Jun 20, 2013 - Sale 2319

Sale 2319 - Lot 256

Price Realized: $ 1,800
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
UNUSUAL PROTO SCI-FI ODDITY (SCIENCE FICTION.) Riddell, John Leonard. Orrin Lindsay's Plan of Aerial Navigation, with a Narrative of his Explorations in the Higher Regions of the Atmosphere, and his Voyage Round the Moon! 33 pages. 8vo, self-wrappers, scattered soiling, few small chips and closed tears at edges, backstrip chipped with slight loss, front wrapper strengthened on small portion of verso; spots of discoloration and dampstaining internally, chiefly to margins. New Orleans: Rea's Power Press, 1847
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first edition of an obscure but important early imagining of a moon landing and a genuine if inchoate science-fiction work, long before the genre was established. J.L. Riddell was a professor of Chemistry at the University of Louisiana (later Tulane University) when he wrote this speculative narrative. A regular on the national lyceum lecture circuit of the time along with such luminaries as Emerson, Thackeray and P.T. Barnum, Riddell was also a botanist, microbiologist, an amateur theoretical physicist, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, an inventor.
"On April 30, 1847, Riddell delivered his annual lecture to members of the New Orleans Lyceum. In this case the subject was not exactly popular science, but a didactic, fictional description of a lunar voyage based closely on the scientific knowledge of the day (with one fantastic assumption). This was 'Orrin Lindsay.' The reading, which probably took about two hours, was enthusiastically received, and lyceum members urged Riddell to publish it" (Bleiler, Science Fiction Studies; vol. 36, pt. 2; 2009). The fantastic assumption cited above was Riddell's "theoretical equation of magnetism and gravitation" as a means for space exploration. A fascinating document. OCLC locates several copies but we know of no other examples appearing at auction since 1971.