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WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS. JOURNAL OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS, auxiliary to the Grand Army of the Republic. Various places (Boston, MA; Washington, D.C.; Minneapolis, MN): various publishers (E. B. Stillings & Co., Griffith-Stillings Press; The National Tribune Co.; Japs-Olson Co.), various dates (1888-1932). A large, nearly consecutive, run of this yearly journal; we offer the years from 1888 to 1932, covering the sixth through the fiftieth conventions, lacking the issues for only five years (1889, 1890, 1913, 1920, and 1929). 40 volumes. Many volumes contain illustrations from photographs of the various officers of the organization. 8vo. Two volumes are bound in half leather. Fourteen volumes are bound in cloth, with gilt-stamped title to spine, and a.e.g. Twenty-four volumes are bound in printed paper wrappers. Ex library. Tipped-in to the volume of the ninth convention, held in 1891, is a holograph, presentation letter from Mary E. Deane, President of Massachusetts Department of the W.R.C.. The half leather volumes are missing large portions of the spines and the boards are detached. The spines of the paper- wrappered volumes are sunned, with some occasional chipping to wrappers; a few of the volumes have either the front or back panel detached. The text leaves are clean and the overall condition of the group is quite good.

Offered with: JOURNAL OF THE TENTH ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS...1890. For the Department of New Hampshire. JOURNAL OF THE EIGHTH ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS...1891. For the Departments of Connecticut , Indiana, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. JOURNAL OF THE SEVENTH ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS...1891. For the Departments of Missouri and Vermont. Seven separate issues covering individual state conventions. 8vo., paper wrappers. Ex-library. Some occasional chipping to wrappers; one of the volumes has a detached cover. Else, near fine. The price for the collection: $1,500.00

The Woman's Relief Corps, a post-Civil War organization, worked through local chapters to relieve the sufferings of disabled veterans, war widows, and orphans. In the North, it functioned as an auxilliary of the Grand Army of the Republic, but in the South, where the G.A.R. had no equivalent, there nonetheless were units of the Woman's Relief Corps. Separate units run by African-American women on behalf of African-American veterans existed in the North. The Boston unit was founded by Susie King Taylor and others in 1886; she served as its president in 1893.

These groups concentrated on cemetery maintenance and the erection of war memorials. The May 30 observance of Decoration Day in the South and Memorial Day in the North owed much to the organizational efforts of these women. Their era of greatest activity was in the 1880s and 1890s, when those whose lives had been shaped by the war began to age, and they feared that wartime sacrifices would be forgotten. (Weatherford. American Women's History.) #59802

TARBELL, Ida M. SIGNED LETTER TO SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY MCADOO, 1916, REFUSING A POSITION ON THE TARIFF COMISSION. One page, one side, 8 3/8 x 10 1/2 inches, blue personal stationery with Tarbell's address. Typed. Letter creased horizontally and vertically, two corners slightly creased. Overall very good condition. In this letter, dated December 30, 1916, Tarbell graciously declines the Secretary's proposal (via Wilson) that she serve on the Tariff Commission: "...I hope that you know that I do consider it a privilege and an honor ... I am not physically fit to undertake the work. I have held very confining positions for years, and recently have had to vary my work ... It only means, however, that I have had to seek a change of work, not that I am retired. As a matter of fact I was never working harder." Tarbell proposes that she might aid the Commission by "interpreting it to the public ... through my professional channels." She makes reference to her tariff work of a few years past, which left her "in a rather anarchist mood on the subject ... Still, if I do attempt to write or talk again on the subject, I shall, for the sake of the cause, sink my anarchism and be wise as a serpent." Tarbell's THE TARIFF IN OUR TIMES was published in 1911, and made investigation of how the tariff system benefited businesses rather than the public. $1500.00 #80220

ADDAMS, Jane. TWENTY YEARS AT HULL-HOUSE WITH AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOTES. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1910. First edition, inscribed on the ffep.; while the recipient's name is not quite legible, it is clearly signed: "Comp of the author|Jane Addams." Illustrations by Norah Hamilton and photographic reproductions of Addams and others. xviii,462,[2] pp. + [4] pp. pub.'s adv. Octavo, brick cloth, lettered in gilt at spine and upper board, color illustration laid-down on upper board. Internally clean, though there are small abraded patches on the frontisp. and t.p., where they had once been stuck together, and one leaf has a marginal chip just touching a couple of lines of text on p. 425. The cloth binding is moderately soiled and a bit rubbed all over, worn at edges, sunned at spine and chipped at the head; hinges are cracked and the volume is shaken in binding. Only a good copy, but inscribed.

