first edition Hardcover
1884 · Detroit, MI
by Stowe, Lyman E.
Detroit, MI: Lyman E. Stowe - publisher, 1884. Book. Near fine condition. Hardcover. First Edition. Octavo (8vo). 319 pages of text. Decorative green hardcover binding with elaborate gilt lettering and decorations [by Stowe] with minor rubbing to extremities and minor flecking to the color finish. Profusely illustrated with plates and woodcuts [by Stowe], including an eight panel fold-out plate depicting the Detroit riverfront, originating from a photograph taken from the balcony of the Crawford House Hotel in Windsor, Canada. In the foreground (Detroit River) are several sailing ships, paddle wheelers and steamers. This work is an peculiar illustrated compendium of writings on religion, astronomy, history, natural history, engineering, technology, and an incredulous variety of other subjects, including predictions of the future by the eccentric author and illustrator. Includes a small section on the 2nd Michigan Regiment of Volunteers in the Civil War, including a piece on the charge at Knoxville on November 24, 1863 as well as Grand Army of the Republic material written and originally delivered in a speech by Stowe. Contains perhaps the first recorded occurrence of "gate-crashing" an event, which is memorialized in a poem by comrade Sergt.-Major John Hazleton; Civil War veterans had been promised free admission, yet were imposed upon for a payment of 50 cents to enter to view an exhibition sham battle as part of the events held during the Army of the Potomac's annual reunion in Detroit, on June 15 and 16, 1882. Stowe rendered a prediction in the form of a newspaper excerpt from the future of 1983; the New York - Chicago Pneumatic [underground air] Tube Transit Company disaster in which 35 passengers were killed by a tunnel collapse. The victims are listed, as is the single survivor. In another news article from the future it is noted that a statue of Ingersoll was partially destroyed when a balloon full of Sunday school picnickers crashed into it. Stowe depicts flying machines used in warfare of the future, discusses the revival of the dead, describes solid food replaced by nourishment delivered via tubes in the form nutritive gases (bringing to mind my brother who was roundly accused at the dinner table of inhaling his meals), seamless garments created through a fusion of water and electricity, and an electrified tropical Detroit enclosed with a glass ceiling covering 20 square miles and warmed by the "internal heat of the earth" rather than global warming. A prediction set forth in a different work by Stowe, "Astrological Periodicity" published in 1904, he states "CELESTIA is a planet beyond Neptune, not yet discovered;" Pluto was discovered in 1930. PROVENANCE: Previous owner's name neatly in ink on the front endpaper: "Miss Mildred K. Stowe," who is a relative of the author, listing the address "131 Catherine St. Detroit Mich", an address Lyman Stowe uses on later publications. Handwritten on the dedication page is "Mildred Kittie Stowe." Some pages uncut and unopened. Not listed in Negley "Utopian Literature"; not listed in Sargent "British and American Utopian Literature". First edition..
(Inventory #: 020257)
(773) 583-7613
