“BOTTLED VELVET,” “ABSINTHE,” AND “RUM FLIP”: JERRY THOMAS' BAR-TENDER'S GUIDE, THE FIRST DRINK MANUAL PUBLISHED IN THE UNITED STATES

THOMAS, Jerry. The Bar-Tender's Guide, or How to Mix All Kinds of Plain and Fancy Drinks. New York: Fitzgerald, (1887). Octavo, original black-stamped brown cloth. $1250.

Later edition, "entirely new and enlarged," of the first drink manual published in the United States, prepared by the bartender at the Metropolitan Hotel in New York, illustrated with numerous in-text wood-engravings, including a diagram of a still.

Jerry Thomas (to whom the famous Savoy Cocktail Book is dedicated) presents 236 recipes for social drinks "apart from water and those of the breakfast and tea-table." Before The Bar-Tender's Guide, knowledge of cocktails and their recipes was largely a matter of oral tradition in the United States; its author is today regarded as the father of American mixology. First published in 1862. See Cagle & Stafford 743; Simon 1461; Bitting, 459. Punch recipe written in pencil on rear endpaper.

A very nearly fine copy.