Great Rare Book Gifts For Recent Ex-Convicts

by Stephen J. Gertz

New York: Ray Long & Richard R. Smith, Inc., 1932.
First American Edition..

What's the matter, friend? You say you just got out after 20,000 years in Sing-Sing for a penny-ante contretemps and all you got was a bus ticket and five bucks for a meal? You're à la recherche du temps perdu and you never got a keepsake to wistfully recall those halcyon days of yesteryear, not even a cheap gold watch?

Columbus: E.G. Coffin, 1899.

You heard the guys over at Ohio State Penitentiary can get a souvenir album when they graduate with photos documenting the highlights of their visit,

including the Bertillon system entry exam, which immortalizes the prisoner's serial number, name, county of conviction, admission date, length of sentence, crime, age, height, weight, complexion, forehead description, nose description, chin description, eye color, hair color, birthplace, occupation, any previous imprisonments, marital status, name and address of nearest friend or relative, any distinguishing features, etc.;

showtime with Ol' Sparky;

and a gallery of murderers hanged in the Annex?

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1933. First Edition.

You say you pine for those serene prison days and wild prison nights and wish you could read a "candid and surprisingly graphic account of prison life by a career criminal, with chapters on drug use, homosexuality, prison violence and gang activity, the author a fellow traveler in stripes who did long stretches at the Massachusetts State Prison in Charlestown and at Auburn Penitentiary in New York, and is described on the jacket copy as '...an articulate prisoner [who] possesses that rare gift among prisoners of writing impersonally on life in correctional institutions...truly in him the intelligent prisoner speaks and speaks with authority,'” the book rare in dust jacket, and a must read despite a mixed critique from Mrs. Grundy in the Saturday Review April 29, 1933?

"The method of of reproducing the conflicting attitudes of prisoners toward those in authority by using foul language of the prison yard has little to recommend it. Few will be surprised or shocked to read words that are in common use wherever men of average or less than average intelligence gather, whether it be in prison, in the army, in the navy, or in the smoking car. It is unfortunate that Nelson has thought that the verbatim recording of such discussions was necessary to simulate realism. This blemish on an otherwise well written analysis of prisoners may, and probably will, weigh heavily against the use of the book by schools, clubs, and other social groups"

Ossining, NY: Sing Sing Prison, 1916. Tenth Edition.

You gripe that at five a day you made 36,500,000 pair of shoes during your 20,000 years in Sing-Sing and now you're down in your heels in russian shoes - step in a puddle and the water rushin' -

- and a nice pair o' high tops ordered from Sing-Sing's catalogue of fine men's footwear would look swell and make you feel like a million bucks?

Philadelphia: Dorrance & Company, 1952.
First Edition.

You say you didn't even receive a copy of The Pen, Inc. (1952), a scarce novel of a wrongly-imprisoned ex-convict who leaves prison with a seething hatred of society and a wacko culinary money-making scheme, “convinced that society will not let an ex-convict go straight, he plans a criminal organization. In a blackmail attempt he is beaten up and shocked into conceiving the idea of The Pen - a big restaurant and nightclub, built to simulate a prison with stone walls, guards and cells for booths. Every employee, from warden to janitor, must be an ex-convict,” the book uncommon in the trade, with OCLC showing just six institutional holdings for this title?

Cincinnati, OH: Stewart Jail Works Co., n.d. [ca.1904-05]].
Special Catalogue No. 15-C.

And you yearn for the security you once knew, the home sweet home away from home that was yours for the best years of your life, and know that an early sales catalog from the good folks at The Stewart Jail Works Co. - “Jail and prison experts and manufacturers of steel cells and steel works, etc., for jails, prisons, and city lock-ups,” a fully illustrated catalog, devoted principally to iron and steel cells, cages, doors, window guards, etc., providing model numbers, measurements, and special features for each of their products, a well-known company, whose steelworks were used in facilities like the New Jail (Newport, KY), Onondaga County Penitentiary (Syracuse, NY), US Federal Prison (Atlanta, GA), and the Virginia State Penitentiary in Richmond, et al., and is a rare and early piece of prison ephemera with OCLC noting only two copies, at Columbia and Virginia Tech - will be necessary to order a personal slammer to set up in your back yard for brief, safe 'n secure vacations but you're stuck in a one-room dump with no mailbox over Satan's Hot Sauce factory, the ambient air is off the Scoville Scale, and your skin is peeling off in sheets?

Is that what's buggin' you, buddy?

Well, then, lift your head up high and take a walk in the sun with dignity and you'll show the world, you'll show them where to get off, you'll never give up, never give up, never give up - [two rimshots] - because the screws at Lorne Bair Rare Books have put together a fine collection of rare prison memoirs, histories, and related penology ephemera just perfect for the man with a record but little else who would like a little something to stir those precious memories of life in stir, no con.

Now scram, you dirty rat!

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With the exception of Cagney, all images courtesy of Lorne Bair Rare Books, currently offering the above items and related more, with our thanks.

Apologies to Eddie Lawrence, "The Old Philosopher." 
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These Vintage Shoes A Tiffany Lamp Unto Your Feet

by Stephen J. Gertz

Say hello to the Karl Friedrich Schoensiegel Schuhmuseum in der Mappe (The Shoe Museum in Portfolio), an extensive archive of original watercolors, drawings, autograph manuscripts, and scholarly materials related to shoes and their historical and cultural significance by Schoensiegel, the Munich-based, erudite connoisseur of vintage footwear from around the world.

Schoensiegel was the most distinguished collector of such material during the first half of the twentieth century.

The collection is being offered by Librairie Jean-Claude Vrain of Paris.

