joel schelly (2 risultati)

Hardcover. Condizione: Very Good. First edition. 12mo. 103pp. One illustration of a silk spinning reel on page 60, with the same illustration repeated on rear board. Text in German. Quarter sheep and printed original green paper over boards. Moderately edgeworn at edges of the boards, very good or better. Top of title page has ink inscription "With Compliments of Cyrus Y. Schelly." A bright, complete copy of a rare book on silk production in Pennsylvania at one of the peaks of production. From *Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia*: "Civic leader Peter DuPonceau (1760-1844), president of the American Philosophical Society, zealously advocated for the silk industry in the early 1830s. He personally supported local silk growing and production initiatives and petitioned the U. S. Congress, unsuccessfully, for federal support for a nationwide industry. Other prominent Philadelphians who attempted silk cultivation in the 1830s include financier Nicholas Biddle (1786-1844) , who invested heavily in mulberry trees at his estate, Andalusia, in Bucks County, and lawyer Philip Syng Physick Jr. (1807-48) , who erected a building, known as The Cocoonery, for silk cultivation in Germantown. In the mid-1830s a new species of mulberry tree was introduced into America that purportedly grew much faster and could feed significantly more silkworms than the native species. This gave rise to a brief silk craze, with increased, widespread attempts at domestic silk cultivation and much financial speculation in the industry. The eventual discovery that the new species was unsuitable for the American climate, together with the nationwide financial panic of 1837, put many silk growers out of business and effectively ended the large-scale cultivation of silk in the United States. Small-scale cultivation continued, but from the mid-nineteenth century on, large-scale manufacturers of silk products mostly imported their raw materials.".

Hardcover. Condizione: Very good-. 1st Edition. First edition. In German. Very good-. Pages are toned with solid internal binding. Tidemark to cover and to edge of first 15 or so pages (visible on title page photo). Quarter leather spine a bit chipped at ends. Bookseller's ticket from Allentaun (Allentown) to front pastedown.