Through the generosity of Dr. Frank P. O’Brien of New York, who has given this collection to the Library, it is possible to place on exhibition about fourteen hundred of those rare little books and magazines which, beginning about the year 1859, were issued in America under the broad and general title of “Dime Novels.” These are separate publications from the house of Beadle and Adams, of which Erastus Beadle, the Otsego printer, was the originator and guiding spirit. The remaining 171 items in Dr. O’Brien’s gift are examples of those other novels which sprang into existence as a result of the popularity with which the Beadle books were greeted from their first appearance. For lack of space, they are not in the exhibition. The collection, as shown in the Main Exhibition Room, constitutes an absorbingly interesting assemblage of a pioneer literature which has now wholly vanished, but which, for a generation, exercised a profound influence on the country’s thought, character, and habits of mind.

No less than thirty-one various “types” or “series” of books, pamphlets, magazines, and periodicals are embraced in the Beadle exhibit. Of certain types which were published but for a short time only, or which have become most difficult to discover, only a few copies are shown. Other varieties, whose regular appearance extended over a considerable period of years, are in some few instances represented by hundreds of different titles. The publications are of all sizes, from little 24mos to large folio sheets as big as a modern newspaper. More than half of the different series were originally issued in illustrated covers or wrappers of different colors, and they are thus shown. They come in brown, blue, orange, tan, green, yellow, red, buff and in various combinations of those hues, and in plain black-and-white. Nearly all are shown in the exhibition cases in a manner to reveal their outward appearance and the dramatic or quaint illustrations with which they were embellished, but certain of the books of each variety are opened for a proper display of the title-pages.

Although every one of the thirty-one types of Beadle books (and doubtless many of the individual items also) will awaken vivid memories in the minds of elder visitors, the dominating influence of the exhibition—especially to those historically inclined—will be the effect which it produces as a whole. The collection is literally saturated with the pioneer spirit of America. It portrays the struggles, exploits, trials, dangers, feats, hardships, and daily lives of the American pioneers from the days of the Puritans to the death of Custer, and breathes the spirit which, for two and a half centuries, shaped the conquest and development of the Continent north of the Rio Grande. It is a literature intensely nationalistic and patriotic in character; obviously designed to stimulate adventure, self-reliance and achievement; to exalt the feats of the pioneer men and women who settled the country; and to recite the conditions under which those early figures lived and did their work.

It is in those obvious qualities that the cause of the immense vogue of the Beadle books is to be found during their generation. It was in those attributes, also, that their equally great popular influence lay, and no serious student who seeks to understand the history of this country and many of its present tendencies, can fail to obtain a better understanding of such matters by a study of the collection now on view. It is a clinic in the subject of mass psychology; as valuable to the university professor for its significant historical revelations as it is to the gray-haired man to whom it recalls memories of boyhood.

Erastus Beadle, who did so much to perpetuate and glorify in print the deeds of the American pioneers, was born in the village of Pierstown, Otsego County, New York, September 11, 1821. His later interest in the subject of American pioneer life, and his devotion to the cause of recording its annals, is no doubt traceable to his own ancestry and to the experiences of his youth. The grandfather of Erastus was Benjamin Beadle, of Wethersfield, Connecticut, who fought in the Revolution under General John Sullivan and General George Clinton. Four generations of Benjamin Beadle’s ancestors were born in or identified with Salem, Massachusetts, where Samuel Beadle died about 1664. Descendants of Samuel fought in the French and Indian Wars.

Benjamin, the Revolutionary soldier, removed to New York in 1796. He traveled by sail-boat from Connecticut to New York City; thence up the Hudson to Lansingburg; and by horses and wagons overland through the wilderness to Otsego County, on Stewart’s Patent, near the present Richfield Springs. This pioneer was married three times, and was the father of twenty-three children. The father of Erastus was named Flavel Beadle, and was a son of Benjamin’s second wife. Flavel Beadle was eight years of age during the journey into the New York wilderness, and was there later married to Polly Tuller, who had come from Massachusetts.

In 1833, when Erastus was twelve years old, he, in his turn, was to enjoy his first extensive experience of wilderness journeying. He accompanied the rest of the family on an overland migration to the town of Schoolcraft, in Kalamazoo County, Michigan Territory, which pilgrimage occupied many weeks. But the Far West of those days did not suit Flavel Beadle, and he brought his family back to New York about two years later.

