_Pioneer Imprints From Fifty States_ will enable readers to view the
Library of Congress collections from an unaccustomed angle. It takes
for its subject the Library's earliest examples of printing from
within present-day boundaries of each State in the Union, providing
for each in turn 1) a brief statement about the origin of printing;
2) identification of the Library's earliest examples--among them
broadsides, newspapers, individual laws, almanacs, primers, and longer
works; and 3) information, if available, about the provenance of these
rarities.
Each of the 50 sections may be consulted independently. To those who
read it through, however, _Pioneer Imprints_ will give some idea of
the movement of printers and presses across the Nation, as well as
insight into the nature and history of the Library's holdings.
The author wishes to express his indebtedness to Frederick R. Goff,
Chief of the Library of Congress Rare Book Division from 1945 to 1972,
who has been constantly helpful and encouraging; to Thomas R. Adams,
Librarian of the John Carter Brown Library, Providence, R.I., who read
the first 13 sections before their publication under the title "The
Library's Earliest Colonial Imprints" in the _Quarterly Journal of
the Library of Congress_ for July 1967; and to Marcus A. McCorison,
Director and Librarian of the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester,
Mass., who read the manuscript of the later sections. These scholars
cannot, of course, be held responsible for any errors or faults in
this bibliographical investigation. The author's indebtedness to
printed sources is revealed to some extent by notes appearing at the
end of each section. He is obliged for much of his information to the
staffs of the Library of Congress, the National Archives, and the
Smithsonian Institution, as well as to the following correspondents:
Alfred L. Bush, Curator, Princeton Collections of Western Americana,
Princeton University Library; G. Glenn Clift, Assistant Director,
Kentucky Historical Society; James H. Dowdy, Archivist, St. Mary's
Seminary, Baltimore; Caroline Dunn, Librarian, William Henry Smith
Memorial Library, Indianapolis; Joyce Eakin, Librarian, U.S. Army
Military History Research Collection, Carlisle Barracks, Pa.; Arthur
Perrault, Librarian, Advocates' Library, Montreal; P. W. Filby,
Librarian, Maryland Historical Society; Lilla M. Hawes, Director,
Georgia Historical Society; Earl E. Olson, Assistant Church Historian,
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Salt Lake City; and
Frank S. Richards, Piedmont, Calif.