African American Studies

New York: Random House, 1975 First printing of the stated first edition. Signed and inscribed by Maya Angelou directly on the title page: "Lois Langland, / Joy! Maya Angelou / Nov 19, 1980 / (I hope we can be / together, again.)" Lois Langland taught (professor emeritus in psychology) at Scripps Women's College. Toning/offsetting to endpapers, else book in fine condition; dust jacket with faint toning to spine and cover margins, else fine.

New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1927. FIRST EDITION. Hardcover. Near fine/No dust jacket. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1927. FIRST EDITION. Frontispiece and 56 plates, some in color, by Covarrubias. Unpaginated. Hardcover. Large 8vo. Brown Modern art binding: full, polished morocco; front and back covers each has a stylized African-American head outlined in gilt. Top edge gilt. A few spots of foxing on the front fly-leaf and the margins of the final plate, still a beautiful copy. Near fine/No dust jacket. (Insurance required to ship this item).

Original illustrated wrappers, tall 8vo (7 1/4 x 9 3/4), includes 12 full page illustrations in addition to wrapper illustrations. Notes and musical score on inside covers. Wrappers are chipped, and there are a cople of pieces missing from the top of the back cover, but don't appear to be affecting text. Spine is split but holding, thanks to tape spine; some minor soiling. The song 'Ten Little Niggers' emerged from the minstrel shows in the South shortly after the Civil War.These shows became increasingly racist as time went on. They were known as Jim Crow shows and then became coon shows. While 'Ten Little Niggers' would appear in Children's nursery rhyme books, there real purpose was to present blacks in demeaning ways. Tffany M.B. Anderson: "Ten Little Niggers": The Making of a Black Man's Consciousness.

Pamphlet, 12mo, original printed pale blue wrappers, stapled, 40 pp. Very slight aging; near fine and an exceptional copy. Marcus Garvey (1887-1940) was one of the most influential black leaders of the early 20th century. Unlike other black leaders, Garvey felt for blacks to really gain equality they would be better off going back to Africa. He was a strong champion of black separatism, feeling it was the only way to overcome racism, he even went as far as to propose alliance with white power groups, including the Ku Klux Klan (see An Appeal to the Soul of White America...). He felt the ends of the two groups were actually very similar. In 1914 Garvey founded the Universal Negro Improvement and Conservation Association and African Communities League, typically referred to as the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA). This organization would probably have close to 75,000 members and would be dedicated to black advancement and uplift. Garvey was inspired by the ideas of Booker T. Washington,… Read More

This is the landmark three-volume set, each individually signed, by late tennis great Arthur Ashe. From the jacket(s): "A Hard Road to Glory, a three-volume work, is the definitive history of black athletes in this country and a milestone in the presentation of United States social and cultural life.... A major contribution to both black history and American history, A Hard Road to Glory is the saga of African-American athletes, from their seventeenth-century ancestral homelands to the present." All 3 volumes are illustrated with B/W photos, and include a reference section, sources list, and index.
A description of each volume follows:
Volume 1
1619-1918
Book Description: Warner Books, New York, NY, 1988. First printing. Number line 10-2. Book Condition: FINE. Binding is tight and square. No extraneous marks or writing. Dust Jacket Condition: NEAR FINE. Not price clipped ($29.95). No chips or tears. Signed on half-title page: "Peace, Arthur Ashe, For Joe," (The comma at the end of both the… Read More

Engraved title page with facing engraving signed M.Jackson titled UNCLE SAM'S EMANCIPATION: "O; massa may die; then nobody knows who get me, and nobody to take my part. No, master, I rather be free man"-Page 17. Also regular half-title and title page, 160pp. (plus 16 pages ads. for 1853 New Illustrated Works published by T. Nelson and Sons, London and Edinburgh.) Bound in contemporary marbled boards.
Londres : T. Nelson and Sons, 1853. Page de titre gravée avec gravure en regard signée M.Jackson intitulée UNCLE SAM'S EMANCIPATION "O ; massa peut mourir ; alors personne ne sait qui m'aura, et personne pour prendre ma part. Non, maître, je plutôt être un homme libre" -Page 17. Aussi faux-titre et page de titre réguliers, 160pp. (plus 16 pages d'annonces pour 1853 New Illustrated Works. Relié dans des planches marbrées contemporaines.

New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1901. First Edition. Near Fine. First edition, first printing. Signed by Paul Laurence Dunbar on the front free endpaper. Bound in publisher's green cloth with elaborate stamping to upper board and spine; with title page in BAL State A, and a deposit copy thus; lacking the dust jacket, though remnants of the front panel remain laid in. Near Fine, with slight tarnishing to gilt on front cover, light rubbing to tips. Offsetting to endsheets. A beautiful copy. With photographs by the Hampton Institute Camera Club, and decorations by Margaret Armstrong.

