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Recent Acquisition
Transatlantic Childrens' Tract
Bell, J.T. Little Jem, the Rag Merchant. New York: Thomas Nelson and Sons; London: S.W. Partridge and Co., [ca. 1867].
This transatlantic imprint is apparently an early collaboration of tract
publishers Thomas Nelson and Sons and S.W. Partridge and Co. Little Jem
is a classic tract tale of an impoverished boy trying to contribute to
his mother's meager earnings as a seamstress by collecting and selling
rags. Although falsely accused of theft, Jem's honesty and piety win the
day. The chromolithographed cover of genteel children at play has
nothing to do with the story, but it is an excellent example of
Victorian illustration.
Purchased from John Gately. Harry G. Stoddard Memorial Fund.
-Laura Wasowicz, Curator of Children's Literature
"One day I am visited by a collector of ordination sermons; the next, by
a collector of 4th of July orations; then comes a collector of geography;
another wants religious newspapers; another wants every book printed in
New York before 1700. I accommodate myself to all; for I want every thing
and collect every thing, and I have more zeal than the whole of them: and
in this way I am kept very busy."
~Christopher Columbus Baldwin
3rd Librarian of AAS
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