The Letters of Carl Sandburg.
New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, [1968]. Hardcover. Edited by Herbert Mitgang. Small 4to. Black cloth with gilt spine lettering, pictorial dust jacket. xiv, 577pp. Near fine/very good. Minor jacket rubbing. Item #51456
Attractive, tight first edition of this thick collection, with choice autograph addition: Tipped to the blank leaf facing the title page is a unique frontispiece -- a great content Autograph Letter Signed from Mitgang, 1p, 5 3/4" X 7 3/4", Great Neck, NY, 30 January 1966. Addressed to Arnold Gates (1914-93, noted Lincoln/Civil War scholar). Near fine. Writing at a time when he was likely working on the Sandburg letters, Mitgang writes his friend: "Tuesdays are crisis days at CBS (that's when we have a news documentary) so I'd better not try to make your kind invitation. Let's put it this way: I'd rather be with Dr Basler & back in the historical past of Lincoln than in the terrible present of Vietnam...." Boldly penned in blue ballpoint and signed simply "Herb." Laid in is the original envelope, addressed in Mitgang's hand with his full signature and home address on verso. Gates was officer of the New York Civil War Round Table and likely invited Mitgang to attend a meeting at which Lincoln scholar Roy Basler was speaker; Mitgang himself authored "Lincoln As They Saw Him" (1956) and "Washington, D.C. in Lincoln’s Time" (1958). Mitgang (1920-2013) was a long-time "New York Times" journalist as well as author and editor.
Price: $75.00