As a boy, Erastus Beadle worked on a farm, and as apprentice to a miller. It was while he was a miller’s apprentice that he laid the foundation of his future career as a printer. Need arose in the mill one day for some letters to be used in labeling the bags of grain. Erastus cut the letters from blocks of hardwood, just as the old block-letters had been made in the days before Gutenberg. He then left the mill, and, with an alphabet of his home-made wooden type, he traveled about the region stamping bags in various mills and similarly marking lap robes, wagons, and other things. On reaching Cooperstown he came to the attention of Elihu Phinney, the pioneer printer of that town, who offered him work. In Phinney’s establishment Erastus learned to be a type-setter, stereotyper, printer, and binder, and with these abilities as his only capital he moved to the village of Buffalo in 1847. By 1852 he had a printing shop of his own, and in that year he issued his first publication, entitled “The Youth’s Casket.” In 1856 he began to issue the excellent magazine called “The Home Monthly” (shown in the exhibition), and two years later he removed to New York City to test his great idea.

This plan was to issue “Dime” publications, and possibly had its immediate origin in the unusual success in Buffalo, of a “Dime Song Book” in which he had assembled a number of the penny lyrics of the period. These had been earlier issued in separate broadsides, by various publishers.

The New York issues of the song books also made an immediate hit, and were swiftly followed by a number of the miscellaneous hand-books shown in the present exhibition. Then, in the summer of 1860, came the first of the original “Dime Novels” in their orange covers. Success was assured from the start, and the publishing activities of Beadle and Company speedily grew to vast proportions.

Many of the best writers of the period, who possessed intimate knowledge of American pioneer life, were asked to put the conditions and events of earlier generations into attractive form. Among those whose help was thus enlisted were Judge Jared Hall, Francis Fuller Barritt, John Neal, Mayne Reid, Mrs. Victor, Colonel A. J. H. Duganne, Edward S. Ellis, William Eyster, Ann Stephens, Judge William Busteed, N. C. Iron, Herrick Johnstone, James L. Bowen, Mary Denison, John Warner, Charles Dunning Clark, and various others.

The little books they wrote were inspired by Erastus Beadle, and his influence is seen in the fact that every phase of pioneer life, and every historic event in which his own ancestors had taken part, is treated in the series of Beadle books. The editorship of the house was entrusted to Orville J. Victor, one of the most remarkable figures in the history of American literature. For thirty years, Victor personally studied, passed upon, and edited the thousands of publications of the House of Beadle. He insisted, first of all, that the narratives must be true and accurate portrayals, in spirit, of the pioneer times and people with which they dealt. They had to reveal wilderness life and struggle as it was, and depict the conditions amid which the pioneers did their work. These tales were not history in the literal or text-book sense, since they often incorporated incidents for which there was no authentic or contemporary proof. But such material, if used, had to be consistent with known conditions of the period portrayed.

Doubtless it was the mass-realization of these facts, on the part of the public, that brought about such recognition of the so-called “Dime Novels.” The people were absorbingly interested in the earlier life of the pioneers, and when it was presented to them in the form inspired by Beadle and directed by Victor, they—as the slang phrase now goes—“ate it up.” “Here at last”—they doubtless intuitively felt—“is the real thing, not set before us as a dull task to memorize, but as a vital picture to be studied and enjoyed, and from which we may learn.”

Then came the Civil War, and the soldiers literally absorbed the convenient little books by the million. The volumes were exchanged, passed from hand to hand, read to tatters, and then thrown away. Throughout the thirty or more years in which the Beadle books held ascendancy they were so cheap, and so common, that they were almost never saved. In that respect they suffered the fate of all common things. It is almost always the case that the commonest objects of one generation become the rarest objects of two generations afterward. Their very commonness is the quality that keeps them from being treasured by their original possessors. Hence they disappear. Beadle books, in their day, were as countless as the bison of the plains or the passenger pigeon of the air. Yet to-day only a few hundred bison are alive, and are carefully protected, while not one passenger pigeon is known to exist.

After the Civil War—to a much greater extent than before that struggle—Beadle and Victor turned their attention to the Far West and enlisted the aid of numerous western explorers, Indian fighters and plainsmen in portraying that part of the country. Erastus Beadle, himself, made a trip across the plains in order to study, at first hand, the life in those regions. Among those whose knowledge of the West was thus embodied in the Beadle books were Dr. Frank Powell, Captain “Bruin” Adams, Buffalo Bill, Major Sam Hall (known as Buckskin Sam), Major St. Vrain, Joseph Badger, Prentiss Ingraham, Captain Alfred Taylor, T. C. Harbaugh, Lieutenant Hazeltine, Captain Monstery, Captain Frederick Whittaker, Lieutenant J. H. Randolph, Major Henry B. Stoddard, Lieutenant Alfred Thorne, Captain Jack Crawford (the Poet Scout), Ensign Charles Dudley Warren, Dr. Carver, Henry Inman, Albert D. Richardson, Dr. J. H. Robinson, Lieutenant James Magoon, Professor William R. Eyster, Oll Coomes, Captain T. B. Shields, J. B. Omohundro (who was “Texas Jack”), and dozens of others whose years of personal knowledge and actual adventure were incorporated in their writings.

