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are Authors! |
My
friend Ellie's aunt's book
My
friend Ellie is a hand book binder and rare book repairer. She moved
her business, Strong Bindery, into the new Loganberry Books building when
we moved in the summer of 2003. Her aunt is an historian who wrote
this interesting book about the first ambassador sent to the young United
States.
From the foreword: "As the American Revolution progressed, France pondered the chances for successful intervention, and for preempting a share of the rich colonial trade monopolized by England. Even after the Declaration of Independence, many uncertainties remained. How long could independence survive Tory dissidence and Quaker pacifism? Was victory militarily possible? The Battle of Saratoga, won in October, 1777, partly with the aid of French muskets covertly supplied, encouraged France to move towards overt aid. A treaty of commerce, long solicited by three American agents in Paris, was concluded, likewise a secret treaty of alliance in the event of war with England. The communication of the Treaty of Amity and Commerce was construed by England as a hostile act, whereupon the negotiator, Conrad-Alexandre Gerard, was sent to Philadelphia to deter any attempt on the part of congress to default from the alliance. Gerard thus became the first diplomatic representative of a foreign power accredited to the United States."
Hudson, Ruth Strong
The Minister From France: Conrad-Alexandre
Gerard 1729-1790. Euclid, Ohio: Lutz Printing, 1994.
Hand-bound by Strong Bindery in burgundy cloth with gilt-on-black paste-on
spine labels. 15 illustrations. Limited print run of
250 copies. As new, $40
My father
Do
you know what a die marriage is? You're not a real coin collector
unless you do. It's not just the date that counts, but the mint,
and the dies used in the striking of the coin. Sounds impossible
to recognize such a difference? Well, that's what the book is all
about! Each dated coin is supposed to look alike, but in the early
days of the Mint, many different individually made dies were used since
they often broke or wore out. The minute cracks, blurps and smears
created by this use are what distinguishes each die, in addition to the
exact positioning of the stars around the edges and things like that.
A die marriage is the combination of obverse and reverse dies, which were
not always sequential. My father and his friends had to not only
recognize and discover many of these different variations, but also had
to develop a language and system for identification and communication amongst
collectors.
The first book deals with Bust dimes, the small versions of the popular
collectible Bust half dollars. Fifteen years following that landmark
book, two of the original authors published a similar book for the even
smaller half dimes. (Sure, we call them nickels now, but there was
no reason for such a name when they were made out of silver. Besides,
they really were smaller than dimes. Thus the family joke about the
itty bitty busties.) Included in this second volume is also an exhaustive
study of the United States Mint in its early days: how it operated, what
materials were used, and how the coins were actually made.
Voted BEST NUMISMATIC PUBLICATION OF THE YEAR,
1999 by the Numismatic Literary
Guild.
Check out what
the coin specialists say about Logan & McCloskey's book.
Check out the John
Reich Collectors Society which published the books and
furthers the studies of these coins.
Logan, Russell J.
Davis, David J., Russell
J. Logan, Allen Lovejoy, John W. McCloskey
and William P. Subjack. Early United
States Dimes: 1796-1837. John
Reich Collectors Society, 1985. out of print, fine/fine, $150
Logan, Russell J.
and John W. McCloskey. Federal Half Dimes:
1792-1837. John
Reich Collectors Society, 1999. out of print, fine, $150
Dede, the rug lady
Dede
and I opened shop together in 1994, sharing space with books and oriental
rugs. Dede retired in 2001, and Loganberry moved into its own building
in 2003, but I still see her quite often (and she's still peddling rugs!).
In one of her past lives however, she was a dietitian and a member of the
Junior Women's Committee of the Cleveland Orchestra. The summer home
of the Cleveland Orchestra is the fabulous Blossom Music Center, the most
perfect place for picnic dinners, and thus the focus of the first fundraising
cookbook. The Committee has produced three fundraising cookbooks
to date, and Dede was the editor of the first two. Of particular
pride is her guidance to Reed Thomason to create such wonderful cover art.
Klaus, Damaris D., ed. (a.k.a.
Dede Moore)
Bach's Lunch: Picnic and Patio Classics.
Junior Women's Committee, 1971.
Bach for More: Fireside Classics.
Junior Women's Committee, 1974.
Honorary Book Club Dad
Dede's
son-in law has a successful engineering text book now in its third edition.
He has a couple related texts too, but this is the major one. The
car on the cover? One of Giorgio's specialties is designing and racing
electric cars. That's one way to get the students to pay attention!
In October 2004, Giorgio's student team broke the land-speed record with
their electric race car.
Rizzoni, Giorgio
Principles and Applications of Electrical
Engineering. McGraw Hill College
Division, Third edition, 2000.
