Hitler’s beer hall _Putsch_ missed fire. President Harding died, and
Calvin Coolidge was quietly sworn in as President of the United States
by his father in a simple ceremony in a small New England village. All
over the country the revived Ku Klux Klan flourished; white-sheeted men
marched openly and fiery crosses burned at night. The magazine _Time_
was founded in 1923. With _Black Oxen_, based on the rather sensational
theme of physical rejuvenation, Gertrude Atherton achieved the great
popular success of her long writing career. _Babbitt_ and _This Freedom_
held over into a second year on a fiction list of typical wide-audience
appeal, marked with first appearances of Arthur Train and Rafael
Sabatini. _Etiquette_, by Emily Post, who had previously been known as a
novelist, topped non-fiction sales and developed into a staple bookstore
item for the years to come. Papini’s _Life of Christ_, a presentation of
the life of Jesus in terms of the new psychology, sold well over 100,000
copies in 1923. The Page _Letters_ made a new record for a two-volume
biography, with 75,000 sold in a year. Mrs. Peters’ _Diet and Health_,
in its second year on the list, had just about reached 200,000. Robinson
and Van Loon in their second years, Wells in his third, and Bok in his
second, the latter with another book besides his _Americanization_ on
the list, gave evidence of the long life of non-fiction. Coué became a
conversational byword through the ideas expressed in his little
self-help book.
1924
Fiction
1. SO BIG, by Edna Ferber. Doubleday, Page
2. THE PLASTIC AGE, by Percy Marks. Century
3. THE LITTLE FRENCH GIRL, by Anne Douglas Sedgwick. Houghton Mifflin
4. THE HEIRS APPARENT, by Philip Gibbs. Doran
5. A GENTLEMAN OF COURAGE, by James Oliver Curwood. Cosmopolitan Book Co.
6. THE CALL OF THE CANYON, by Zane Grey. Harper
7. THE MIDLANDER, by Booth Tarkington. Doubleday, Page
8. THE COAST OF FOLLY, by Coningsby Dawson. Cosmopolitan Book Co.
9. MISTRESS WILDING, by Rafael Sabatini. Houghton Mifflin
10. THE HOMEMAKER, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. Harcourt, Brace
Non-Fiction
1. DIET AND HEALTH, by Lulu Hunt Peters. Reilly & Lee
2. THE LIFE OF CHRIST, by Giovanni Papini. Harcourt, Brace
3. THE BOSTON COOKING SCHOOL COOK BOOK; new ed. by Fannie Farmer. Little, Brown
4. ETIQUETTE, by Emily Post. Funk & Wagnalls
5. ARIEL, by André Maurois. Appleton
6. THE CROSS WORD PUZZLE BOOKS, by Prosper Buranelli and others. Simon & Schuster
7. MARK TWAIN’S AUTOBIOGRAPHY. Harper
8. SAINT JOAN, by Bernard Shaw. Brentano
9. THE NEW DECALOGUE OF SCIENCE, by Albert E. Wiggam. Bobbs-Merrill
10. THE AMERICANIZATION OF EDWARD BOK, by Edward Bok. Scribner
* * * * *
“Twenty-four votes for Underwood” rang through the nation as the 1924
Democratic Convention in the old Madison Square Garden on New York’s
Madison Square went on through the hot summer days and nights. At
Aeolian Hall, Paul Whiteman brought jazz into the realm of classical
music with his introduction of George Gershwin’s _Rhapsody in Blue_ to
the concert stage. _What Price Glory_, realistic war drama, was the
theatrical hit of the year. The Teapot Dome scandal thoroughly
discredited the Harding regime, and Calvin Coolidge, who had become
President upon Harding’s death, was reelected. Edna Ferber was a new
name on best seller lists. Her _So Big_ skyrocketed. _The Plastic Age_,
a revelation of campus life and the “lost generation,” achieved the best
sellerdom that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s _This Side of Paradise_ (1920)
never reached. Attempts to suppress Percy Marks’ novel only added to the
demand for it. Anne Douglas Sedgwick returned to the list for the first
time since 1912. In its third year, _Diet and Health_ outsold every
other non-fiction title. Papini’s _Life of Christ_, approaching 200,000,
was in second place for the second year. The _Boston Cooking School Cook
Book_, which has sold over 3,000,000 copies through its long career from
its first publication in 1896, appeared in a new and best-selling
edition. _Etiquette_ continued to sell. A French writer, Andre Maurois,
found a big American audience for his biography of Shelley. Shaw’s
_Saint Joan_ was one of the few dramas in all these years to make an
annual list. The first and highly successful venture of the new
publishing house of Simon and Schuster was that of putting cross word
puzzles, long a newspaper feature, into book form. The demand was so
great that this firm has continued ever since to publish several volumes
of cross word puzzles and the later _Double-Crostics_ each year. Since
1924 many novelty books of various kinds from _Ask Me Another_, _Believe
It Or Not_ and _Boners_ to the photographic books of Clare Barnes, Jr.,
have followed in the wake of this first experiment.