For a long time a considerable part of the reading public in the East looked upon these tales from the Far West as unadulterated fiction, entirely harmful in its effect. Uncounted armies of boys who lived between the Mississippi and the Atlantic were taken to the woodsheds by their fathers, and there subjected to severe physical and mental anguish as a result of the parental discovery that they were reading such “impossible trash.” But the intuition of the boys was a truer guide—in this matter at least—than the opinions of those parents who did not read the books, and it has finally come to be realized that the pictures of pioneer life in the Far West, as presented by the Beadle books, are substantially accurate portrayals of the strange era and characters therein depicted. As a matter of fact, the men and women who wrote those narratives for the House of Beadle succeeded much better in their task than hearsay chroniclers who also undertook it. The Beadle books present a more accurate and vivid picture of the appearance, manner, speech, habits and methods of the pioneer western characters than do the more formal historians. The reason for that circumstance lies in the fact that writers chosen by Beadle and Victor were ones who had lived the life of which they told, and were familiar with its fundamental, day-by-day qualities. That advantage enabled them to get closer to real conditions than the distant commentators and hearsay chroniclers whose methods of narration were in a considerable degree hampered by existing conventionalities of historical writing, whose viewpoint of western life had not been shaped by long or intimate contact with it. Much of the biographical material relating to famous western characters, which is embodied in various Beadle books, is not to be found elsewhere. And, since the lives of the men thus treated are an integral and essential part of western history, the importance now placed on such biographical and regional material is easily seen.

In the years when the little Beadle volumes were common, and at the height of their popularity, they were often denounced from the pulpit as pernicious and evil in their influence upon the men and boys who read them so avidly. But such condemnation was due to ignorance of their character. Of late years that judgment has been radically reversed. The present esteem in which they are held was in part stated by Charles Harvey, in an article on the subject published by him in the Atlantic Monthly for July, 1907. Mr. Harvey said:

“Ethically they were uplifting. The hard drinkers, and the grotesquely profane and picturesquely depraved persons who take leading roles in many of the dime novels of recent times were inexorably shut out from their progenitors of Beadle’s days.

“These tales incited a love of reading among the youth of the country.... Many of the boys and girls who encountered Pontiac, Boone, the renegade Girty, Mad Anthony, Kenton, and Black Hawk in their pages were incited to find out something more about those characters and their times, and thus were introduced to much of the nation’s story and geography. Manliness and womanliness among the readers were cultivated by these little books, not by homilies, but by example. It can be truthfully said that the taste and tone of the life of the generation which grew up with these tales were improved by them. No age limit was set up among Beadle’s readers. Lincoln was one of them.”

When Lincoln sent Henry Ward Beecher to England as a Special Commissioner, in an effort to win support for the Union from the English Cabinet, it was Victor, editor of the House of Beadle, whose “Address to the English People” gave material aid to the President’s representative. After Beecher had returned he discussed these things with Victor, and said to him: “Your little book and Mrs. Victor’s novel [referring to ‘Maum Guinea’] were a telling series of shots in the right spot.”

It was Victor, also, who wrote the life of Lincoln included in the “Lives of Great Americans” series, and who, in his hastily composed memorial preface to that volume, summarized the dead President in a manner not excelled by any other writer of the period. Victor therein said: “Few men realized the magnitude of his task—it was too mighty for comprehension; few men were dispassionate enough to judge justly; few were wise enough to judge understandingly.”

Such was the man who, under the guidance of Erastus Beadle, chose and edited the pioneer literature which, for a generation, molded the thought and ambitions of America’s youth. That literature itself has almost disappeared, but its effects on the national life are everywhere still present.

In the exhibition are shown about sixty-eight different examples of the famous “original yellow back” Dime Novels, which began to appear in 1860. No less than seventeen of the first twenty-five titles constituting this series are embraced in the collection. Number 8 is a first edition copy of Edward Ellis’ celebrated “Seth Jones,” a story of the New York Wilderness in 1785. More than 450,000 copies of this book had been sold in America before 1865, and it had been translated into seven foreign languages. Number 9, “The Slave Sculptor,” illustrates the little known bibliographical fact that Beadle and Company issued English editions of many of these books from 44 Paternoster Row, London. The English editions were printed from the American stereotype plates, with specially prepared title-pages. It was during the issuance of the first few titles of the original Dime Novels that various experiments were made by the publishers in the form and color of these books. Numbers 10, 11 and 12 illustrate such changes. But the appearance adopted in Number 11 was finally chosen, and thenceforth was adhered to during the printing of over 300 books in the yellow-back series. Among other titles included in this type is a copy of Mrs. Victor’s “Maum Guinea,” which was preferred by President Lincoln, as a portrayal of slavery, over Mrs. Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” Still other celebrated issues among the yellow-backs shown are Ellis’ “Riflemen of the Miami,” Frances Barritt’s “The Land Claim,” and Ann Stephen’s “Story of the Oregon Trail.”

