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AN AUTHOR S PRESENTATION COPY TO U.S. REP. REUBEN ROBIE; EX-COLL. DANIEL G. VOLKMANN JR. First edition, second issue (first illustrated). Washington: printed by Jno. T. Towers, 1851. Quarto (11" x 7 1/2", 279mm x 190mm). [Full collation available.] With 11 tinted lithographed plates and 6 folding lithographed charts. Bound in the publisher's plum blocked cloth, the central vignette gilt ("MEMOIR AND MAPS OF CALIFORNIA"). Sunned at the spine, with the rear board starting from the top and some splitting generally. A little peripheral sunning, with bumped fore-corners and some spotting. Evenly tanned, with offsetting at the plates. Stub tears, some particularly long (6" or more). Gilt leather ex-libris of Volkmann to the front paste-down, above the purple ink-stamp "PROPERTY OF/ REUBEN E. ROBIE/ BATH, N.Y." Presentation inscription in ink to the title-page: "For The Hon Reuben Robie/ of N. Yk./ With the respects of/ The Author -". Cadwalader Ringgold (1802-1867) was a naval officer, attaining in 1849 the rank of Commander, from a distinguished Maryland family. It was as a lowly lieutenant in Wilkes's Exploring Expedition (1838-1842), however, that Ringgold had the opportunity to survey the West Coast. He returned in 1849 -- "when the tide of emigration was beyond all example, and when the magnificent expanse of waters groaned under the weight of commerce" (p. 5) -- and through 1850 continued to survey California, which following the gold rush had become a lodestone of Manifest Destiny. The Series of charts is a rutter -- a handbook for sailors, with visual cues (marks) for navigating difficult passages -- which will have been particularly attractive to those intending to ply the Pacific waters. The first edition of the work, published 1851, was unillustrated, and was followed in the same year by an illustrated issue (and a second unillustrated edition), as is the present volume. Demand continued strongly enough to merit four further editions in 1852. Much ink has been spilled on the number of plates present (Howes, Kurutz and Sabin calling for 8 plates). In our first (illustrated) edition, there are 11 plates. Streeter calls the plates of the first edition the best. In later editions, the 12 views on 11 plates are collapsed to 8 by doubling up several of them. In the present example the plates are as follows: 1. "View of Sacramento City from the west bank" (as frontispiece) 2. "Entrance to San Francisco" 3. "View of San Francisco from Yerba Buena Island" (a little trimmed at the lower edge) 4. "View of Monte Diablo from Garnet Island." 5. "View of Benicia from the Anchorage East of Seal Island." 6. "View of Monte Diablo from Forks of the Sacramento." 7. "Entrance to the Sacramento River" 8. "Mark for Invincible Buoy Point Smith, east end of Angel I. on with Signal Hill" and "Mark for Invincible Buoy North extreme of Marin I.s on with Clump of trees north of San Rafael" 9. "Mark for Tongue Shoal" 10. "Mark for entering the second section of the Middle Fork of the Sacramento River" 11. "Marks for entering the Sacramento and its Forks at their confluence". Reuben Robie (1799-1872) was born in Vermont but from the age of 20 established himself in Bath, NY (Steuben county). After holding various municipal magistracies, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1851, which places the dedication nicely close to the time of publication. Daniel Gustave Volkmann, Jr. (d. 2009) was descended from an old California pioneer family. He graduated Yale in 1945 and received a masters of architecture from Berkeley in 1951. His collection of books began with an inheritance from his mother and grew from the late 1960's till his death, and came to include a complete Zamorano 80 -- at the time, the only one in private hands. Sold by Dorothy Sloan in "The Daniel G. Volkmann Jr. Collection of Rare Californiana" 16 February 2005, lot 162. Howes R 303; Kurutz 536e; Peters II pp. 112-113; Sabin 71425; Streeter Sale 2679.
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