various Harper’s books. The Timothy Hughes Rare & Early Newspaper inventory contains the first two titles and it is there I will be searching for Chapter Two.
At least, that is how it will begin.
Snapshot 1934… Adolf Hitler declares he will not go to war!
March 12, 2019 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
The following snapshot comes from the Chicago Daily Tribune dated August 6, 1934, which features Adolf Hitler’s Declaration that “War Means Ruin…Will Fight Only If Attacked.” At least he got the 1st part right.
Saint Patrick’s Day in 1842 – Conspiracy Theories Abound…
March 11, 2019 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
In less than a week we will be celebrating Saint Patrick’s Day – a holiday which brings a bit of cheer to both Irish and n0n-Irish alike. We recently discovered rather interesting related coverage in a Daily National Intelligencer, dated March 23, 1842. The front page reports that the President and Vice-President of the United States were invited to Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations in Washington, D.C., but both declined to attend. Their stated, but rather bland reason for respectfully and graciously declining their invitation was that there were too many pressing affairs on behalf of the public good to which they needed to commit their time and effort. However, historians now speculate they may have tempered their true feelings – theories which may or may not be true, but are certainly a bit more intoxicating than “we’re simply too busy” (see below). Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!
Announcing: Catalog #280 (for March, 2019) is now available…
March 4, 2019 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
- Catalog 280 (in its entirety)
- Noteworthy Catalog 280 ($250+)
- Combined Catalogs (current, w/ remnants of previous)
Don’t forget about this month’s DISCOUNTED ISSUES.
(The catalog links above will redirect to the latest catalog in approx. 30 days, upon which time it will update to the most recent catalog.)
I’m New Here…Week Three
March 1, 2019 by Stephanie Williams · 2 Comments
These last few days have been highlighted by fascinating rare newspaper excursions that touched on Johnny Appleseed and hot air balloons and genealogy searches and gold ink newspaper editions and even “mourning rules” (a post-worthy ramble in itself). As this week closes, I find myself musing on all things literary.
I recall my first encounter with Walt Whitman’s poetry as being somewhat controversial. Compiling an anthology for a sixth grade project I stumbled across “Song of Myself” and laboriously copied it out onto its own page — carefully fitting text to margins and indents that defined, despite lackluster rhyme or rhythm scheme. Abruptly, I was the focus of adults pontificating on the perils of the modern age and the coming doom symbolized by artists throwing off established norms and strictures. In college, I was perplexed to find that Whitman wrote his grieving “Lilacs” four months after the eloquently detailed sixteen hundred mile funeral procession for Abraham Lincoln. From all the squawking, I had assumed the poet lived in my time, or my parents’ time — not contemporaneously with the sixteenth president. I’m keen on Frost and Dickinson and Oliver and all the greats, but Whitman broke the lingering nursery rhyme cadence of Robert Louis Stevenson with a clear voice of plain-speaking, beauty filled, heartwrenching truth. And so, with ten minutes of unscheduled time this week, I delved into the directories of perhaps the largest Civil War newspaper collection in the world, to see what we might have within our archives. Three years after Lincoln’s assassination, the popular New York Herald was the first to publish the words “…to all cut off before their time, Possess’d by some great spirit of fire Quenched by an early death.” It is signed in block type, “WALT WHITMAN”. And, yesterday, I held it in my very own 21st century hands, looking at this poem irreverently sandwiched between complaints against Kansas senators and the connection of the Minneapolis/Montreal railroad. In 1888 Walt Whitman’s words were taken at face value, distinct from any of the acclamation or aspersion that would come with the passage of time. Reading them, this way, is a little bit like traveling back two hundred years to look at things from a completely different view. Many of you who call or email or write or browse online in search of particular subjects, dates and people are reaching for the insight from the immediate context of newsprint columns, to hear what was once merely words in print, chronicling the events of the day.
At any rate, no one can live by poetry alone, so next Friday I am honor bound to tell you of one or two colossal mistakes I have made, and balance this week’s ponderous tone with a humorous tale or two. Things around here are often funny and deep — a little bit like those old, modern poets.
They Put It In Print… Black Americana……
February 25, 2019 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
Few nations can boast of a peaceful trek from being a slave state (at least in part) to the enslaved people-group holding the highest position in the very land that had once enslaved their ancestors. Whereas there is still much work to be done, the United States’ governmental structure allows, and even promotes such progress. Since much of these historic events were put in print, the link below is able to provide a chronology of many of the highlights of this amazing, albeit bumpy road. Since the link only provides a snapshot of each issue’s content, in order to view the related coverage you may need to click on the item number of several in order to view the item’s full description.
BLACK AMERICANA (and more)
Note: While perusing the issues shown in the link above, one might wonder why a link to a chronology of “Black Americana” issues includes those from outside the United States. Answer? Life rarely happens in a vacuum – and this is equally true with the trek shown above. Both the related tragedies, atrocities, and eventual progress which transpired outside the U.S. were often foundational in the thinking of those within. As a result, they have been included.
I’m New Here…Week Two
February 22, 2019 by Stephanie Williams · 5 Comments
For the next day and a half I’ve been left in charge of a small portion of things in the Rare and Early Newspapers world, which must mean I’m learning something. Still, I am going to rattle off this week’s post between all the responsibilities as I am fiercely resolved to not let anyone down. If you’re disappointed with my submission, please check in again next Friday when I have a little more time to reflect. But I do want to take a momentary glance at this recent week before it is forgotten in the next discovery.