The collection was last seen at Bonham's on June 22, 2011; the hammer fell at $42,700 including buyer's premium.

 

The archive is comprised of 349 watercolors, here sampled, and is grouped into several geographic and historical sections: Asia, Africa, America, Australia, and Europe; in Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Seventeenth, Eighteenth, and Nineteenth centuries. Each watercolor is vivid, bright and clean.

Schoensiegel visited museums throughout the world and made sketches of each interesting shoe he came across, later developing the sketches into fully-developed watercolor drawings. The Schuhmuseum in der Mappe was exhibited in Berlin in 1939.

The shoes, alas, are not rated for comfort or practicality, though it doesn't take a genius to understand that if you have to walk in what appear to be Viking boats with bows curved upward to Valhalla or tie the toes of your shoes to your knees, a casual passeggiata through the streets of Siena - or anywhere else - will be a challenge without a podiatrist or cobbler following in your wake.

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All images courtesy of Librairie Jean-Claude Vrain, with our thanks.
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Of Related Interest:

Vintage Shoe Art Walks The Runway At Bonham's.

Confessions Of A Vintage Shoe Fetishist.
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Vintage Shoe Art Walks the Runway at Bonhams

by Stephen J. Gertz

 

 At the beginning of the twentieth century, Munich collector and scholar Karl Friedrich Schoensiegel assembled what was at the time one of the most important collections of shoes in the world. Exhibited in Berlin in 1939, the War prevented further public exhibition of the collection or publication.

 

Bonham's recently  auctioned the Schoensiegel Collection archives at their Fine Books and Manuscripts sale, June 22, 2011. Estimated to sell for between $40,000 - $60,000, the hammer fell at $42,700, including buyer's premium.

 

It's a tremendous archive of original watercolors, drawings, manuscripts, and scholarly materials related to shoes and their historical and their cultural significance.

Schoensiegel's vibrant and skillful watercolor renderings document the collection in part, and  other materials gathered therein preserve an important contribution to fashion scholarship that has yet to be fully realized.

The archive is comprised of: Das Schuhmuseum in der Mappe (The Shoe Museum in a Portfolio), 277 bright and clean original watercolors on paper executed by Schoensiegel, depicting shoes in the artist's own collection and in the collections of museums around the world, housed in six portfolios hand-titled in black and red. The watercolors are grouped into several geographic and historical sections: Asia, Africa, America, Australia, and Europe; Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries.

 

...A collection of sixty-one smaller original watercolors on paper, seven ink drawings, one drawing in pencil, and one shoe sole and ink collage, of shoes, soles, and related subjects, many of an erotic nature. It was inevitable, I suspect, that eroticism would, ultimately, suffuse the collection.

...And 145 original tracings on transparencies of shoes (many from the watercolors in the Schuhmuseum) and related subjects.

 

Also included are several manuscripts and typescripts, published and unpublished, of Schoensiegel's and his collaborator Valentin Dittmeier's historical and interpretative studies of shoes: Der Bau und die Funktion des Fusses {The Construction and Function of the Foot, Ulm-Donau: Fachzeitung der Schuhmachermeister, 1939]; Der Schuhim Wandel durch Sechs Jahrtausende (The Change in  Shoes Through Six Millennia, Ulm-Donau: Fachzeitung der Schuhmachermeister, 1940.]; Von der Bedeutung (Symbolik) des Fusses und des Schuhs (Of the Symbolic Meaning of the Foot and the Shoe); Geschichte der Fussbekleidung (History of Footwear); and Uber die Bedeutung des Fusses und des Schuhes. (On the Importance of the Foot and the Shoe).

Finally, the collection features several folders containing miscellaneous materials for educational use or the preparation of manuscripts including mounted clippings, reproductions of drawings, and other ephemera, with extensive annotations and captions in Schoensiegel's hand, as well as a portfolio of mounted black and white and color photographs and reproductions featuring the legs of women wearing high heels. 

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All images courtesy of Bonham's, with our thanks.

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She Collects Shoes, He Collects Books

Oh, the perils of posting - and discovering that the posts are actually read.

On Tuesday, I wrote about a friend and book collector who was considering tapping into his retirement savings to buy highly desired rare books. I feared for his sanity - and that’s not all: I privately extended an invitation to him to sleep on my couch after his wife found out about the plan.

After posting the article, This Is Your Brain On Books, and alerting him to temporary room and boarding availability when his wife kicks him to the curb, I received the following response from him:

“My pension fund and life insurance are fully funded. I was referring to additional monies that [she] and I were considering to invest and/or spend. She collects shoes so why can't I collect books?”

Why not, indeed?






SHOES:

• Finely crafted
• Wrought in fine leather
• Object reflects cultural context
• Artisian-made
• Wearable art








RARE BOOKS:

• Finely crafted
• Bound in fine leather
•Object reflects cultural context
• Artisian made
• Readable art


It’s the perfect marriage of collectibles. At the end of a long day, you’ll want to get out of those shoes and into a good book. For my friend and others in similar circumstances, however, getting out of a good book and into their wife’s shoes may pose challenges.

With apologies to you-know-who-you-are for questioning your sano mentis.
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The binding, for a copy of Manson's biography of Sir Edwin Landseer, is a full dark green levant morocco Cosway-style binding by Riviére & Sons for Sotheran & Co. The front and back covers are ruled and decoratively tooled in a gilt floral and leaf design, surrounding ten oval/round miniature paintings under glass. Nine miniatures on the front cover depict eight hunting dogs around a stag; the miniature on the back cover is a portrait of Sir Edwin Landseer. Extremities double ruled in gilt, with turn-ins ruled and decoratively tooled in gilt.

Images courtesy of Manolo Blanik and David Brass.