History of Woman Suffrage.

A complete set, rare in any configuration, of the "bible" of the women's suffrage campaign; a mixed edition with all but the first two volumes in first edition, the four lifetime volumes in a handsome contemporary calf binding, the last two volumes near-fine in the original cloth and presented by the publishers to the Davenport Library of Bath, New York - fitting given Anthony's determination to see the History incorporated into institutional libraries. Given the History's extended and expensive publication history, it is uncommon to find it complete in six volumes or uniformly bound. We can trace three appearances of six-volume sets in auction records, none within the last decade, all of which were ex-library. History of Woman Suffrage offers "a vast compendium of reminiscences, reports, arguments, and commentaries unevenly shaped by the logic of the suffrage cause and its leading proponents. The making of the History was at once a profoundly personal and self-consciously political venture. Few social movements have been graced with leaders who could assemble, organise, and comment on such a vast amount of information [and] the prime mover for the History was Susan B. Anthony" (Buhle, p. xvii-xviii). The History was a monumentally expensive project. In the case of the first two volumes, published in 1881 and 1882, the New York publisher Fowler and Wells covered the paper, presswork, binding and advertising. Anthony and her co-authors paid for the composition, stereotyping, and the making and printing of the steel engravings; Harper notes that engraving costs totalled over $6,000, each plate paid for either by the woman featured in the portrait or at Anthony's expense. In 1885 Anthony purchased the rights to the contents and plates from Fowler and Wells, reprinting both volumes in 1887 and listing herself as sole publisher on the title pages. Volumes III and IV (first 1886 and 1902) were similarly self-published. "When the first edition of the three mammoth volumes finally came into her sole possession, they represented an outlay on her part of $20,000" (p. 613). Although the first three volumes were priced $15 a set in cloth and $19.50 in leather, Anthony donated over 1,000 copies to libraries across Europe and America, and presented others to friends, family, contributors, and supporters, in order to promote the suffrage movement. The present six-volume set comprises first editions of volumes III-VI. Volume I is the second edition of 1889 (stated thus on the title page) and volume II is the 1887 reprint (which uses the first edition sheets prefaced by a cancel title page). The last two volumes, V and VI, were published by the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in 1922; a label per front pastedown notes these particular copies as presented by the publishers to the Davenport Library of Bath, New York. Constructed c.1830, the building housing the Ira Davenport Library was altered sometime between 1893 and 1915 after it became a library. It was added to National Register of Historic Places in 1983. After the new Alice and Henry Dormann Library was established on the same campus in 1999, the former was renamed and repurposed, and is currently home to the Steuben County Historical Society and the Steuben County Historian's office. Mari Jo & Paul Buhle, eds., The Concise History of Women Suffrage, 2005; Ida Husted Harper, The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, vol. 2, 1898. 6 vols, large octavo (235 x 153 mm). Vols I-IV: contemporary speckled calf, spine with twin red and black labels and gilt fillets, raised bands, marbled endpapers. Vols V-VI: original maroon wavy-grain cloth, spines lettered and ruled in gilt, blindstamped border to covers, dark yellow vine-patterned endpapers. Complete with numerous tissue-guarded steel, copperplate, and photogravure engravings, as called for; printed maps to vol. VI. Together presenting very nicely, with some surface chips and discreet professional refurbishment to bindings o.…