The second series of Beadle books portraying pioneer conditions and events was called the “Pocket Novels,” which began to appear about 1869 or 1870. These were of the same 12mo size as their predecessors, but the previous uniformity of coloring was abandoned for a more brilliant appearance and each cover was given a multi-colored illustration on a solid background of red, green, blue or brown. Some sixty-four titles of this series are displayed, and almost without exception they deal with historical pioneer conditions, events and personages. Among these books the visitor will find “Mad Anthony’s Scouts,” by Rodman; Whittaker’s “Boone the Hunter” and “Dick Darling” (the pony expressman); “Billy Bowlegs”; and “The Sons of Liberty” and “Mohawk Nat,” by the historian Charles Dunning Clark, who wrote for Beadle under the pen name of W. J. Hamilton. Clark wrote no less than seventeen of the “Pocket Novels” books, nearly all of them dealing with the periods and circumstances of the French-Indian wars in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania, or with the scenes of the Revolution, phases of national history upon which Clark was a specialist. Many of the “Pocket” series also dealt with the settlement of the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys from 1780 to 1815, and with the Far West from 1849 to 1869. This “Pocket” series is bibliographically known as Type B of the Beadle publications, while the original yellow-backed books belong to Type A.

The next two groups—Types D and E—have a common title, the “Boy’s Library of Sport, Story and Adventure,” and are distinguished from one another by the larger size and earlier issuance of the Type D items. They are imperial octavo in size, whereas the Type E publications are ordinary octavos. Both are uncolored, and have their title-pages entirely occupied with bold black-and-white illustrations. The Type D books are somewhat different in various qualities from their predecessors, and were obviously designed to create an interest in foreign countries, peoples and customs as well as in American adventure. A typical item of this class is Harbaugh’s “Snow Shoe Tom, or New York Boys in the Wilderness,” wherein the veteran author (who is still living in Ohio) instructs his readers regarding camp and wilderness life in Maine, in moose-hunting, fishing, trapping, the making of snow-shoes, and self-reliance in the woods. The Type E books are concerned almost wholly with life in the Far West, and with the lives and adventures of celebrated plainsmen. Among these titles are Aiken’s story of the exploits of “Kit Carson”; Joseph Badger’s Autobiography (written under the pen name of Post); and Ingraham’s biography of the celebrated scout called Texas Jack, whose real name was J. B. Omohundro.

A series of little 12mo paper books having about 100 pages each, with colored illustrations on orange-red covers, come next in the exhibition. These are of the “New Dime Novels” series, known in bibliographical realms as Type F. There are no less than 114 of them, all in remarkable condition considering that some were copyrighted as early as 1866, and none are less than forty years old. These books, like the original dime publications and the Pocket series, are devoted to the early Indian wars, to various pioneer conditions and events, to the settlement of the Mississippi Valley and to the Far West. Among the titles displayed in this section are “Eph Peters, the Scout of the Mohawk Valley,” by Clark; “Indian Jim,” a story of the Minnesota Massacres of 1862, by Ellis; “Wingenund,” by Murray; “The Grizzly Hunters,” by Captain Whittaker; a Sioux narrative under the title of “Old Zip,” by Bruin Adams; John Neal’s description of the Maine “Moosehunter”; and Whittaker’s story of “The Death’s Head Rangers” of Texas.

Next among the various varieties of publications are the “American Tales.” These (the Type G books) have become particularly rare, and are represented by but five examples. They are octavos with brown pictorial covers. One of these, entitled “The Blue Brotherhood, or the Young Patroon’s Inheritance,” deals with the events of the Mohawk Valley during the Revolution, and with the manor house of Abram Van Kempen, which was then known as “Van Kempen’s Castle.”