1925
Fiction
1. SOUNDINGS, by A. Hamilton Gibbs. Little, Brown
2. THE CONSTANT NYMPH, by Margaret Kennedy. Doubleday, Page
3. THE KEEPER OF THE BEES, by Gene Stratton Porter. Doubleday, Page
4. GLORIOUS APOLLO, by E. Barrington. Dodd, Mead
5. THE GREEN HAT, by Michael Arlen. Doran
6. THE LITTLE FRENCH GIRL, by Anne Douglas Sedgwick. Houghton Mifflin
7. ARROWSMITH, by Sinclair Lewis. Harcourt, Brace
8. THE PERENNIAL BACHELOR, by Anne Parrish. Harper
9. THE CAROLINIAN, by Rafael Sabatini. Houghton Mifflin
10. ONE INCREASING PURPOSE, by A. S. M. Hutchinson. Little, Brown
Non-Fiction
1. DIET AND HEALTH, by Lulu Hunt Peters. Reilly & Lee
2. THE BOSTON COOKING SCHOOL COOK BOOK; new ed. by Fannie Farmer. Little, Brown
3. WHEN WE WERE VERY YOUNG, by A. A. Milne. Dutton
4. THE MAN NOBODY KNOWS, by Bruce Barton. Bobbs-Merrill
5. THE LIFE OF CHRIST, by Giovanni Papini. Harcourt, Brace
6. ARIEL, by André Maurois. Appleton
7. TWICE THIRTY, by Edward Bok. Scribner
8. TWENTY-FIVE YEARS, by Lord Grey. Stokes
9. ANATOLE FRANCE HIMSELF, by J. J. Brousson. Lippincott
10. THE CROSS WORD PUZZLE BOOKS, by Prosper Buranelli and others.
1st--4th series. Simon & Schuster
* * * * *
Coolidge prosperity--the Scopes case in Tennessee, in which Clarence
Darrow and William Jennings Bryan argued the theory of evolution, basis
of the play _Inherit the Wind_ in 1955--Red Grange--the Florida
boom--the crash of the Shenandoah--are all memories of 1925.
_Soundings_, first in fiction, sold nearly 100,000 copies. Better
remembered is _The Constant Nymph_, made into a stage hit and the basis
of both British and American movies. _Glorious Apollo_, woven around the
character of Byron, was the start of E. Barrington’s (Mrs. L. Adams
Beck) extremely successful series of novels about real people of the
past. Michael Arlen made a much talked-about hit with what was
considered a daring novel, _The Green Hat_, later a highly successful
stage play starring Katharine Cornell. Sinclair Lewis’ third novel,
_Arrowsmith_, confirmed his place in American literature and probably
was an important factor in his being awarded the Nobel Prize.
_Arrowsmith_ dealt with the medical profession as _Babbitt_ had with the
businessman and as _Elmer Gantry_ was to deal, in 1927, with the
ministry. Here was the first appearance of Anne Parrish, long a favorite
writer. The records of both _Diet and Health_ and _The Boston Cooking
School Cook Book_ gave evidence of the exceptionally energetic
distribution of books which gave practical advice on the always popular
subject of food. _When We Were Very Young_, permanent contribution to
the literature of childhood by A. A. Milne, previously known chiefly as
a playwright, was the first book in the field of semi-juvenile,
semi-adult writing to hit the lists in many years. Bruce Barton topped
Papini’s _Life of Christ_, then in its third year on the best seller
lists, with an American businessman’s version of Jesus’ life. Lord
Grey’s reminiscences gave a foretaste of the advent of more basic books
on World War I than the reporters’ narratives published during and
immediately after the war years.
