In 1902, May E. Southworth wrote a cookbook for Elder & Shepard called One Hundred & One Sandwiches. It was sold very well, and Elder asked Southworth to write more. In the 1904 Catalog From a Western Publisher (catalog C20), he writes:
The many who have experienced the gustatory joys of 101 Sandwiches will give a hearty reception to four additional volumes, affording them that multiple of the famous 101 Epicurean Thrills
The four new cookbooks were Salads, Chafing-Dish Recipes, Beverages, and Candies. The five cookbooks, including Sandwiches, were reprinted with a Tomoye Press title page and whimsical cover art by Spencer Wright. They were issued in two bindings: paper wraps, and the “Kitichen edition” of canvas over boards. Elder named the series “101 Epicurean Thrills,” and by 1908 there were eleven titles in the series:
One Hundred & One Beverages
One Hundred & One Candies
One Hundred & One Chafing-Dish Recipes
One Hundred & One Desserts
One Hundred & One Entrées
One Hundred & One Layer Cakes
One Hundred & One Mexican Dishes
One Hundred & One Salads
One Hundred & One Sandwiches
One Hundred & One Sauces
One Hundred & One Ways of Serving Oysters
In 1914, Southworth followed up the series with a cookbook entitled Midnight Feasts: 202 Salads and Chafing-Dish Recipes.
It would taken the pen of a Carlyle to describe our mysterious flight over Paris at midnight. The impression was so startling that for an hour we never spoke above a whisper.
George Eli Hall’s 1902 story A Balloon Ascension at Midnight is one of my favorite publications from the Elder & Shepard years. Gordon Ross’s color illustrations, including several of Notre-Dame cathedral, immediately sweep the reader back to the Belle Epoque. The book was published in two bindings: paper on boards (below), and green suede with gold trim on boards.
Hall (1863-1911) was born in Nice, France, and was an agent and importer. About 1895 he became the Consul-General of Turkey and Persia in San Francisco. The job evidently included some danger and intrigue: the 8 November 1898 edition of the San Francisco Call, in a note entitled “Lurking Death for Turkey’s Consul,” said that Hall “had been receiving anonymous packages for the past week containing high and deadly explosives. At first the matter did not seem of much consequence to him, but as these munitions of war continued to constitute a portion of his daily mail, he became apprehensive and reported the matter to Chief of Police Lees.”
The Menehunes, Their Adventures With the Fisherman and How They Built the Canoe, by Emily Foster Day, 1905. This small volume was bound in Hawaiian kapafabric, with delightful illustrations by Spencer Wright. The following year, Day wrote another book of Hawaiiana for Paul Elder, The Princess of Manoa. Emily was married to Francis Root Day (1859-1906), a prominent doctor. In 1887 they moved from Chicago to Honolulu, where they lived until their deaths.
Menehunes are popular characters in Hawaiian mythology; they are said to be a race of small people that live in the deep forest, far from the prying eyes of humans. The Menehunes arrived in Hawaii before the Polynesians, and were excellent craftspeople who built heiau(temples), roads, and fishing ponds.
Beginning in 1901, Paul Elder compiled and published a series of booklets of aphorisms, each with a separate theme. Friendship was published first, followed by Happiness, Nature and Success in 1903, and finally byLove in 1905. They were quite successful—over 70,000 copies were sold by 1904—so in 1906 Elder reissued the five booklets as a single volume entitled Mosaic Essays. The cover and title page artwork is by Santa Barbara artist Robert Wilson Hyde.
There are three known bindings: paper wraps, paper on boards, and leather wraps. The paper wraps edition seen below was issued with a matching presentation box; such a box was probably available with the other editions as well.
Katharine Hooker’s Wayfarers in Italy is perhaps the finest book issued by Elder & Shepard during their five-year collaboration (1898-1903). It was privately printed in 1901 at the Stanley-Taylor Company on hand-made Ruisdael paper in two different limited editions of 100 and 300 copies. The title page decorations and illuminated chapter headings were almost certainly designed by Morgan Shepard, and the book contains many photographs taken by Katharine’s daughter Marian. In 1902, Scribners bought the book; their edition of Wayfarers went through four printings by 1905.
Hooker, born Katharine Mussey Putnam (1849-1935) was very well connected in turn-of-the-century California. She had an active, athletic youth, and both climbed Half Dome and hiked the Grand Canyon. She learned French and German as a teenager, and had a lifelong interest in books.
Katherine’s husband John Daggett Hooker became wealthy in the ironworks industry, allowing her to take an extended trip to Europe in 1896 with her daughter Marian and Samuel Marshall Ilsley (author of By the Western Sea, Elder & Shepard’s first publication). She and Marian returned to Italy in 1899 (by which time Katherine had also become fluent in Italian), and it was this trip that became the basis for Wayfarers. The commission came to Elder & Shepard through Katharine’s sister Mary Putnam, who was married to Morgan Shepard. Katharine also wrote two other travel books about Italy, Byways in Southern Tuscany (1918) and Through the Heel of Italy (1927).
Hooker’s prose is enjoyable, and if she uses the passive voice a bit too often, I forgive her. She is adept at painting a gauzy, romantic picture of warm Italian summer afternoons, while also recounting amusing and interesting conversations with the locals. In Milan’s Museo Poldi-Pezzoli, Hooker and her daughter fail to find a certain Madonna and Child listed in their catalog; they quiz the custodian without success, but later he escorts them into a private room to show them the painting. In Ancona, she delightfully describes a heaping plate of light, fluffy fritto misto. In Venice, they strike up a friendship with their gondolier, Giovanni, who teaches them about the hardships and politics of his profession. Hooker’s visit to Siena can be dated to August 1899 because she witnessed the Palio on August 16th, where the contrada of Lupa was victorious. And if you are an experienced visitor to modern Italy, you will shake your head on almost every page as you think about how much has changed in the last 110 years.
Marian Osgood Hooker (1875-1968) also had a notable life. She became a physician and published numerous medical and scientific books, in addition to being a prominent amateur photographer. In 1903, Marian became the first woman to climb Mt. Whitney (the tallest mountain in the contiguous 48 states), in a party that included family friend and famed naturalist John Muir.
Elder & Shepard’s edition of Wayfarers in Italy is rare because so few were printed, but the Scribner edition is easier to find. Here is one vintage book you will enjoy reading.