Most spectacular and attractive of all, in their outward appearance, are the books of the Type H series. These are likewise octavos, published in 1870 and the years immediately following, and they have dramatically drawn covers published in colors. For a long time it was not known by modern bibliographers that these tales were published by Beadle, since, almost without exception, they bear an imprint reading “Frank Starr and Company, Publishers, 41 Platt Street.” Investigation, however, at length disclosed that Frank Starr was a foreman in Beadle’s employ, and that 41 Platt Street was a rear entrance to the Beadle establishment. And finally a copy of “The Texan Spy” of this series was discovered, with the Beadle imprint on the title-page, and also a Beadle copyright, although the “Frank Starr” attribution appears on the front cover. The title-page of “The Texan Spy,” which ultimately settled the problem, is shown in the exhibition. Although this series is among the most rare, no less than thirty-nine examples are in the collection. They embrace historical tales dealing with Kit Carson, the Gulf Pirates, the Black Hawk War, Pioneer Life in Texas, the New York Wilderness, the Seminole War, Early California, the Trappers of the West, the Civil War, Early Ohio, Marion’s Rangers, the Settlement of the Susquehanna Region, and many other equally absorbing phases of American pioneer conditions.

Following comes an assemblage of very different outward aspect. These are 105 specimens of the “Pocket Library,” which are collectively known as Type J. They are uniform, small octavo pamphlets of thirty-two pages each, with the front covers occupied by illustrations in black-and-white. The very first issue of this series is shown. It is Edward Wheeler’s story of “Deadwood Dick, the Prince of the Road.” Among the more important items in this division of the collection are Omohundro’s story of the Scout New Wylde, Captain J. F. C. Adams’ “Oregon Sol,” the same famous pioneer’s tale of “Nick Whiffle’s Pet,” Mayne Reid’s “The Yellow Chief,” Prentiss Ingraham’s “Buffalo Bill’s Bet,” and Ingraham’s “Pony Express Rider.” The dominant motif of this series is far western adventure, but there are also numerous stories portraying life in New York City.

The succeeding group (belonging to Type K) reveals another striking reversal of form and outward appearance. These are fat little 12mo books of about 200 pages each, with colored illustrated covers. But much of the coloring used in decorating the covers in this series, was not done by the printing press. It was performed by paint brush and human hand, on each separate volume, as part of the original publication process. As a result of this innovation, and also of course due in part to the increased size of the books, these volumes were sold at 20 cents each. Their publication began in 1871, and but few titles appeared. They are now exceedingly rare, although fifteen of the thirty-one known items of the series are shown by the Library, including No. 1. It is Albert Aitken’s story of “Overland Kit.” No. 11 is “Idaho Tom,” by Oll Coomes; No. 17 is Mrs. Victor’s “Turkey Dan”; No. 27 is Buffalo Bill’s “Deadly Eye,” and No. 29 is Badger’s “Old Bull’s Eye.” All are attractive and well-made little volumes. “Deadly Eye” is embellished by a cover portrait of Cody, done in colors.

Following the Type K books in the exhibition come 317 issues of the “Beadle’s Half-Dime Library.” Somewhat more than one thousand titles appeared in this series, and the Library’s collection, therefore, contains nearly one-third of the titles published in this form. As their collective name indicates they were sold for five cents, and were the most ephemeral of all the Beadle imprints. Millions of them came from the press, but, owing to their cheapness, form, and popularity, virtually none were saved.

These tales are sixteen-page pamphlets of royal octavo size, with the front page almost always filled by a strongly-drawn and dramatic illustration portraying some vital incident of the narrative. Although the series, as a whole, is mainly devoted to far western life and conditions, it also contains numerous stories dealing with New York City. Among these the exhibition shows copies of “Broadway Billy’s Boodle” (No. 514); “Broadway Billy in Clover” (No. 678); and “Bicycle Bob’s Hot Scorch, a Story of the Schoharie County Hayseed in New York” (No. 989); all by Cowdrick; “Bowery Ben in Chinatown” (No. 892), by Harold Payne; and “Buck Bumblebee, the Harlem Hummer” (No. 623); and “The Big Four of the Bowery” (No. 837), both by Joseph Pierce.

The far western tales and biographies in this series are particularly interesting. Among the biographical issues are “Buffalo Billy, the Boy Bull-whacker” (No. 191), by Captain Taylor; “Buffalo Bill’s Bet” (No. 194), by Taylor; “Bison Bill” (No. 216), by Ingraham; “California Joe’s First Trail” (No. 376), by Col. Monstery; “California Joe’s War Trail” (No. 395), by Captain Whittaker; Ingraham’s narrative of Joe Bruce, the Texas Ranger, under the title of “Arizona Joe” (No. 495); and the same author’s story of William L. Taylor of Texas, under the title of “Buck Taylor, King of the Cowboys” (No. 497). The illustrations borne by all the titles of this series will be found to possess unusual interest, but some of the drawings have an especial fascination. Notable in such regard are “Giant George” (No. 246); “Sierra Sam’s Pard” (No. 253); “The Scalp King” (No. 288); and “Ker-Whoop, Ker-Whoo” (No. 318).

