Memoirs of James Gordon Bennett and His Times.

[Isaac Clark Pray].

Memoirs of James Gordon Bennett and His Times.

New York:

Stringer and Townsend,

1855.

Gift of Patricia Otto.

This binding for James Gordon Bennett’s memoirs features a striking vignette stamped in gold. Bennett was the editor and publisher of the New York Herald, which he founded in 1835. The vignette was made specifically for this publication: the bottom-most book in illustration exhibits a date of 1835 and the topmost book is dated 1855—the year when this book was published. Book covers offered clues to their contents well before the mid-19th century. But the practice became more common after 1832, when the Imperial Arming Press began to be used for gold stamping on cloth.

From the collection of Rare Book School