Author: Various
Title: A Collection of Penmanship Copybooks
Description: Various, various, 1857. Eight notebooks, 1857 - 1873; various sizes, various pagination; colorful, engraved and decorated wraps in yellow, green, gray, beige, and red; filled in manuscript in different hands; overall in very good condition, with occasional spotting and small nicks to edges; two of them with period, hand-stitched repairs to spine; one with loss of paper to lower corner of back wrap and a small, archival-paper repair to upper corner of front wrap. In the 18th century, handwriting had been a highly-valued skill, but the history of American penmanship, arguably, did not start until the publication of John Jenkins' "Art of Writing" in 1791. Prior to that, the only reference material used had been European copybooks. In the first half of the 19th century, various penmanship systems would be developed and different copybooks would be published, including Spencer's, Dunton's, Potter's, and others - some focusing on speed, others on specific "muscular movement," and yet others - on complicated, ornamental styles. Most commercially produced copybooks had beautiful cover art, with fancy fonts, woodcuts, steel engravings, and many had the multiplication table printed on the back wrap. Usually, instructions were enclosed on the front wrap verso. A number of them contained handwriting examples, to be copied repeatedly, while others just had blank, lined paper. Sometimes, examples seen here, the students used the notebooks to practice writing by keeping a diary, or even by recording financial transactions. - "Payson, Dunton and Scribners's Combined System of Rapid Penmanship for Vermont Schools. Boston: Crosby, Nichols and Company, 1857." - - "Payson, Dunton and Scribners's National System of Penmanship in 12 Numbers. Revised and Improved. Book 7. New York: Potter, Ainsworth and Company, 1873." - "Spencerian System of Penmanship, Books 1 and 2. New York and Chicago: Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor and Co. 1873." - "Specimens of Penmanship. S. l.: s. n. n. d. (1870s)." - "Potter and Hammond's Synthetical, Analytical, and Progressive System of Penmanship in Twelve Numbers, Book 4. Philadelphia and New York: Schermerhorn, Bancroft and Co. 1861." - "Anonymous (The Property of..). S. l.: s. n. n. d. (1860s)." - "Writing Primer. Introductory to the Duntonian Copy Books. Boston and New York: Lee and Shepard, 1873. Very good .

Keywords: Penmanship


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