In his last contribution Sheldon Cheney shared what the Book-Plate Booklet project meant to him. It is my opinion that Alfred Fowler would come to hold similiar sentiments. Working behind the scenes has its own rewards. The following highlights were my own. KM
####### May 1910, Volume 3, Number 3 #########
WITH this issue the Book-plate Booklet makes its last bow to the book-plate world. No further issues will be prepared under the present editor's guidance---though it is to be hoped that other venturesome spirits will come forward and continue the magazine's work. But personally I am through with it---tonight I am writing my last word for a publication which has been much with me these last four years. It has been a true companion, bringing its little worries and greater joys. As a financial venture it has not been a success. I fancy it will be many, many months before I can---with a clear conscience---cross off the several records of loans from myself, all properly registered in the Booklet's accounts. Nor has the magazine been eminently successful as a peridoical publication. It began modestly enough, announced to appear "occasionally." But with the second number ambition overcame better judgment, and the word "quarterly" appeared in the heading. After the first year the periods between the dates of issue gradually lengthened, until with the issue before this the adjective "occasional" again took its long-earned place, the number being one year behind quarterly schedule. It is only one more proof that personal magazines cannot be regular. The material that is worth publishing does not come at stated intervals and expected times. But if there has been failures in the Booklet's life, there have been certain successes. Certainly I personally have gained much from the Booklet. The varied life of a publisher must always be interesting, and I shall long treasure the letters I have received, with sincere appreciation of the magazine expressed by understanding collectors. The friendships I have made are the greatest pleasures I have had in the Booklet. I have often thought how like we collectors are to a nation of citizens, looking up with undisputed loyalty to our princes, the artists. Our feeling toward these creators of the exquisite prints we gather, is one of reverence. The Booklet has brought me in pleasant contact with many of these fine men. I have letters from that king of English engravers, Mr. Sherborn. Our own Mr. Hopson I may count among my intimate friends. Mr. Spencely, that nature-poet of the book-plate world, I have known. Mr. Stone, Mr. Plank, Mr.Cross, Mr. Fischer, Dr. Noll, Mr. Kirby, Dr. Clark---these all have helped the Booklet and have become my friends. There are those too, who have written for the Booklet---I have come to know then well in other ways. To Charles Dexter Allen the reader owes more than he knows---as certainly I do. My thanks are due to Georgia Medora Preston and Olive Percival both a contributors and friends. And the list of the Booklet's closest friends would not be complete without Mr. Prescott, Mr. Brewer, Dr. Potter, Miss Wheeler, Mr. Ammann, and Mr. Brainerd. All these, I believe, felt a personal interest in the magazine. The Booklet may die, but the friendship of these men and women I keep. Yes, I have gained from my little magazine. And you (I had almost said "dear subscriber"), you who have read the several numbers, have gained something, I believe, from these many artists and writers. So I do not mourn the discontinuance of the Booklet as the end of a venture which has failed of any worthy accomplishment. There have been ups and downs in this little publishing business as there must be in all life. But good has come out of it, as it must wherever there is sincerity and honest effort. As I look on the four years there are no lasting regrets. But now I am ready to step down, and to let another take the place I have found so full of pleasant experience. So a joyful farewell to you, reader---with just a passing pang of pain that our little medium of these past four years must die.
(courtesy of Sheldon Cheney, The Bookplate Booklet, May 1909, Volume 3, Number 2, pp. 71, 72, Missouri Valley Special Collection, Kansas City Public Library, Kansas City, accessed March 21, 2010)
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Karl comments: In the above selection Mr. Stone was a Chicago bibliophile and publisher of Herbert S. Stone & Company. (His name appears on page 4 of the Olive Percival booklet) A chap-book published by Herbert Stone & Company may be seen HERE, http://archive.org/stream/storieschapbook00editrich#page/n9/mode/2up.
accessed Oct 21, 2012)
(links to Charles William Sherborn, The Correspondence of James McNeill Whistler, http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/people/biog/?bid=Sher_1; William Fowler Hopson, The Smithsonian American Art Museum, http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artist/?ID=2300a; J.Winfred Spenceley, Fred Geary: Swept Up By The Revival, http://carrollton-wood-engraver.blogspot.com/2010/03/introducing-artists.html; Charles Dexter Allen, Open Library.org, http://archive.org/stream/exlibrisessaysof00allerich#page/n7/mode/2up;
Olive Percival, Open Library.org, http://archive.org/stream/olivepercivallos00apos#page/n3/mode/2up; accessed Oct 19, 2012)
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