The largest group of all, in the Library exhibit, is that representing the Type M publications of Beadle. These were collectively known as the Dime Library, of which each issue was an imperial octavo of thirty-two pages, with an illustration on the front cover. Nearly one thousand titles were issued in this series, of which the Library possesses and shows 356, or considerably more than one-third of all that were published. Probably a majority of the Dime Library tales portray the conditions and famous characters of the Far West, and among the pioneer phases of western life with which its titles deal are overland emigration, fur trapping, lumber-camp life, gold hunting, the Texas War, the exploits of the Texas Rangers, the stage coach era, cattle rustling, ranch life, vigilante rule, the depredations of road-agents, Indian fighting, and conditions in all the new states and territories.

Many of these Dime Library pamphlets are also biographical. The narratives of this type dealing with celebrated western characters embrace “Kit Carson, Jr., the Crack Shot of the West” (No. 3), by Major Hall; “Joaquin, the Saddle King” (No. 154), by Badger; “Wild Bill” (No. 154), by Ingraham; “Big Foot Wallace” (No. 204), by Major Hall; and “The Lasso King’s League” (No. 653), and “The Cowboy Clan” (No. 658), by Ingraham. The last two named deal with Buck Taylor of Texas. Several of this series were written by Cody, and still others relate to him. Among these are “Buffalo Bill’s Secret Trail” (No. 682), by Major Burr; and “Buffalo Bill’s Body Guard” (No. 727), by Ingraham.

Included also in this department of the collection are a number of Aiken’s stories of New York City life. Some of these titles are “The Wolves of New York” (No. 161); “The Phantom Hand, or the Heiress of Fifth Avenue” (No. 72); and “The Wall Street Blood, or, Tick, Tick, the Telegraph Girl.”

Following the imposing array just described there come, in the exhibition, representatives of seven exceedingly rare groups of Beadle publications. Of “Beadle’s Dime Fiction Library,” published in 1864 and 1865, only five examples are present. The “Library of Choice Fiction,” also published in 1864, is represented only by “The Maiden Martyr,” which deals with the New England witchcraft horror. “Beadle’s 15 cent Novels” series, which appeared in 1861, has a New York history specimen in the shape of “The Maid of Esopus, or, The Trials and Triumphs of the Revolution.” The “American Novels” series contains nine titles. It appeared from 1865 to 1867, and the little books bear the imprint of Irwin P. Beadle, who was a brother of Erastus. No. 7 of this type is “Fort Stanwix; a Tale of the Mohawk in 1777,” by Hamilton Myers. Next in succession are “Frank Starr’s American Novels,” of which there are but four, published from 1870 to 1872, and they, in turn, are followed by four specimens of the “Frank Starr’s Fifteen Cent Illustrated Novels,” which appeared in 1870 and 1871.

Last of all, in this group of rarities, are six copies of the “Boys’ Books of Romance and Adventure.” These, which are perhaps the most uncommon and important of the Beadle issues, are attractive octavos, on colored covers. No. 1 of the series (which the Library shows), is Robinson Crusoe, but all the others deal with famous personages and events in American history. Some of the books contain several such narratives, among them being stories of Marion and his men, of Daniel Morgan, of Tecumseh, Moody, Simon Girty, and other historic characters of pioneer times. This series of publications was edited by Edward S. Ellis, and, like several other groups with which it is associated in the exhibition, has hitherto escaped the knowledge of bibliographers.

Once more there is a striking change in the bewildering display arranged in the exhibition. The small and colorful exhibits just described are succeeded by a large illustrated series printed in black and entitled “New and Old Friends.” These well-made royal octavo pamphlets of thirty-two pages appeared in 1873, and of the fifteen known titles the Library possesses and shows no less than fourteen, only No. 2 of the file being absent. All relate to American pioneer life. This series was enlarged to folio size after the fifteenth issue, and two examples in the larger form are in the exhibit. One of them is “Oonomoo, the Huron,” by Ellis. Of this tale Senator Zachariah Chandler once said: “The man who does not enjoy ‘Oonomoo the Huron’ has no right to live.”

“The New York Library,” issued under the Frank Starr imprint for a short time in 1877 is next represented by No. 19, which is “Red Cedar, the Prairie Outlaw,” and it is followed by nine copies of “Beadle’s Popular Library,” an imperial octavo series devoted to western and detective exploits. These bring to an end the historical and semi-historical tales published under various imprints by the house of Beadle.

