EARLY EDITION OF IDA TARBELL’S BIOGRAPHY OF LINCOLN

(LINCOLN, Abraham). TARBELL, Ida. The Life of Abraham Lincoln. New York: Lincoln History Society, 1908. Four volumes. Octavo, contemporary three-quarter black morocco gilt, top edges gilt. $1250.

Early edition of this monumental biography, with numerous illustrations including photographs, maps and facsimile Lincoln documents, handsomely bound.

This popular biography of Lincoln was completed after four years of research by newspaperwoman and muckraker Tarbell. "She depicted Lincoln's useful frontier-bred virtues and complexities and treated him less as a saint than as a democratic realist" (ANB). Published in competition with the biography by Lincoln secretaries Hay and Nicholay, Tarbell's work contains many previously unpublished Lincoln speeches and documents. Originally published as a serial in McClure's Magazine from 1895-1899, and in 1900 as a two-volume book. See Monaghan 1312.

Text and plates very clean, with faint embrowning along some margins. An attractive set.