[Rare pre-1850s American chapbook]
SCUDDER, J. Letters to Sabbath-School Children. Philadelphia: American S. S. Union [n.d.] (no later than 1843).
(150 x 95) pp. 54 + 6 blank pages. 10 woodblock illustrations embellish the text. Paper wrapper with framing illustration around title, author, and publication information. Back cover is publisher’s ads, framed in decorative border. Crudely stitched binding. Some curling to edges. Waterstain to first 23 pages, subsequent spotting congruous with age. Overall GOOD condition
An 1888 P.H. Mayo & Brother, Richmond, Virginia “Costumes of Warriors & Soldiers Ancient and Modern” (first series) stub, to promote Holly Tobacco inserted as bookmark. This stub features a colour illustration by Hatch Lithographic Company of Edward the Black Prince on recto, and details about the series on verso.
Rev. Dr. John Scudder was born in New Jersey in 1793, graduated Princeton in 1811 and the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1813. He became the first medical missionary in India— noted under his name on the publication as “Missionary at Madras”.
The American Sunday School Union was founded in Philadelphia in 1824, formed from the 1817 Sunday and Adult School Union. The objectives were to create and distribute religious literature with moral grounding for the improvement of youths. The literature distributed had to be moral, religious, age-appropriate, and American, to be unanimously approved by the Publications Committee. The ASSU continually published until 1960, after which, in 1974, it became the American Missionary Fellowship and continues today.
MB393