Law leather

Last updated

Law leather was the name for a specific kind and grade of sheepskin leather used for bookbinding. As its name indicates, it was used for binding statute books and other official documents. Many state statutes specified "law leather" bindings. An 1871 Ohio state resolution, for example, provided that

WHEREAS, The first volume of the annual report of the commissioner of railroads and telegraphs, for 1870, now being printed, contains the constitutional provisions, general laws and special charters governing the railroad companies of Ohio, together with much other valuable information worthy of careful preservation ; and,
WHEREAS, Six hundred copies of the second volume of said report, containing railroad and telegraph statistics, recommendations of the commissioner, etc., are now provided by law to be bound in cloth, and leather binding is no more expensive, and is much more durable than said cloth binding ; therefore,
Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, That the supervisor of public printing, be authorized to have the full edition of said first volume bound in good law leather and suitably lettered on the back. [1]

In the 1880s, the Philadelphia publisher Blakiston offered many of its medical text in a choice of "cloth", "medical sheep", and "law leather" bindings. [2]

Related Research Articles

The Pacific Railroad Acts of 1862 were a series of acts of Congress that promoted the construction of a "transcontinental railroad" in the United States through authorizing the issuance of government bonds and the grants of land to railroad companies. In 1853, the War Department under then Secretary of War Jefferson Davis was authorized by the Congress to conduct surveys of five different potential transcontinental routes from the Mississippi ranging from north to south. It submitted a massive twelve volume report to Congress with the results in early 1855. However, no route or bill could be agreed upon and passed authorizing the Government's financial support and land grants until the secession of the southern states in 1861 removed their opposition to a central route. The Pacific Railroad Act of 1862 was the original act. Some of its provisions were subsequently modified, expanded, or repealed by four additional amending Acts: The Pacific Railroad Act of 1863, Pacific Railroad Act of 1864, Pacific Railroad Act of 1865, and Pacific Railroad Act of 1866.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hardcover</span> Book bound with a rigid protective cover

A hardcover, hard cover, or hardback book is one bound with rigid protective covers. It has a flexible, sewn spine which allows the book to lie flat on a surface when opened. Modern hardcovers may have the pages glued onto the spine in much the same way as paperbacks. Following the ISBN sequence numbers, books of this type may be identified by the abbreviation Hbk.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Library binding</span>

Library binding can be divided into the two major categories of "original" and "after market". The original category is as it says: the book was originally bound with the idea that it would be used in a library setting where the book would receive harder use than those usual trade editions sold to the public.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harvard Classics</span> 50-volume anthology of classic works from world literature

The Harvard Classics, originally marketed as Dr. Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf of Books, is a 50-volume series of classic works of world literature, important speeches, and historical documents compiled and edited by Harvard University President Charles W. Eliot. Eliot believed that a careful reading of the series and following the eleven reading plans included in Volume 50 would offer a reader, in the comfort of the home, the benefits of a liberal education, entertainment and counsel of history's greatest creative minds. The initial success of The Harvard Classics was due, in part, to the branding offered by Eliot and Harvard University. Buyers of these sets were apparently attracted to Eliot's claims. The General Index contains upwards of 76,000 subject references.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dust jacket</span> Paper wrapper for a book

The dust jacket of a book is the detachable outer cover, usually made of paper and printed with text and illustrations. This outer cover has folded flaps that hold it to the front and back book covers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fugitive slave laws in the United States</span> Laws passed by the United States Congress in 1793 and 1850

The fugitive slave laws were laws passed by the United States Congress in 1793 and 1850 to provide for the return of enslaved people who escaped from one state into another state or territory. The idea of the fugitive slave law was derived from the Fugitive Slave Clause which is in the United States Constitution. It was thought that forcing states to deliver fugitive slaves back to enslavement violated states' rights due to state sovereignty and was believed that seizing state property should not be left up to the states. The Fugitive Slave Clause states that fugitive slaves "shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due", which abridged state rights because forcing people back into slavery was a form of retrieving private property. The Compromise of 1850 entailed a series of laws that allowed slavery in the new territories and forced officials in free states to give a hearing to slave-owners without a jury.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amasa Stone</span> American industrialist

