Maine Antique Digest May 2015

32-A Maine Antique Digest, May 2015

- AUCTION -

“It was a good sale. Very exciting to see

that people still love Western Americana,”

said Dr. Catherine Williamson, who is a

vice-president for Bonhams and the spe-

cialist in the Los Angeles books and man-

uscripts department. She spoke about her

very successful February 9 auction in

San Francisco of Western Americana. In

this case, good translates to more than

$1.8 million in sales (including buyers’

premiums).

The auction had a lot going for it. There

were very rare books in good condition,

many of them on the wish list of serious

collectors who knew this auction could be

their last chance—ever—of acquiring this

material. The material on offer was the

property of a single collector, who “fin-

ished his collection eight years ago,” said

Williamson, and purchased much of his

collection before that for record-setting

prices at the time. Williamson added, “We

thought we had to manage his expectations

about the prices people would pay today.”

As it turns out, she needn’t have bothered.

The top 13 lots all sold for record-breaking

prices. Williamson credited “a new genera-

tion of private collectors. If it had been just

the trade bidding, the prices would not be

so high.”

A member of the trade, Jeff Voracek of

Red Mesa Gallery, near Sacramento, Cal-

ifornia, and Reno, Nevada, tried to buy a

few lots. He even bid “a thousand dollars

more” than he believed one lot he wanted

was worth, to no avail. “Prices were really

strong for pamphlet-size early California

material,” Voracek said. “It was a big sur-

prise how high things went.”

Williamson called Western Americana

“a fun area to collect” that offers many

avenues of specialization including early

exploration, early overland narratives, and

Gold Rush. “You can just collect narratives

by women, books about Oregon—you can

slice it and dice it so many ways.”

As far as she knew, this was the first

Bonhams auction in recent memory solely

devoted to Western Americana. “We sell

stuff like this all the time but mixed in with

material from the East Coast. I hope that

the success of this sale will bring us new

collectors who see how advantageous it is

to sell in northern California, especially

while the Antiquarian Book Fair is under-

way in Oakland.”

For more information, contact William-

son via the website

(www.bonhams.com

)

or call (323) 436-5442.

Bonhams, San Francisco, California

Western Americana Sale Exceeds Expectations

by Alice Kaufman

Photos courtesy Bonhams

Serious collectors...

knew this auction

could be their last

chance—ever—

of acquiring this

material.

An “extremely rare” first edition of

the first laws of California,

Regla-

mento para el Gobierno de la Provin-

cia de Californias

(1784), written by

Felipe de Neve, the first governor

of California, sold to the successful

floor bidder, who once again outbid

his rival on the phone, this time for

$197,000 (est. $120,000/180,000).

Williamson called this book

“incredibly important” and the

first of the lots in this auction to be

included in the Zamorano 80, which

according to Wikipedia is “a list of

books intended to represent the

most significant early volumes pub-

lished on the history of California,”

compiled in 1945 by members of the

Zamorano Club, founded in 1928 as

“a Los Angeles-based group of bib-

liophiles. Collecting first editions of

every volume on the list has become

the goal of a number of book col-

lectors” (some were bidding at this

auction) “though to date only four

people have completed the task.”

For some Zamorano completion-

ists, this was now or very possibly

never.

The phone bidder and the bidder in

the room who competed for many

lots vied for

Diario Historico...,

“the

suppressed report of the Portolá

Expedition,” which the catalog calls

“probably the rarest of all Cali-

forniana including accounts of the

founding of Monterey and San Diego

and the discovery of San Francisco

Bay.” The 1770 pamphlet sold after

a bidding duel, with the floor bidder

winning again over the phone bid-

der, the former paying $125,000 (est.

$80,000/120,000). Catherine Wil-

liamson called this “a great and rare

piece” and said she was “glad to see

it break its old record price.”

To quote the catalog,

Estracto de Noticias…

an “extremely rare first

printed account of the

founding of Monterey,

the first European settle-

ment in northern Califor-

nia,” attributed to Gaspar

de Portolá, published in

1770. It sold for $97,500

(est. $30,000/50,000) after

the first of many bidding

wars between a bidder in

the room and a bidder on

the phone. The bidder in

the room prevailed, as he

did for many subsequent

lots.

The floor bidder who took home the suppressed report of the

Portolá Expedition and the first laws of California also beat

out his telephone competition to purchase a first edition of

Frederick William Beechey’s 1831

Narrative of a Voyage to the

Pacific…

for $18,750 (est. $6000/8000). “A beautiful copy,”

said Williamson, “not just a great title but on the original

boards.”

The same two

bidders were bid-

ding again, this

time for a first

edition

(1787)

Historica

Francisco Palou,

which includes

this map

Palou

was a colleague

of Father Juni-

pero Serra, who

was among the

earliest Catholic

missionaries sent

to California. For

this lot, the phone

bidder won, paying $50,000 (est. $8000/12,000). Williamson said, “A very

strong price for a really nice copy. A lot of collectors—of Mexican explor-

ers, of books with Zamorano numbers—would want this for different

reasons.”

A hand-col-

ored first edi-

tion of John

Wo o d h o u s e

A u d u b o n ’ s

I l l u s t r a t e d

Notes

Expedi-

tion through

Mexico

and

C a l i f o r n i a

(1852), which

includes four

h a n d - c o l -

ored

litho-

graphs, sold

for $137,000 (est. $80,000/120,000). Audubon (1812-1862), who had

worked with his father, John James Audubon, was a forty-niner who

joined the Gold Rush, traveling to California in 1849. Forty plates

that illustrated the journey were planned, but only four (the first of a

series that didn’t continue for lack of funding) were ever published.

“Beautiful and rare,” said Williamson. “We sold this copy to the con-

signor eight to ten years ago, and that was its first time at auction in

forty years.”

A first edition of one of

the first publications on

the discovery of gold in

California, J. Ely Sher-

wood’s 1848

Califor-

nia: And the Way to Get

There; with the Official

Documents,

Relating

to the Gold Region…

sold for $37,500 (est.

$15,000/25,000). Wil-

liamson said, “This

could appeal to collec-

tors of scientific books,

emigrant guides, and

several others.”

Same bidding duel, usual result—

the floor bidder this time paid

$75,000 (est. $30,000/50,000) for

The Personal Narrative of James

O. Pattie of Kentucky during an

Expedition from St. Louis

, pub-

lished and written by Pattie. The

catalog calls it “the first book to

narrate an overland expedition

to California” and states that this

first edition is “excessively rare.”

Williamson called this “a true first

edition, which is rare, printed in

1831. The owners signed it in 1832

and 1833.”