A Summer of Travel in the High Sierra (association copy)
Ashland, OR: Lewis Osborne, 1972. First edition. Hardcover. An uncommon limited edition, this number 645 of 1000 copies, and a nice association copy, inscribed in the year of publication by the editor via a label affixed on the limitation page: "Christmas, 1972, For Jean Hanna Clark who, by ancestory [sic] and experience, is interested in mountains, books, and people. Love, Shirley." Jean Hanna Clark was a granddaughter of John Muir, and she and Sargent would later collaborate on the book Dear Papa: Letters Between John Muir and His Daughter Wanda (see our copy, another association copy). Signing typed labels was Shirley Sargent's usual mode, it would seem because her handwriting (from other samples we've seen) was actually very tough verging on impossible to read. Her labels suggest a level of advanced thoughtfulness and have a certain charm. She was a prolific historian of Yosemite. Her bestselling book was John Muir in Yosemite National Park (1972), but she published on many facets of the park and its history via her own Flying Spur Press. This book is by Joseph Nisbet LeConte, "Little Joe," the son of Joseph LeConte Sr., who was as influential as his father without the eugenicist views. "Little Joe" was the second president of the Sierra Club after Muir and served on its boards of directors for more than forty years starting in 1898. He was a devoted and accomplished mountaineer, and A Summer of Travel in the High Sierra is his journal from a 652-mile hike he took with three others through the Sierra Nevada in 1890, "a well-nigh incredible narrative." He also helped route and establish what's now the John Muir Trail in honor of his predecessor. Like his father, he was a professor at UC Berkeley, but in mechanical engineering, and he was also a pioneering photographer of the Sierras. With a foreword by Ansel Adams, who said of LeConte's photography elsewhere: "Never intentionally 'arty', most of his compositions reveal a sensitive reaction to the finest moments of the mountain scene. It is this quality that differentiates between a mere record and a creative, sympathetic statement." Opposite the label inscription is a gift inscription: "To Mom for Christmas 1972, Love Ross." He is, then, the great grandson of John Muir. Beige cloth with gilt lettering. Map endpapers. A fine book in a very good jacket with a few light stains to rear panel. It features an Ansel Adams photograph of Bridalveil Falls in Yosemite. Fine / Very good. Item #2001
Price: $950.00 save 5% $902.50