Interstellar and Interplanetary Communication by Optical Masers. Washington, February 27, 1961

PRE-PUBLICATION RARITY. “The classic paper published in Nature that started it all” (coseti.org), this is the founding work of optical SETI. This pre-publication form is dated more than a month before the article’s publication in Nature. For years SETI research focused on radio transmissions, but the development of powerful lasers has made Optical SETI (OSETI) a highly promising area of research. Townes’s prescient proposal is even the more remarkable given the very limited power of masers and lasers at the time this paper appeared.

$8,500

A Collection of Three Reports on the Treasury’s Receipts and Expenditures. Philadelphia: Childs and Swaine, 1790-1793

A collection of rare Treasury reports on the finances of the United States during its earliest years.

3 items: $8,500

Autograph letter signed to F. P. Church.. Washington, 1871

In this fine, boldly penned letter, Walt Whitman sends the manuscript of his poem “The Mystic Trumpeter” for possible publication in the January 1872 number of The Galaxy. Whitman would include the poem in the final edition of Leaves of Grass (1891).

$8,500

The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, Begun in the Year 1641. With the precedent Passages, and Actions, that contributed thereunto, and the happy End, and Conclusion thereof by the King’s blessed Restoration. Oxford: Printed at the Theater, 1702-1704

FIRST EDITION. A magnificent set of Clarendon’s History of the Rebellion, “the most valuable of all the contemporary accounts of the Civil Wars. … His characters are not simply bundles of characteristics, but consistent and full of life, sketched sometimes with affection, sometimes with light humor” (DNB).

$7,800

Marble column being carried on a cart to the Capitol. Washington, 1860

This rare salt print shows a colossal marble column being carried to the Capitol during its construction. The enormous cart is being drawn by team of twelve or more horses.

$7,500

Autograph manuscript signed “Walt Whitman on the Poets.”. No place, [1885]

In this fascinating manuscript Whitman provides a newspaper with an article defending himself against attacks that he did not respect the great American poets of the day.

$7,500

Opus eruditissimum Divi Irenaei …. Basel: Froben, 1526

FIRST EDITION of the works of Irenaeus, “the father of Christian theology,” as he is widely known.

$7,500

On the Origin of Species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life.. London: John Murray, 1866

FOURTH EDITION. On the Origin of Species is “certainly the greatest biological book ever written” (Freeman) and “the most important single work in science” (Dibner).

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The Vermont State House. Vermont, [c. 1859]

A fine salt print of the Vermont State House.

$7,000

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. London: Strahan and Cadell, 1791

SIXTH EDITION of the most important book in the history of economics. One of 2000 sets. The sixth edition is the first to have been published after Smith’s death in 1790.

$6,800