Mar 21, 2013 - Sale 2308

Sale 2308 - Lot 65

Price Realized: $ 6,480
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,500 - $ 5,000
(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) CHILD, LYDIA MARIA, Editor. The Fountain for Every Day in the Year. Stipple engraved frontispiece of a kneeling slave by African American engraver Patrick Reason. 208 pages. 24mo, original publisher's cloth with the title within an elaborate gilt frame on the upper cover; all edges gilt; minute wear to the corners; fine crack to the cloth at rear joint, but holding firm; contemporary ink ownership inscription on the rear endpaper "Enos H. Neath President [ ? ] A. S. Society, Coventry, R.I." A few early childish scribbles on the endpapers; an exceptional copy. New York: Charles S. Taylor, 1836

Additional Details

first edition, possible "gift" binding. The frontispiece of this "toy" book was engraved by Patrick Henry Reason, born Patrice Rison (1816-1898) in New York City. This is the first published engraving of his to bear the clear attribution of his name as engraver. While the frontispiece to Charles C. Andrews' "History of the New York African Free School" is often cited as his first "engraved" work, it is not. That frontispiece was engraved after a drawing by Reason.
Reason was 19 year old when he engraved the present image of the kneeling woman slave for the American Anti-Slavery Society. It was widely used on letterhead, anti-slavery tokens, etc. Reason's image is actually a variation on the logo, designed for the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society by Josiah Wedgwood in 1787, showing a kneeling male slave with the caption "Am I not a Man and a Brother?" A rare book, only six copies are located by OCLC, in addition to two at auction in the last 25 years. For more on Reason, and other African American artists, see Steven L. Jones article in the International Review of African American Art, Volume 12, No. 2 for 1995.