ATLAS OF WASHINGTON COUNTY IOWA Containing Maps of Villages, Cities and Townships of the County. Maps of State, United States and World. Farmers Directory - Business Directory - General Information
Davenport: Iowa Publishing Company, 1906. First Edition. Hardcover. Poor. Item #1302066
Original gilt-stamped large folio ½ leather & cloth over boards. 15" x 18.5". Now, let's get this disclaimer out of the way. Buyer will not be acquiring this copy because of the condition - the binding is in dreadful condition - but for content and the rarity thereof. More on condition below. 165pp. Maps (all shaded in color). Portraits. Contents: Decoratively printed title page; Publishers' Preface (1p), Table of Contents page (listing Townships, Cities, Towns and Villages, Miscellaneous Maps -- State of Iowa, U.S., the World, Rural Route Map of Washington Co, The System of the United States Land Surveys, Topographical Map of Washington County --, Portraits, Miscellaneous (-- these are located in various places in the book --- Advertisements, Farmer's Directory of Washington Co, History of the State of Iowa, History of Washington Co, Preface, Reminiscences of Early Settlers, Road Laws of Iowa, Views of Washington Co). I count 37 maps: 1 Topographical of county, 1 state, 1 U.S., 1 world, 2 City of Washington (northern side & southern side), 1 of Principal Meridians & Base Lines of U.S., and the rest are township maps. Of the city & township maps, 6 are double page & three page/plates have 3 maps each. I think my count is accurate but don't hold my feet to the fire if I missed one or over-counted slightly. There are 12pp of Farmers Directory alphabetical list with route number. There are 18pp of ads, many of them with black & white half-tones. There are 29pp of half-tone portraits (around 26 per page), some of them deceased citizens. There are 13pp of history & reminiscences. Back to binding: Corners worn with much leather worn away exposing boards. Binding is broken. Joints are broken but covers still reasonably firmly attached. Several leaves are badly margin chipped, but with only loss of text on bottom edge of last leaf of portraits (1/2 of one barn is missing). Title page fore edge chipped back 1 - 2 inches (no loss of decorative material or text). There are various edge tears. One leaf with ads on both side is torn all the way across, and a previous owner mended it with tape. And finally, pp87 & following are cracked along the binding with most split along the inner margin, mostly outside of text. The reason why this inner margin has taken place is largely because the publishers chose to make the book a stapled binding inside the boards - a sure-fire way to eventually cause the paper to break. This represents a serious restoration job for the book preservationist, but all but the slightest bit of textual and pictorial information is present. This copy apparently at one time to a resident of Franklin Township as his name has been underlined and later highlighted in the directory portion. Someone also identified his portrait.There are a couple of other highlights & old marks. Rare. Less than a handful of copies in libraries worldwide.
Price: $403.20