1926
Fiction
1. THE PRIVATE LIFE OF HELEN OF TROY, by John Erskine. Bobbs-Merrill
2. GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, by Anita Loos. Boni & Liveright
3. SORRELL AND SON, by Warwick Deeping. Knopf
4. THE HOUNDS OF SPRING, by Sylvia Thompson. Little, Brown
5. BEAU SABREUR, by P. C. Wren. Stokes
6. THE SILVER SPOON, by John Galsworthy. Scribner
7. BEAU GESTE, by P. C. Wren. Stokes
8. SHOW BOAT, by Edna Ferber. Doubleday, Page
9. AFTER NOON, by Susan Ertz. Appleton
10. THE BLUE WINDOW, by Temple Bailey. Penn Publishing Co.
Non-Fiction
1. THE MAN NOBODY KNOWS, by Bruce Barton. Bobbs-Merrill
2. WHY WE BEHAVE LIKE HUMAN BEINGS, by George A. Dorsey. Harper
3. DIET AND HEALTH, by Lulu Hunt Peters. Reilly & Lee
4. OUR TIMES, Vol. I, by Mark Sullivan. Scribner
5. THE BOSTON COOKING SCHOOL COOK BOOK; new ed. by Fannie Farmer. Little, Brown
6. AUCTION BRIDGE COMPLETE, by Milton C. Work. Winston
7. THE BOOK NOBODY KNOWS, by Bruce Barton. Bobbs-Merrill
8. THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY, by Will Durant. Simon & Schuster
9. THE LIGHT OF FAITH, by Edgar A. Guest. Reilly & Lee
10. JEFFERSON AND HAMILTON, by Claude G. Bowers. Houghton, Mifflin
* * * * *
The middle 1920’s were the years of pioneering along the air lanes of
the world. Admiral Byrd made the first flight over the North Pole in
1926. Babe Ruth became Sultan of Swat. Philadelphia opened the
Sesquicentennial Exhibition. In Germany, Hitler’s _Mein Kampf_ had been
published. The Book-of-the-Month Club, which was to introduce an
extremely successful method of marketing books, was founded in 1926. New
fiction writers were coming to the fore in America--John Erskine, with
his first great hit, _The Private Life of Helen of Troy_, historical
fiction written in a new manner; Warwick Deeping, English author, whose
_Sorrell and Son_ found a responsive note in thousands of American
hearts (his book marking the first appearance of the firm of Alfred A.
Knopf, Inc., on the annual best seller lists); and P. C. Wren, whose
more popular _Beau Geste_ was published late in the previous year and
did not make the 1925 list, and whose second book, _Beau Sabreur_, also
appeared among 1926 best sellers. Galsworthy was at the height of his
American sales, with one of the novels in _The Modern Comedy_, companion
volume to _The Forsyte Saga_. Edna Ferber followed _So Big_ with the
perennially famous _Show Boat_, familiar to all Americans as book, play,
movie, and song. With his _Man Nobody Knows_ heading non-fiction, Bruce
Barton added an interpretation of the Bible in his series of books on
practical religion. George Dorsey rode the wave of the new interest in
psychology with _Why We Behave Like Human Beings_, and _Diet and Health_
continued on in its fifth year, the new edition of _The Boston Cooking
School Cook Book_ in its third. Mark Sullivan’s first volume of _Our
Times_ marked a new interest in our recent past that was continued some
years later by such books as Frederick Lewis Allen’s _Only Yesterday_
and _Since Yesterday_. Evidence of the bridge craze was the 65,000
copies of Milton Work’s new manual ordered before publication and the
sale of over 100,000 copies of Foster’s _Simplified Auction Bridge_
within ten months after publication. (“Contract” had not yet come
along.) Will Durant’s _Story of Philosophy_, which had previously
appeared in part in the five-cent booklets published as Little Blue
Books by the Haldeman-Julius Co. of Wichita, Kansas, marked the peak of
the “outline” era, selling 95,000 copies in 1926 alone.