Early copy of "Esquisse d'un Tableau Historique des Progres de L'Esprit Humain" (Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind) Suive de (followed by) "Reflexions Sur L'Esclavage des Negres" (Reflections on the Slavery of Negroes) by Marquis de Condorcet. 1822; Chez Masson et Fils, Libraires; Paris. The book is written entirely in French. Leather covers with decorative gilt borders and gilt decorations on the spine; marbled end papers and marbling on all page edges. With a Table of Contents at the back of the book.Condorcet, who denounced slavery, was a French philosopher and mathematician. His ideas, including support for a liberal economy, free and equal public instruction, constitutional government, and equal rights for women and people of all races, have been said to embody the ideals of the Age of Enlightenment and Enlightenment rationalism. In "Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind" (originally published in 1795), he dealt with theoretical thought… Read More

LECTURES on the Philosophy and Practice of Slavery As Exhibited in the Institution of Domestic Slavery In the United States with the Duties of Masters to Slaves.
William A Smith DD, President of Randolph-Macon College And Professor Of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy
Edited by Thomas O Summers, DD Stevenson and Evans 1856, Nashville, Tenn Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, by WILLIAM A. SMITH, In the Office of the Clerk of the District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY A. A. STITT, SOUTHERN METHODIST PUBLISHING HOUSE, NASHVILLE, TENN.This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.
The book consists of thirteen lectures on the subject of slavery as was given to students of Moral Science in Randolph Macon College. The author presents lectures on the various components of slavery. His main reason for agreeing with the institution is that is "a fundamental… Read More

New York: Viking Press, 1963. SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR on half-title page - " For Dana Ericson - best wishes Ezra Jack Keats". Stated Second printing February, 1963, with Caldecott Award medal front panel, $3.00 price with Caldecott mention front flap and lovely snowflake decorated end papers. Near Fine, slight bow to front board, in a Near Fine dust jacket, hint of a crease and trace of wear at head of spine. SIGNED copies of this groundbreaking and award winning children's book are RARE in any printing, and particularly so in such lovely condition. . SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR. Second Printing. Decorative Cloth. Near Fine/Near Fine. Oblong 8vo.

New York: Macmillan, 1965. First Edition, Seventh Printing (stated). Hardcover. Octavo. 8.5 x 5.75 inches. 415 pp. Near Fine / Good+. Unclipped first state dust jacket showing original price of $5.95. Red buckram over board, spine lettered in gilt and black. Fore edge deckled, top edge stained red. Publisher's number "51732" black stamped at lower right of back cover with same on dust jacket back panel. Dust jacket front and back panels feature b/w Harlem street scenes by photographer Leroy McLucas, with title and author's name in red script on front panel. Very slight rubbing at tips and spine ends. Text block tight and square, pages clean and unmarked. Dust jacket mildly sunned with spine faded; some chipping at spine ends, as well as at top leading corners top, front and back; slight edge creasing; three quarter inch closed tear on front panel near head of spine, as well as half inch closed tear at top leading corner. Dust jacket now in archival protective cover.

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1973 First printing of the stated first edition. Book in fine condition; dust jacket with a short closed tear/crease to top edge of the front cover, diagonal crease to top corner of front and back flaps, a touch of rubbing to back cover, and light wear to spine ends, else fine. A beautiful copy of a very scarce title.

Heyward, Du Bose. The Country Bunny And The Little Gold Shoes. 1939 Houghton Mifflin First Edition, First Printing Thus. QUITE RARE in this first printing. No other printings listed. ILLUSTRATED BY MARJORIE FLACK. EXLIB. Good Condition/ No Dust Jacket Included. Library Bound. Bright red pictorial boards with red, green, and gold ornamentation. Plot Summary: "With twenty-one baby bunnies to look after, mother bunny Cottontail abandons her dream of becoming an Easter Bunny. But when Grandfather Bunny spies her perfectly behaved brood, he's so impressed that he makes Cottontail the most important Easter Bunny of all!"

Chicago: The David Company, 1991 First edition, publisher’s original stiff wrappers, a black and white mottled design of a composition notebook with poems written in first-person voice of twenty imagined young characters. Presentation copy signed and inscribed "For Kenan Heise. / Sincerely / Gwendolyn Brooks / July 21, 1996."
A few faint creases to front cover, else book in fine condition, issued without a dust jacket.

Kenan Heise’s links to Chicago history are strong, nurturing relationships with Chicago luminaries such as Gwendolyn Brooks and Studs Terkel. Kenan Heise is a member of the Chicago Journalism Hall of Fame, a prolific author and historian, a poet and a playwright, and a prodigious book collector and broker (Proprietor of Chicago Historical Bookworks). He worked for the Chicago Tribune newspapers for 36 years, including Chicago's American, Chicago Today and the Tribune. He is a Michigan native, and has written or collaborated on more than 25 books and memoirs… Read More

New York: Random House, 1972 First printing of the stated first edition. A trace of rubbing to corner tips of jacket, else book and dust jacket in fine condition. An exemplary copy.