I went to an antiques show this weekend, and I didn’t find any antiquarian booksellers. I did find, though, a few antiques dealers who had books for sale.
One of my favorite book finds is a book that looks like nothing. Look at the cover on this one:
It really looks like a mess. It’s old, it’s been written on, it’s a bit ragged around the edges. But when I opened the book, I found a hand written Math Primer, dated 1815. The teacher or tutor wrote the concept he (she?) was trying to teach in large letters at the top of each page and then a definition of the concept. Then he wrote word problems for his student to practice, which he did, on the very same page. I think it is quite an interesting example of what type of arithmetical skills a child of the early American Republic learned.
Looks like the student also had to write a sentence many times:
See you in the stacks!