1927
Fiction
1. ELMER GANTRY, by Sinclair Lewis. Harcourt, Brace
2. THE PLUTOCRAT, by Booth Tarkington. Doubleday, Page
3. DOOMSDAY, by Warwick Deeping, Knopf
4. SORRELL AND SON, by Warwick Deeping. Knopf
5. JALNA, by Mazo de la Roche. Little, Brown
6. LOST ECSTASY, by Mary Roberts Rinehart. Doran
7. TWILIGHT SLEEP, by Edith Wharton. Appleton
8. TOMORROW MORNING, by Anne Parrish. Harper
9. THE OLD COUNTESS, by Anne Douglas Sedgwick. Houghton Mifflin
10. A GOOD WOMAN, by Louis Bromfield. Stokes
Non-Fiction
1. THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY, by Will Durant. Simon & Schuster
2. NAPOLEON, by Emil Ludwig. Boni & Liveright
3. REVOLT IN THE DESERT, by T. E. Lawrence. Doran
4. TRADER HORN, Vol. I, by Alfred Aloysius Horn and Ethelreda Lewis. Simon & Schuster
5. WE, by Charles A. Lindbergh. Putnam
6. ASK ME ANOTHER, by Julian Spafford and Lucien Esty. Viking Press
7. THE ROYAL ROAD TO ROMANCE, by Richard Halliburton. Bobbs-Merrill
8. THE GLORIOUS ADVENTURE, by Richard Halliburton. Bobbs-Merrill
9. WHY WE BEHAVE LIKE HUMAN BEINGS, by George A. Dorsey. Harper
10. MOTHER INDIA, by Katherine Mayo. Harcourt, Brace
* * * * *
Mechanical and scientific progress continued in 1927, height of the
whole period of invention and exploration that followed World War I.
Lindbergh made the flight to Paris that thrilled the world, and later in
the year wrote about it in a book that became a best seller. Ford
produced his new Model A, the first Ford with a gear shift. The Holland
Tunnel under the Hudson River was officially opened. The stock market
was booming. The disastrous Mississippi floods occurred the same year
that the musical play based upon Edna Ferber’s novel of Ol’ Man River
was produced in New York. The Literary Guild, following book marketing
methods similar to those of the Book-of-the-Month Club, started to
function in 1927, and one of its first selections, _Trader Horn_, made
the yearly list. The publication of _Elmer Gantry_ with an initial
printing of 100,000 copies and sales of over 200,000 in the first ten
weeks found Sinclair Lewis at the peak of popularity. Booth Tarkington
was high on the list. So was Warwick Deeping, with two books; _Sorrell
and Son_, holding over from 1926, sold 133,830 copies in the two years.
Mazo de la Roche, a Canadian contributor to American best seller lists,
like Gilbert Parker, Ralph Connor, and Louis Hémon of past years, made a
great hit with _Jalna_, first book in a notable series about the
Whiteoak family of Canada. The ninth volume in the series, but the
earliest chronologically, was published seventeen years afterward, in
1944, and there were more Jalna stories in the ’50’s. Louis Bromfield
made his first appearance on the list with _A Good Woman_. _The Story of
Philosophy_ was the outstanding non-fiction title of the year. Emil
Ludwig, who was to write so many popular biographies, revived the always
latent interest in Napoleon. _Revolt in the Desert_ was a book of
permanent historical importance by the great English hero of World War
I, the mysterious and daring Lawrence of Arabia. Trader Horn came from
South Africa to tell tall tales which caught the public’s fancy. As
Simon and Schuster had done, a new firm, the Viking Press, scored its
first best-selling success with a series of novelty books. Its _Ask Me
Another_ quiz book was an immediate hit, selling 100,000 copies in its
first four weeks and becoming the first of a series which made quizzes a
popular pastime for years--perhaps germinating “Information Please!” and
the “$64,000 Question.” With two best sellers in 1927, Richard
Halliburton captured a public which wanted adventure with glamour, a
trend in travel and escape reading that had begun with O’Brien’s _White
Shadows in the South Seas_ a number of years before. Dorsey carried on
the interest in popular science, and in _Mother India_ Katherine Mayo
wrote the first book to make a large audience aware of modern India’s
problems.
