SEMI-TROPICAL CALIFORNIA: ITS CLIMATE, HEALTHFULNESS, PRODUCTIVENESS, AND SCENERY: ITS MAGNIFICENT STRETCHES OF VINEYARDS, AND GROVES OF SEMI-TROPICAL FRUITS, ETC., ETC., ETC. By Major Ben. C. Truman. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & Company, Publishers, 1874. Octavo (22.5 x 14.2 cm), pp. [1-2: blank] [3-9] 10-204 [206-208: blank] [first and last leaves excised or under the paste-downs], original pictorial blue cloth, front and spine panels stamped in gold. First edition. Signed inscription by Truman on the front free endpaper: "With Compliments of the author Ben C. Truman." Signature of early owner Joseph A. Rindge below Turman's inscription and his signature again at the upper right corner of the title page. Joseph was perhaps related to Frederick Hastings Rindge (1857–1905), a prominent Los Angeles businessman. The most important and influential book by Benjamin Cummings Truman (1835-1916), "an early and prolific publicist for Southern California. His exceptional booster book SEMI-TROPICAL CALIFORNIA enticed thousands to experience the special qualities of the Southland. Southern California, Truman argued, boasts a desirable year-round climate, especially for those suffering from lung aliments ... He considered 'semi-tropical California' to be the counties in the southern part of the state that reached from San Luis Obispo to San Diego with its border on Mexico. While Los Angeles and the immediate surrounding are emphasized, he also writes of the history and geography of communities as far away as Anaheim and San Bernardino. The San Gabriel Valley gets special attention as 'the Lombardy' of semi-tropical California ... A book such as this hearkens back to an Edenic time when, instead of experiencing congested freeways, polluted air, and a house in a crowded suburb, a man and his family could sit on their front porch of an evening, take healthful breaths, and view the still largely empty California landscape at its pristine best." - Gordon J. Van De Water, Zamorano Select (The Zamorano Club, 2010) 107. Cowan (1933), p. 645. Cloth worn at spine ends and corner tips, outer joints rubbed, light ghosting to title page from ink inscription and signature on the front endpaper, a very good copy with tight and clean interior. (#164927).
Price: $375.00
No statement of printing.