[Rarebooks] Offering: Five Western Americana

[Michael John Thompson]

1.  GREELEY, Horace. AN OVERLAND JOURNEY. From 
New York to San Francisco, In The Summer of 1859. 
New York: C.M. Saxton, Barker & Co. / San 
Francisco: H.H. Bancroft & Co. 1860 First 
Edition, First Printing. First Edition. Octavo, 
original brown pebble-grained cloth decorated in 
blind. 386 pp + [10] pp publisher's ads at rear. 
Lacks front free endpaper, cloth lightly worn at 
corner tips and spine ends, a very good clean 
copy, sound and attractive. Fascinating account 
of an overland journey via the just-opened Pikeís 
Peak Express Leavenworth-Denver route. Greeley 
was editor of the New York TRIBUNE, and his 
account of Yosemite was one of the first accounts 
of the valley published outside of California. $125.00

2.  FREMONT, Brevet Col. J. C. THE EXPLORING 
EXPEDITION TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, OREGON AND 
CALIFORNIA, To Which is Added a Description of 
the Physical Geography of California. With Recent 
Notices of The Gold Region from the Latest and 
Most Authentic Sources. Buffalo: Geo H. Derby & 
Co. Publishers. 1849. New Edition. New edition; 
the first edition to contain the section on the 
California Gold regions. Octavo, original green 
cloth titled and with a design of a stag in gilt 
on spine panel, front & rear panels stamped in 
blind. 456 pp., Illustrated. Mild foxing, cloth 
with some minor and light wear along spine 
hinges, corners and spine tips; inner front hinge 
a bit weak. Ownership inscription of William m. 
Bates, Glastonbury, Conn, dated December 14, 
1849, on preliminary blank. Overall, a very good 
copy, much nicer than most. Originally issued as 
the "Report of the Exploring Expedition to the 
Rocky Mountains in the Year 1842 and to Oregon 
and North California in the Years 1843-'44" in 
1845, this 1849 edition includes an 
'Advertisement to the New Edition' at the front 
which pertains to the gold fields of Northern 
California, and pp 427-456 prints the new section 
"Gold Regions of California", which includes 
'Col. Mason's Official Report', 'Purity of 
California Gold Dust', 'Physical Geography of 
California', 'Different Routes to California', 
'The Gold Regions - Miscellaneous Matter' and 
'Advice to those Going to California by the 
Capes". Fremont's book was the first major work 
on published on California, and this new 1849 
edition contains important contemporary reports 
on the California Gold Rush. $250.00

3.  FABRI, Johann Ernst; Adam Christian Gaspari; 
J¯rgen Kjerulf. GEOGRAPHIE FOR UNGDOMMEN, til 
brug i skoler og ved privat underviisning. 
Kj¯benhavn (Copenhaven): A. & S. Soldin, 1803 
Octavo, contemporary boards with leather (sheep?) 
spine, title label on spine. 558 pp + [2] pp at 
rear. Text in Danish black letter. generally 
somewhat worn, especially at head of spine, some 
worming to front cover but generally a very good, 
solid copy; complete. Geography textbook, with 
Western American place-names; California is 
mentioned on p. 480; p. 464 lists Cape Mendocino, 
Juan de Fucas Inlet, Nootka Sound, Quadra and 
Vancouver Island, The Queen Charlotte Islands and 
Prince William Sound in Alaska. Complete as 
issued with no maps or illustrations. Remarkably 
early references for West Coast place names. $200.00

4.  HELPER, Hinton R. THE LAND OF GOLD: Reality 
Versus Fiction. Baltimore: Published for the 
Author, by Henry Taylor, Sun Iron Building. 1855. 
First Edition, First Printing. First edition. 
Octavo, original embossed cloth stamped in blind 
on front & rear panels, gilt pictorial spine 
depicting a miner with a pickaxe. Bookplate on 
endpaper, binding stamping upside down in 
relation to the text; a fine, tight copy 
otherwise. An important and early first hand 
account of life in California during the gold 
rush years, the work was reprinted much later 
under the title DREADFUL CALIFORNIA. The author's 
general attitude was racist and negative. In 
Chapter VII, 'The Chinese In California', the 
author berates and denegrates the Chinese, 
stating that 'one Chinaman looks almost exactly 
like another', and goes on to say that 'No 
inferior race of men can exist in these United 
States without becoming subordinate to the will 
of the Anglo-Americans... it is so with the 
Negroes in the South, it was so with the Indians 
in New England, and it will be so with the 
Chinese in California.' Strong stuff.  $175.00

5.  MORROW, William C. BLOOD-MONEY. San 
Francisco: F.J. Walker & Co. 1882. First Edition, 
First Printing. First edition. Octavo, original 
green cloth stamped in black, titled in gilt and 
with a pictorial design of bags of money in gold 
on front cover. Floral endpapers. 237 pp. Cloth 
worn at lower rear corner of spine hinge, mildly 
rubbed along extremities; a very good copy. The 
author's first novel,an indictment of the conduct 
of California railroad companies which were 
forcing settlers off their land, based on the 
Mussel Slough Tragedy. Morrow was a San Francisco 
based author, a mentor & contemporary of Ambrose 
Bierce; most of his stories originally appeared 
in Bay area journals and his tales astounded and 
fascinated readers in old San Francisco. He is 
best known for his collection of weird and 
macabre stories 'THE APE THE IDIOT & OTHER 
PEOPLE' [1897]. This is his first published book, and it is rare. $500.00


Terms: Prices, Generally in Cdn Funds, can be 
considered to be in USA $ for the purposes of 
this list. Trade discount 20%. Post extra. 
Somebody should buy the W.C. Morrow book, it's terribly scarce.

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Michael John Thompson, Antiquarian Bookseller
'Imladris'
5275 Jerow Road
Hornby Island, BC
Canada V0R 1Z0
250-335-1182

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