There still remain, however, two other important phases of its activity which demand attention, and which, in point of chronology, even ante-dated the different types of books and pamphlets already described. When Erastus Beadle removed from Buffalo to New York, in 1858, his first ventures were a number of little hand-books on various subjects, and song books. These appeared from 1858 to 1860, and numerous specimens of them are contained in the Library’s exhibit. These were 12mo or 16mo in size, and were presented in attractive colored covers, sometimes with illustrations. Most important and historically valuable of these publications were the Beadle Baseball Guides, that began to appear in 1859 or 1860 and were continued for about twenty years. They were the first continuous series of baseball guides in the world, and contain a huge mass of information relating to the national game that is nowhere else to be found. In that respect they are invaluable, and no history of baseball can be written without constant recourse to them.

Other volumes of like character in the exhibition are the “Joke Books”; the “Year Book and Almanac”; the “Ladies Letter Writer”; the “Housewife’s Manual”; the “Book of Verse”; the “Debater”; the “Elocutionist,” and the three issues of the “Book of Fun.” The “Book of Fun No. 3” is notable because of the fact that it is the first edition, in book form, of Mark Twain’s story of the Jumping Frog, which is contained on pages 29 to 32. This volume appeared in 1866, preceding by a year the appearance of the pamphlet commonly accepted as the first edition of the tale.

Of similar size and make-up are the series of “Dime Dialogues” and “Dime Speakers,” which are also shown. The Dialogue series contained at least forty-one issues, and the speaker series is known to have embraced twenty-five books. Numerous copies of each are shown, the Speaker No. 1 being dated 1861.

Erastus Beadle was himself a great lover of out-door sports and out-door life (due, no doubt, to his immediate pioneer ancestry), and in addition to the baseball guides he published many other similar hand-books. The Library exhibition contains copies of the Beadle “Book of Cricket,” of “Football,” of “Croquet,” of “Skating,” of “Curling,” of “Pedestrianism,” and of “Riding and Driving.” All these appeared in the ’60’s.

With the outbreak of the Civil War the publisher began the issuance of little volumes designed to inform the Northern public regarding its military leaders, and this phase of Beadle activity continued until 1865. Among books of this sort shown in the exhibition are biographies of the principal Union Generals, the “Report of General Grant,” and the “Story of the Grand March” made by Sherman. All were published at ten cents, and each contains about 100 pages of text.

Most important of all the Beadle series, from the historical standpoint, is that known as Type C and entitled “Lives of Great Americans.” It appeared monthly, in the 70’s, for about a year, and contained thirteen different titles. All these are rare, yet the Library file, as shown, contains no less than eleven of them and embraces the lives of Washington, Paul Jones, Anthony Wayne, Ethan Allen, Lafayette, Israel Putnam, Crockett, Tecumseh, Lincoln, Pontiac and Grant. Those lacking are the lives of Boone and Kit Carson. This series is attractively bound in colored illustrated covers, much of the coloring having been done by brush. There was also issued a Life of General McClellan, and a memorial edition of the Life of Grant, issued after his death. Both of these are shown.

The other manifestation of Beadle’s early activities after his removal to New York was his issuance of popular song books. One of the first of these was the “Dime School Melodist” of 1859. The Library copy (a later edition) is dated 1860.

Following it came three distinct series of song literature. The first was a collection called the “Dime Song Book,” which began in 1859 and embraced some twenty or more separate numbers that came out periodically. The earliest shown by the Library is Number 3, dated 1859. They were 12mos in salmon colored covers, and each number contained sixty or seventy of the popular ballads of that time.

The second series of songsters was named the “One Cent Song Book,” of which nine different numbers are known to exist, and of which the Library shows eight (lacking only No. 6). As its name indicates, it was sold for a cent, and was a 16mo eight-page pamphlet. All numbers are extremely rare. It was published in 1868. Previously, in 1861, the “Dime Union Song Book” in two numbers had been brought out, containing the war songs of the North.

The third and last songster series was a pretentious royal octavo in size, and named “Beadle’s Singers’ Library.” Beginning in 1878, it continued weekly into 1879, and 43 separate numbers are known. Of these the Library possesses an almost complete file, lacking only numbers 3 and 20, with nearly all the numbers in first edition. The first editions of these items had large colored vignette illustrations on the front page, with much of the coloring done by hand. Each number contained fifty or more songs of the day, the entire series, therefore, embracing more than two thousand of the songs most popular with the Americans of 43 years ago.