Requests for birthday papers are a regular occurrence here, and it’s a good excuse to go hunting in the racks, exploring the mazes of columns and rows. To me, the best thing about searching for these issues is that they frequently hold a hitherto unknown element that increases the value beyond “a regular NYT from 1959”. However, I am learning that content is in the eye of the beholder. Yesterday I climbed and crouched (and crawled at one point) pulling every volume that might still contain the specified date. When at last I laid it flat on one of the twenty(?) portable viewing surfaces, I felt a surge of confidence that I had found something exceptional and I cornered the closest newspaper veteran to verify my discovery. “Winston Churchill,” I pronounced, “shaking hands with Harry Truman, on the front page above the fold. Is that special content?”
It turns out that it was not. It turns out Churchill and Truman were “getting together like that all the time.” Those were the very words used to burst my bubble and I couldn’t help wondering a bit about these giants of recent history — one with an abrupt ascension to the highest office in the land, and the other whose stirring oratory inspired hope in hopeless times — who were nevertheless real people with routines and commonplace interactions and details of living, even as they went about setting their mark on everything that came after. Newspapers are crammed to bursting with so many important people, so many consequential events and so many seemingly insignificant things, as well. Regular treasure hunters already know this; the novices might just discover it in a birthday paper. At any rate, this week I learned that there are at least two quests involved when I head out into the rows, coordinates in hand: the thing I know I am looking for, and the thing I didn’t expect to find.
I hope today you uncover a bit of treasure yourself.
Snapshot 1946… The Apple Watch prototype in print…
February 18, 2019 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
The following snapshot comes from the Chicago Sunday Tribune, January 13, 1946. Does Apple pay Dick Tracy’s estate royalties?
I’m New Here… Week One
February 15, 2019 by Stephanie Williams · 10 Comments
It’s a daunting world — Rare & Early Newspapers — and at first it can feel like being in a foreign country, overhearing a few words that sound familiar in a vague sort of way. At least, that’s my sense. But I suspect it appeared that way to many collectors at the beginning. With that in mind, my plan is to share some of my observations, discoveries and even mistakes over the coming weeks, months and years as I learn to navigate this universe of newsprint. If you have never even held an old paper, much less thought to purchase one, perhaps my adventures will pique your own interest and you’ll find yourself browsing the titles and descriptions of the details of life in a bygone era. Having “met” a few of you veteran collectors and scholars, I suspect you might enjoy a little reminder of the early days when you turned that first purchase over in your hand, skimmed the columns, and then settled in for a read.
I began and then discarded multiple versions of this initial post — there’s no way to convey the immensity of standing in a treasure trove that is more than three times my height, wider than my house, and filled with papers. Without moving my feet I can examine the headlines from Harper’s, published every Saturday in the first half of 1869. 1869. That is not a misprint! The proper title is “Harper’s Weekly”, subtitled “A Journal of Civilization”. It is astounding that one hundred and fifty years after these rolled off the printing press, were cut and bundled and delivered to 100,000 people living in a completely different world (regardless of our shared geographical location), I am able to hold an original issue in my hands. It’s a rag paper, so the pages can be turned without any fear of damaging it. I verified this before opening an issue; gloves aren’t even required. The details of manners and battles and grocers and treasury debt emerge and bring the inevitable conclusion. Life in a different time –even with dramatically changed fashions, altered lifestyles, and varied circumstances– is still life. Civilization is after all the story of people. Sometimes it’s seen in broad strokes, sometimes in classified advertisements. I found the following in an 1861 publication, “When families send for ‘Lea & Perrin’s Worcestershire Sauce’, observe if it is the genuine JOHN DUNCAN & SONS…” I am amazed the condiment has been around so long (and wonder, who was making fake Lea & Perrin’s Worcestershire Sauce?). Others might be more interested in the 15″ map of Major-General McClellan’s Operations Along The Potomac.
Anyway, the Harper’s Weeklies section is a good place to stand and introduce myself and tell you I am privileged to be here. Please check in and see the “progress” part of my experience. Also, tell me what I should look for if you’ve been around a while. And if you’re new, feel free to ask any questions. If I don’t have the answer (which is likely, as I am new here) I have recently met some brilliant people who probably do.
Stephanie
Revisiting “The Crime of the Century” through the reporting of the Chicago Tribune…
December 20, 2018 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
Question: What do you get when you cross The Chicago Tribune with “The Crime of the Century”?
The Chicago Tribune, self-described as “The World’s Greatest Newspaper,” earned a reputation for having dramatic, timely headlines. In this regards, they are perhaps 2nd to none. However, they are also well-known for what may very well be the greatest mistake in front-page headline news: “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.” While certainly the most recognized, it was not the Chicago Tribune’s 1st major faux pa. Approximately 16 years earlier, in an effort to be at the forefront of breaking news in regards to “The Crime of the Century,” they printed the dramatic headline: “REPORT ‘LINDY BABY HOME’.” Sadly this would prove to be a false, unsubstantiated report (aka, “fake news”) – as the Lindbergh baby would be found dead a little more than a month later. It sure goes to show how even the “best of the best” can make mistakes – a good lesson in humility for all of us.