1928
Fiction
1. THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY, by Thornton Wilder. A. & C. Boni
2. WINTERSMOON, by Hugh Walpole. Doubleday, Doran
3. SWAN SONG, by John Galsworthy. Scribner
4. THE GREENE MURDER CASE, by S. S. Van Dine. Scribner
5. BAD GIRL, by Vina Delmar. Harcourt, Brace
6. CLAIRE AMBLER, by Booth Tarkington. Doubleday, Doran
7. OLD PYBUS, by Warwick Deeping. Knopf
8. ALL KNEELING, by Anne Parrish. Harper
9. JALNA, by Mazo de la Roche. Little, Brown
10. THE STRANGE CASE OF MISS ANNIE SPRAGG, by Louis Bromfield. Stokes
Non-Fiction
1. DISRAELI, by Andre Maurois. Appleton
2. MOTHER INDIA, by Katherine Mayo. Harcourt, Brace
3. TRADER HORN, Vol. I, by Alfred Aloysius Horn and Ethelreda Lewis. Simon & Schuster
4. NAPOLEON, by Emil Ludwig. Liveright
5. STRANGE INTERLUDE, by Eugene O’Neill. Liveright
6. WE, by Charles A. Lindbergh. Putnam
7. COUNT LUCKNER, THE SEA DEVIL, by Lowell Thomas. Doubleday, Doran
8. GOETHE, by Emil Ludwig. Putnam
9. SKYWARD, by Richard E. Byrd. Putnam
10. THE INTELLIGENT WOMAN’S GUIDE TO SOCIALISM AND CAPITALISM, by George Bernard Shaw. Brentano
* * * * *
With the outward scars of World War I healed, war itself outlawed by the
Kellogg-Briand Pact, and the big bull market well under way, Americans
were flocking to Europe by every conceivable means, from freighter to
mammoth liner. Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly the Atlantic.
At home, gangsters, bootleggers, and racketeers were riding high. The
first all-talking movie, _The Lights of New York_, was presented, and
Walt Disney was working on his first Mickey Mouse picture. _The Bridge
of San Luis Rey_, a novel that attained such fame that the Pulitzer
Prize committee departed from its usual custom of giving its award to a
story laid in the United States, was leader of 1928 fiction. This novel
with a South American background, Thornton Wilder’s first great success,
sold 240,000 copies in its first year. English writers with devoted
American audiences were next on the list. A new writer of detective
stories, S. S. Van Dine (pseudonym of Willard Huntington Wright),
flashed into the book world with big sales. _The Greene Murder Case_ was
one of the first of many novels that made Philo Vance almost as familiar
a fictional character as Sherlock Holmes, and the first detective story
to appear on an annual list since Mary Roberts Rinehart’s _The Window at
the White Cat_ in 1910. Booth Tarkington’s _Claire Ambler_ had an added
interest because it was the first book to be issued under the new
imprint of Doubleday, Doran & Co., a merger of the old firms of
Doubleday, Page and George H. Doran. Biography was the subject of about
half the non-fiction list. André Maurois followed his successful _Ariel_
with the life of Disraeli. Emil Ludwig’s _Napoleon_ held over into its
second year and he added a biography of Goethe to the list. American
antipathy to all things German having subsided, readers devoured Lowell
Thomas’ account of a German war hero’s exploits. _Mother India_ and _We_
were both best sellers for the second year. Eugene O’Neill’s play,
widely publicized for its feat of holding audiences through five hours,
with intermission for dinner, sold well in book form. Admiral Byrd
followed Lindbergh’s account of sky adventure with his story of his 1926
flight to the North Pole. Bernard Shaw addressed the intelligent woman
on political theory.
1929
Fiction
1. ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT, by Erich Maria Remarque. Little, Brown
