A Son of the Middle Border
New York: Macmillan Company, 1919. Later printing. Hardcover. 467 pages. Signed by the author. Hardcover, bound in black cloth, and lettered in gilt and red with red rules and a gilt, red and black stamped design of a covered wagon in a prairie setting. Outwardly clean and square, but with a weak front hinge, with separation between the half-title page and the frontispiece. Manufacturing defect at two leaves, pages 359 to 362, creating narrow dog-ears and incorrectly trimmed page edges. Item #876
First book of the author's Middle Border family history and autobiography. Illustrations by Alice Barber Stephens. Later printing, with 1919 on the title page; the first printing was in 1917. This copy is inscribed by the author, in black ink, on the front free endpaper: "'Then o'er the hills in legions, boys,/'Fair game afar,/'We'll have our rifles ready, boys/'Ha, ha haha!'/From an old song of 'the/Middle Border.'/Hamlin Garland/Inscribed for/Mrs Van [illegible]." Underneath is another inscription, by a previous owner: "To Carlton with love/from Nelda./June 1920." Also in the author's handwriting is a note at the bottom of the book's final page, "(To be continued)", accompanied, for some reason, by a line drawn through the phrase "Printed in the United States of America"
Price: $150.00