For that reason it is also a historically invaluable collection, since the song literature it contains discloses, in striking manner, the prevailing thoughts and manners of society. Many of the songs themselves, both in title and text, reveal the prevalence of an artificial sentimentality, a tolerance of crime and vulgarity, a worship of alcohol, and a laxity of morals decidedly in contrast with ideas now prevailing. A column might be filled with the peculiar titles to these interesting ditties. Among them are “The Crackman’s Chant,” “Pull Down the Blind,” “Battle of the Kegs,” “Since Terry First Joined the Gang,” “Grease the Griddle, Birdie, Darling,” “When Brown Comes Rolling Home,” “She Was Clerk in a Candy Store,” “Billiards and Pool,” “See that my Nose is kept Red,” “The Way my Daddy Went,” “I’m Dancing Mad,” “The Old Whisky Jug,” “Go It While You’re Young,” “The Rat Catcher’s Daughter,” “On Coney Island Beach,” “She Wept her Life Away,” “Charge the Can Cheerily,” “Bright, Bright Wine,” “I Fancy I’ve seen you Before,” “Charley the Masher,” “Please Father don’t Drink Any More,” “Come Home Mother,” and “Dear Father, Come Down with the Stamps.”

Although the preceding outline of Beadle activities sufficiently suggests that his career was not confined to the publishing of adventure tales, according to the general impression, there still remain to be noticed the items which terminate the distinctively Beadle phase of the Library’s exhibition. They are four in number, of which three are newspapers and one is a pretentious monthly magazine. The magazine in question is “The Home Monthly,” four volumes of which appeared in Buffalo during the years 1856-1860, before Beadle came to New York City. It ranked among the best periodicals of the country. The Library shows it in completeness.

The newspapers were all published in New York City. “Belles and Beaux” was a home weekly issued during 1874. It is represented by Number 3 of Volume I. Only a few scattered numbers are known. “Girls of Today,” which came out in 1875/6, is shown in a complete volume. The “Young New Yorker,” which was issued in 1878/9, is also on view in the shape of a complete volume. It was an excellent illustrated journal intended to foster a love of nature and out-of-door life, and completes the cycle of Beadle literature, which, for extent and variety, has scarcely been approached by any other American publisher.

The remainder of the collection (not exhibited) consists of numerous series of adventure tales and other dime novels, nearly all of which were inspired by, and followed, in the wake of the Beadle imprints. First in this section come thirty-two of the tales published by DeWitt in imitation of the original salmon-colored Beadle books. Robert DeWitt began their publication in New York in 1867, closely following the outward appearance of the Beadle books, and they continued to appear, to the number of more than 118, during the following ten years. To some degree, also, the DeWitt volumes dealt with the same pioneer subjects and conditions, although they were frankly fiction, and not nearly so well written as the Beadle books.

Another imitator of Beadle had appeared in Boston in 1864 or 1865, in the shape of the publishing firm of Elliott, Thomes and Talbot, which then began the issuance of a series of little blue bound books of adventure. Some thirteen of this series are known. They are excellently made volumes, well printed, of about 120 pages each, and were sold for ten cents. They, however, were not wholly confined to American life in their subject matter, but included stories dealing with other lands.

Still a third imitator of Beadle was Sinclair Tousey of New York, who, in 1864, began publishing a series called “American Tales.” These were octavos in colored illustrated covers, and were sold for 15 cents. They (doubtless due to the date of their appearance) relate to the Civil War and its events.

Following are fifty-six numbers of the most famous of the later generation of American dime novels. These are the “Old Cap Collier Stories,” first published by the house of Munro in 1883. George Munro, the originator of the house, was at first a bookkeeper for Erastus Beadle, but in 1866 Munro left the Beadle establishment, and, in conjunction with Irwin Beadle, set up a competing enterprise and began the issuance of Munro’s Ten Cent Novels. They likewise covered the same historic ground, were put out in the same general form, and acquired great popularity. Later, however, the Munro books underwent a radical change, and the “Old Cap Collier” stories took the place of the more solid historical material. The first of the Cap Collier series dealt with the Savin Rock Mystery of New Haven, and the ensuing numbers of the series did not bear any numerical designation until several had appeared. It continued as a semi-weekly issue for several years, as an octavo, and later became an imperial octavo. A copy in the large size, as it appeared 31 years ago, is also included. This title is “The Death of Sitting Bull, or, General Custer Avenged,” and is number 391 of the entire Munro output.

Other series of similar later publications are the “Old Sleuth Library,” the “Wide Awake Library,” the “War Library,” the “Five Cent Weekly Library,” the “Comic Library,” the “Army and Navy Library,” the “Nickel Library,” the “Log Cabin Library,” and the “Camp Fire Library.” All these are degenerate and feeble imitations of the earlier Beadle publications, but necessary in any comprehensive collection of this most unusual and significant phase of American literature. The final group, by contrast, contains several copies of “The Novelette,” first issued in Boston by Ballou in 1857, and which is believed to have suggested to Erastus Beadle—in part at least—his great enterprise. The “Novelette” titles are pretentious and well-printed tales relating to American history.