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Lorne Bair Rare Books

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Harrild & Sons’ Complete Illustrated Catalogue of Printers’ Bookbinders’ & Stationers’ Machinery & Materials

Folio (32cm). Brown cloth stamped in black and gilt, with large gilt view of the "Fleet" Works on rear board; pale floral patterned endpapers; [iv], 122pp; numerous wood engravings. Title page printed in four colors. Card of Representative H. C. Marquet, Nottingham, to front pastedown. A sound, upright copy, corners bumped, a few minor stains to cloth, rear free endpaper heavily browned, but interior generally clean and bright: Very Good. Detailed and extensively illustrated catalogue from a printing supply company; a valuable resource for studying or teaching about late nineteenth-century printing technologies. Robert Harrild, originally a printer, developed composition ink rollers in the 1810s, which were instrumental in the shift to cylindrical presses. He soon shifted from printing to manufacturing rollers and other printing supplies. By the 1890s, Harrild & Sons was a prosperous printing supply company; they also sold printing presses manufactured by Bremner of Otley in Yorkshire. This catalogue advertises lithographic and relief printing presses; folding machines; guillotines; ink rollers; printing types and rules; composing room furniture, including typecases, composing frames, imposing stones, and form racks; chases and furniture; stitching machines and binding equipment; stereotype manufacturing equipment; and a wide variety of other miscellaneous supplies, most illustrated in clear detail. [63976].
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Three Pieces of Souvenir Ephemera for Ray R. Myers ” The Armless Musician”

Three pieces of promotional ephemera, produced for Ray Myers during the 1940's and later. Comprising: Pamphlet, 23cm x 15cm. Original grey card wraps, titled in black to front wrap. Clean and sharp with a small closed tear to the upper of the fore-edge, not interfering with text. Signed in pencil by Myers to a "Welcome" page at the front, underneath an image of the musician and his wife. Also present is a 2pp. loosely inserted song sheet. [with] A folded green card envelope, 16cm x 10cm. Titled in dark blue to front panel: "Souvenir Folder of Ray R. Myers 'The Armless Musician.'" Lightly sunned to edges, slight touches of wear and spotting to card, very good. Containing 9 black and white photographs of Ray Myers, arranged in a concertina format that folds out into a panorama of images of Mr. Myers performing mundane every day tasks without the benefit of arms. The general theme of his promotional material was to depict him driving, shooting, lighting a cigarette etc. [with] A folded brown card enevelope, 14.5cm x 10cm. Clean and sharp, inscribed by Ray R. Myers to the front panel: "Best Wishes, Ray R. Myers." Titled in black to rear closure flap; "Souvenir of Ray R. Myers." Containing 9 black and white phtographs of an older Mr. Myers, now in his 50's, playing guitar, composing with a keyboard, riding a small tractor, playing with his dog etc. Ray R. Myers was a celebrity steel guitarist and variety musician, born without arms, in Lancaster PA in 1911. Quickly showing musical aptitude, he was sent to a local community school after his parents maintained they wanted him to have as "normal" an upbringing as possible. Despite living in relative poverty, they rejected offers from large circuses and carnivals to take Roy in, and did their best to ensure he could make up his own mind as to what career he wished to pursue. Eventually, after the death of hs father relatively young, Roy did take up Ripley's "Believe it or Not Oddities" offer to perform and became somewhat of a musical celebrity and radio star, and by the 1950's he had a daily show on WPDX in West Virginia. [63910].
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The Butterfly [New Series]

Octavo (24cm) Two volumes in brown leather, single gold fillet around perimeter of boards, spines tooled in gilt with brown leather spine labels, all edges gilt; marbled endpapers, with turn-ins tooled in gilt; iv,278pp; [ii],ii,[294]pp; numerous black and white plates. Bound with the original front wrappers for issues 1, 7, and 12 (others omitted). A firm, handsome set with mild rubbing to edges, a few inital leaves professionally re-attached, generally Very Good indeed. Second iteration of the Aesthetic literary journal of the 1890s, complete. The first series was issued in 1893-94; this New Series was published by Grant Richards, a publisher known for his discerning taste (he published Shaw, Housman, Butler, and Joyce, and launched the World's Classic series now continued by Oxford). Particularly notable contributions to the journal include first appearances of an anonymous story by H. G. Wells, "A Vision of Judgment" (vol. II, p.21) and a story by Baron Corvo, "About What is Due to Repentance" (vol. I, p.267). Other contributing authors included Laurence Housman, Max Beerbohm, Nora Hopper (later Nora Chesson), Arthur Morrison, Allan Monkhouse, Norman Gale, Barry Pain, Riccardo Stephens, Henry Dawson Lowry, and Arthur Wimperis. Contributing artists included Joseph Pennell, S. H. Sime, Dion Clayton Calthrop, Leonard Raven-Hill, Maurice Greiffenhagen, and Martin Hardie; the journal also features two copies of prints by Hiroshige. The title is thought to be a reference to Whistler's butterfly signature. This cataloger also notes that the Butterfly features the most infuriatingly idiosyncratic pagination system we have ever encountered, a rampant defiance of the bibliographical fact that every leaf has two pages. But overall, a complete run of this charming example of Aesthetic literary and artistic style, from a tastemaking publisher. [63909].