An Old Man with his Old Books
My interest in old books is now well into my seventh decade. To a kid in the 1950’s old books were accessible mysteries. I already had Howes’ USiana and was bumping into its limitations, just 10,500 titles and its narrow focus: Americana in book form. Pamphlets, broadsides and ephemera were around but very little of it made its way into Howes. Between them there were 96 references. In book barns and on random shelves you could see fiction was the bigger category. Americana was more like a cottage industry. I learned early I knew more than most sellers and soon began to conceal the How...