Addams (1860-1935) was a pioneering social reformer and peace activist who worked primarily in Chicago, but her influential ideas were felt throughout the United States and beyond. She and her colleagues documented tenement conditions, sweatshops, and child labor; she worked for the reform of the corrupt Chicago municipal system and fought for the special treatment of children by the courts. In 1889 she found Hull-House settlement which grew to include a day nursery, gymnasium, dispensary and playground, cooking and sewing courses, and a co-operative boarding house for working girls. In 1931 she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace with Nicholas Murray Butler of Columbia University; it was the first time the Nobel Prize was awarded to an American woman. $600.00 #71403

MILLAY, Edna St. Vincent. "THE PATIENT PERIODICAL," in THE VASSARION, Volume Twenty-nine. Poughkeepsie, NY: Vassar College, 1917. Illustrated. Small quarto. Two parts bound as one: 204,[28]; 55,[1] pp. Black paper with a simulated leather texture, title printed in white on spine, an owl device which incorporates the year is stamped in silver gilt on upper board. Vassar-designed bookplate with student signature, a member of the class of 1918, on recto of frontispiece. Binding is sound though chipped at crown, superficially rubbed along joints, and worn through just at the tips of corners. Text and photos are clean.

This is the Vassar College yearbook for the class of 1917. Printed on p. 59 are the lyrics to "The Patient Periodical," Millay's winning entry in the Class Song Contest of 1916 for which she wrote both the words and music. Millay's senior portrait appears on p. 80; and there is an informal picture of her on p. 27 of the second part in which she is identified as Vincent, her familiar name. Millay's name also appears as a member of the Tree Ceremonies Committee (p. 53), as a cast member of "The Locked Chest" (p. 122), and as President of the Spanish Club (p. 168).

Millay, a scholarship student at Vassar, began her studies at the age of twenty-one. While there, she studied literature and languages, and wrote and appeared in several plays for college productions. She had trouble obeying the rules and regulations meant to protect young Vassar students and was very nearly barred from graduation but for the intervention of faculty and students. After graduation, and before the year had ended, Millay began her successful and very public career by publishing Renascence and Other Poems and moving to New York City. $750.00 #81280

GRANT, [Anne] Mrs.. MEMOIRS OF AN AMERICAN LADY: with sketches of manners and scenery in America, as they existed previous to the revolution. New York: Printed for Samuel Campbell, by D. & G. Bruce, 1809. Same year as the two-volume first American edition published at Boston. viii,344 pp. 12mo., full-bound in contemporary sheep with a black spine label. Leather is rubbed along edges and scuffed on surfaces, with shallow loss at heel and crown. Paper is age toned with some occasional light foxing and just a couple of spots of marginal soiling. Nonetheless, it is a very good copy. The author, commonly known as "Mrs. Grant of Laggan," was the daughter of a British army officer. She spent her early years, until the age of thirteen, in Albany, NY with the subject of this book, Mrs. Philip (Catherine) Schuyler, aunt of Gen. Philip Schuyler. It contains information about the Schuyler family and Albany customs, travel in the northeast colonies, and Native Americans, particularly the Mohawk tribes in New York state. (Howes G303, Larned 1101, Sabin 28296). $325.00 #77687

ADAMS, Hannah [and Mrs. Hannah F. Lee]. A MEMOIR OF MISS HANNAH ADAMS, WRITTEN BY HERSELF, WITH ADDITIONAL NOTICES BY A FRIEND. Boston: Gray and Bowen, 1832. 110 pp. 12mo., green cloth with paper spine label. Fair to good, rear joint starting, spine label scraped with only remnants legible. Light pale spotting to cloth. Interior foxed, hinges starting. Rear flyleaf has small chip and small closed tear. Lovely lithograph frontispiece portrait, slight soil to page edges, not affecting image. $600.00 #80303

SANGSTER, Margaret E. WINSOME WOMANHOOD: FAMILIAR TALKS ON LIFE AND CONDUCT. Illustrated by Studies from Life by W. B. Dyer. New York: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1900. First edition. 260 pp. 12mo., red cloth stamped in white and gilt, decorative cover with cameo vignette. TEG. Slight rubbing to spine. B/w frontispiece photo reproduction and tissue guard fine. Advice to ladies young and old. In very good illustrated dust jacket, slight age-toning, a few nicks at joints, spine. $250.00 #80356

SHELLEY, Lady Frances, ed. Richard EDGECUMBE. THE DIARY OF FRANCES LADY SHELLEY 1787-1817. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1912. vii + [3] + 406 pp. 8vo., dark blue cloth stamped in gilt and black. Top edge gilt. Faint dust soil to bottom edge, else fine, a lovely copy in a good dust jacket with light soil and a few closed tears at edges. Owner's ink signature on front flyleaf. Interior clean and bright, with tissue guard at frontispiece. B/w plates. $200.00 #83081