2. DODSWORTH, by Sinclair Lewis. Harcourt, Brace
3. DARK HESTER, by Anne Douglas Sedgwick. Houghton Mifflin
4. THE BISHOP MURDER CASE, by S. S. Van Dine. Scribner
5. ROPER’S ROW, by Warwick Deeping. Knopf
6. PEDER VICTORIOUS, by O. E. Rölvaag. Harper
7. MAMBA’S DAUGHTERS, by DuBose Heyward. Doubleday, Doran
8. THE GALAXY, by Susan Ertz. Appleton
9. SCARLET SISTER MARY, by Julia Peterkin. Bobbs-Merrill
10. JOSEPH AND HIS BRETHREN, by H. W. Freeman. Holt
Non-Fiction
1. THE ART OF THINKING, by Ernest Dimnet. Simon & Schuster
2. HENRY THE EIGHTH, by Francis Hackett. Liveright
3. THE CRADLE OF THE DEEP, by Joan Lowell. Simon & Schuster
4. ELIZABETH AND ESSEX, by Lytton Strachey. Harcourt, Brace
5. THE SPECIALIST, by Chic Sale. Specialist Publishing Co.
6. A PREFACE TO MORALS, by Walter Lippmann. Macmillan
7. BELIEVE IT OR NOT, by Robert L. Ripley Simon & Schuster
8. JOHN BROWN’S BODY, by Stephen Vincent Benet. Doubleday, Doran
9. THE TRAGIC ERA, by Claude G. Bowers. Houghton, Mifflin
10. THE MANSIONS OF PHILOSOPHY, by Will Durant. Simon & Schuster
* * * * *
The Coolidge boom turned into Hoover prosperity, only to totter in
September with the first warning crash of this country’s greatest
financial depression. But the market still wavered on the brink of
disaster, and book sales were booming. The great novel of World War I,
_All Quiet on the Western Front_, written by a German, appeared eleven
years after the war’s close, to sell 300,000 in its first year. It was
issued here in a first printing of 100,000; 700,000 were printed in
Germany. Famous all over the world, it was made into a Hollywood
super-feature. Sinclair Lewis did another portrait of the American
businessman in _Dodsworth_, a book that was made into a highly
successful play, later a movie. S. S. Van Dine’s _Bishop Murder Case_
was as high on the list as his _Greene Murder Case_ had been. Ole
Rölvaag’s _Peder Victorious_ was a sequel to his first novel of the
Dakota prairies, _Giants in the Earth_ (1927). American regional
literature was awakening more and more interest. The South provided two
new novelists of distinction, DuBose Heyward of _Porgy_ fame, and Julia
Peterkin, who won the Pulitzer Prize with her first book. Perfecting its
technique for selecting and developing best sellers, the young firm of
Simon & Schuster, which had started only five years previously with _The
Cross Word Puzzle Book_, was responsible for four books on the
non-fiction list. _The Art of Thinking_, by a French writer, caught on
with a public interested in self-improvement and sold 125,000 in 1929.
The sensational spit-in-the-wind _Cradle of the Deep_ followed in Trader
Horn’s footsteps. _Believe It or Not_, first of Robert Ripley’s
collections of his popular newspaper features, went over 50,000. _The
Mansions of Philosophy_ did not become the great success that Will
Durant’s _Story of Philosophy_ had been. _Henry the Eighth_ and
_Elizabeth and Essex_ were added to the many notable biographies of the
period. Word-of-mouth publicity made Chic Sale’s tiny little book of
decidedly homely humor a runaway best seller. Since 1929 its sales have
exceeded 1,000,000 copies. Walter Lippmann, outstanding political
commentator, made his first appearance among best sellers in 1929. _John
Brown’s Body_, one of the early selections of the Book-of-the-Month
Club, attained unusual sales for a book of poetry, in this case one long
narrative poem. Its first printing was 70,000 copies. At that time the
Book-of-the-Month Club’s membership was about 50,000.
1930
Fiction
1. CIMARRON, by Edna Ferber. Doubleday, Doran
2. EXILE, by Warwick Deeping. Knopf
3. THE WOMAN OF ANDROS, by Thornton Wilder. A. & C. Boni
4. YEARS OF GRACE, by Margaret Ayer Barnes. Houghton Mifflin
5. ANGEL PAVEMENT, by J. B. Priestley. Harper
6. THE DOOR, by Mary Roberts Rinehart. Farrar & Rinehart
7. ROGUE HERRIES, by Hugh Walpole. Doubleday, Doran
8. CHANCES, by A. Hamilton Gibbs. Little, Brown
9. YOUNG MAN OF MANHATTAN, by Katharine Brush. Farrar & Rinehart
10. TWENTY-FOUR HOURS, by Louis Bromfield. Stokes
Non-Fiction
1. THE STORY OF SAN MICHELE, by Axel Munthe. Dutton
2. THE STRANGE DEATH OF PRESIDENT HARDING, by Gaston B. Means and May Dixon Thacker. Guild Publishing Corp.
3. BYRON, by André Maurois. Appleton
4. THE ADAMS FAMILY, by James Truslow Adams. Little, Brown
5. LONE COWBOY, by Will James. Scribner
6. LINCOLN, by Emil Ludwig. Little, Brown
7. THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY, by Will Durant. Garden City Publishing Co.
8. THE OUTLINE OF HISTORY, by H. G. Wells. Garden City Publishing Co.
9. THE ART OF THINKING, by Ernest Dimnet. Simon & Schuster
10. THE RISE OF AMERICAN CIVILIZATION, by Charles and Mary Beard. Macmillan
* * * * *