Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$95.00 + shipping
Condition: Poor
Description: Oversized hardcover. Illustrated paper over boards with black lettering; illustration of Father Goose and man with quill and paper on front cover. Geese in a line on rear cover. Title page not dated. Copyright page dated 1899, stated fourth edition. This copy unfortunately has coloring in crayon on a number of pages, including to the front cover illustration. Spine strip is missing, revealing binding. Corners and edges are quite worn and bumped, exposing boards. Binding is fragile; covers are pulling from binding, and some signatures feel loose, but all remain attached to binding. Final page states that all pages of verse in Father Goose, His Cook have been hand lettered by Ralph Fletcher Seymour. Overall, a fair reading copy, whose outside appearance has surely seen better days. Please e-mail us with questions or to request photos. This is an oversized book. Extra shipping charges may be required for international or priority delivery.
Seller: Riverby Books, Fredericksburg, VA, U.S.A.
Price: US$175.00 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Quarto, 102 unnumbered pages, pictorial boards (rubbed), edgeworn, corners worn, rebacked in brown leather with new endpapers. Ex libris Elsie Walch 1929. Note: it appears that young Elsie helpfully provided pencilled page numbers at the top of each page. Verse by L. Frank Baum. Illustrated by W. W. Denslow, who, of course, also did THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ the next year. Hand-lettered by Ralph Fletcher Seymour, his first big job after arriving in Chicago from Indiana. and before he began his Alderbrink Press. The final page is a drawing of Ralph Seymour by W. W. Denslow.
Seller: Thomas J. Joyce And Company, Chicago, IL, U.S.A.
Price: US$274.53 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Third edition, (83) pp., bound in half cloth and boards with part of original dust jacket pasted on front cover. Spine and several tears restored, age toning, some spots. Good and solid copy with framed illustrations with text in black/grey/yellow/orange. 28 x 23 cm.
Seller: Antiquariaat Digitalis, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Baum, L. Frank. Father Goose: His Book. Geo. M. Hill Co. Publishers, Chicago, 1899.
Price: US$400.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: Slim 4to(11"tall)grey illustrated paper over boards. Very Good but for bumped outside corners with some of the boards exposed at corners, one inch splits to cover paper top and bottom of front gutter, some soiling and scuffing of cover paper, otherwise Good to Very Good with textblock Very Good. SCARCE IN ANY CONDITION. **NOTE: A large and heavy book that will require extra packing and postage.**
Seller: Kestrel Books, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Baum, L. Frank. Father Goose His Book.. Geo. M. Hill, Chicago, 1899.
Price: US$825.00 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Skillfully added new spine. Cover corners repaired; old ownership notation on front flyleaf; tear in one leaf repaired (crosses lower corner of plate); several marginal spots and two or three short marginal tears.
Seller: By Books Alone, Woodstock, NY, U.S.A.
Price: US$1150.00 + shipping
Description: HB NODUSTJACKET, September 1899, 1st edition,1st Issue, Pictorial Tan Cover in Beige & bRown & Orange & white of Father Goose with feather in haNd & Goose looking at him, Much Rub, Scuff & Wear & small StaiNs & Wrinkling to Covers GOOD- , cover Hinge has nice Tape Reinforcement Restoration Most Likely but has on spine printed Father Goose His Book , with Baum bottom of spine , Cover some chipping near Extremities & Scuff, Othrwise GOOD delicate Condition Cover, Interior Hinge probable white Tape Reinforcement,Few pgs small mended Tears & creases or Scuff, few small INK margin mrks, Minor Fox, OtHerwise Nice, & Tight, Most Plates are Nice & colors Bright, Few Page Repairs in Margins, Few small pencil mrks, Interior VG-, AS-IS, NODJ, UNpaginated
Seller: Bluff Park Rare Books, LONG BEACH, CA, U.S.A.
BAUM, L. Frank. DENSLOW, W. W. (illus.). Father Goose: His Book.. Geo. M. Hill Co., Chicago, 1899.
Price: US$4500.00 + shipping
Description: Pictures by Wm. W. Denslow (in color throughout). Folio, publisher's illustrated boards. First edition, first issue (September 1899). Boards rubbed at edges and corners; expertly rebacked with neat replacement of the bottom three inches of the spine; marginal corners of three leaves expertly replaced. Inscribed and signed in green ink on the front free endpaper by W. W. Denslow, with an original watercolor drawing of a small girl looking out to a ship at sea, also signed by the artist, "Den," with his seahorse.
Seller: Jeffrey H. Marks, Rare Books, ABAA, Rochester, NY, U.S.A.
Baum, Frank L.. Father Goose His Book. Geo. M. Hill Co., Chicago, 1899.
Price: US$8500.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: Chicago Geo. M. Hill Co., 1899. First Edition of Baum's Father Goose BAUM, L. Frank. Father Goose. His book. Pictures by Wm. W. Denslow. Chicago: Geo. M. Hill Co., [1899]. First edition, first issue. With no printed information about edition on copyright page. Large quarto (10 11/16 x 8 3/4 inches; 277 x 222 mm). With numerous full page, color illustrations. Original pictorial boards. Very good condition, remarkable uncommon in this condition. The "first significant American color-plate children's book." Schiller 21. The first edition of Father Goose was published on September 25, 1899. To the astonishment of Hill and the delight of Baum and Denslow, it was so quickly sold out that a second edition of ten thousand copies was printed on October 16. By Christmas, 75,700 copies had been run off to meet the demand. On a single day, December 18, 1899, there were sold 3,934 copies. Nor did interest in the book die with the holiday season. During 1900 this best seller required the printing of an additional thirty thousand copies, and the Tribune reported in June, 1900, that "Father Goose, His Book last year achieved the record of having the largest sales of any juvenile in America." Father Goose with his old-fashioned skirted coat and twinkling eyes, like a comic Ben Franklin, was popular alike with the public and the book reviewers. "Father Goose is the new philosopher of the cradle and the fireplace," wrote the Times Herald. "As he comes in fancy masquerade, with clever yarns, bright ditties and assurances that the will take off from Mother's shoulders a good deal of work, give him double welcome." Father Goose set the pattern in some ways for the format of the Oz books that were to come. Greene and Hanff. To Please a Child, Baum & MacFall. HBS 65986. Of course, Baum and Denslow collaborated on another classic that year for Hill -- The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Housed in a custom-made collector's slipcase.
Seller: Bookbid, Beverly Hills, CA, U.S.A.