[PRINTED ON ACTUAL BARK]. Birch Bark Poems (Vols. I and II)

Chillicothe, Ohio: The Author, 1883. Original wrappers. Near Fine. Together 2 vols., 64mo (73 x 59 mm). Ad 1 ("Eighth Thousand"): [12] pp. including pictorial birch bark wrappers. Ad 2 (apparently the first printing): [12] pp. including pictorial birch bark wrappers. Both volumes feature a front cover illustration signed by J.S. Conant, Boston, and gives new meaning to the word "woodcut." The back cover illustration (by the same engraver?) depicts naked children peeling thin layers of bark from birch trees. PRINTED ON ASTONISHINGLY, ALMOST IMPOSSIBLY THIN BIRCH BARK. Intact copies of these two minute string-bound booklets of Lummis' poems are now scarce (for obvious reasons). In our experience, books printed on birch bark are almost never encountered and MUST BE SEEN to be fully appreciated. The striated birch material has a pale pinkish-grey tint, and the out covers are slightly "thicker" (if we could call it that) than the other leaves.

From the 1928 Lummis Foundation "Works of Chas. F. Lummis" Catalogue: "Back in 1878, in the White Mountains in New Hampshire, Lummis set up some of his boyish poems and printed them in a tiny booklet, 2 1/2 x 3 inches, on real birch bark -- gathered, cut to size, split to filmy thinness, printed and stitched, all by the young author." The Catalogue stated that just "four copies" (sic) remained at the Lummis Foundation. For obvious reasons, the fragility of the piece has drastically decreased its rate of survival over the last 142 years.

Charles F. Lummis (1859-1928) is best known as Indian rights and historic preservation activist; lesser known is the fact that in 1905, unwillingly, he became Librarian of the Los Angeles Public Library. He was also a noted photographer, poet, ethnographer, and archaeologist. As a poet, he was unremarkable, but it is worth noting that the titles of some of present poems are: Birch Bark, The Old Man of the Mountain, Drifting, Sunset of Profile Lake, Canoe Song, etc.

Ours is the only complete set of the "Birch Bark Poems" currently on the market (although we have seen a copy of Vol. I available, the asking price being $550).

See Mark Thompson, American Character: The Curious Life of Charles Fletcher Lummis and the Rediscovery of the American Southwest (2012). (Inventory #: 4315)