Amasa Stone, Jr. was an American industrialist who is best remembered for having created a regional railroad empire centered in the U.S. state of Ohio from 1860 to 1883. He gained fame in New England in the 1840s for building hundreds of bridges, most of them Howe truss bridges. After moving into railroad construction in 1848, Stone moved to Cleveland, Ohio, in 1850. Within four years he was a director of the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad and the Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad. The latter merged with the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway, of which Stone was appointed director. Stone was also a director or president of numerous railroads in Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Michigan.

John Ratcliff of the seventeenth century is the first identifiable bookbinder in America, known for binding Eliot's Indian Bible in 1663. Ratcliff, who came from London, England, worked as a bookbinder in Boston, Massachusetts, for about twenty years, from approximately 1662 to 1682.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indianapolis and Bellefontaine Railroad</span>

The Indianapolis and Bellefontaine Railroad (I&B) was an American railroad founded in 1848. It changed its name to the Indianapolis, Pittsburgh and Cleveland Railroad (IP&C) in 1854. Its counterpart in Ohio was named the Bellefontaine and Indiana Railroad (B&I). The B&I ceased to exist as an independent company when it merged into the Bellefontaine Railway in September 1864. The Bellefontaine Railway merged with the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati Railroad to form the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati and Indianapolis Railway in December 1864.

The Norrœna Society was an organization dedicated to Northern European culture, that published sets of reprints of classic 19th-century editions, mostly translations, of Old Norse literary and historical works, Northern European folklore, and medieval literature. The society was founded toward the end of the 19th century and ceased publications early in the 20th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bookbinding</span> Process of assembling a book

Bookbinding is the process of physically assembling a book of codex format from an ordered stack of paper sheets that are folded together into sections called signatures or sometimes left as a stack of individual sheets. Several signatures are then bound together along one edge with a thick needle and sturdy thread. Alternative methods of binding that are cheaper but less permanent include loose-leaf rings, individual screw posts or binding posts, twin loop spine coils, plastic spiral coils, and plastic spine combs. For protection, the bound stack is either wrapped in a flexible cover or attached to stiff boards. Finally, an attractive cover is adhered to the boards, including identifying information and decoration. Book artists or specialists in book decoration can also greatly enhance a book's content by creating book-like objects with artistic merit of exceptional quality.

Harmsworth's Universal Encyclopaedia is an encyclopedia edited by John Hammerton and published in London, England by The Education Book Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of Northcliffe's Amalgamated Press, in 1921/22.

The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution of the United States establishes that the Constitution, federal laws made pursuant to it, and treaties made under its authority, constitute the "supreme Law of the Land", and thus take priority over any conflicting state laws. It provides that state courts are bound by, and state constitutions subordinate to, the supreme law. However, federal statutes and treaties must be within the parameters of the Constitution; that is, they must be pursuant to the federal government's enumerated powers, and not violate other constitutional limits on federal power, such as the Bill of Rights—of particular interest is the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which states that the federal government has only those powers delegated to it by the Constitution.

<i>Luther Burbank: His Methods and Discoveries, Their Practical Application</i>

Luther Burbank: His Methods and Discoveries, Their Practical Application is one of the first sets of books published using color photography and is the most-extensive publication of the work of Luther Burbank (1849–1926).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad (1848–1869)</span> 19th-century American railroad

The Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad (CP&A), also known informally as the Cleveland and Erie Railroad, the Cleveland and Buffalo Railroad, and the Lake Shore Railroad, was a railway which ran from Cleveland, Ohio, to the Ohio-Pennsylvania border. Founded in 1848, the line opened in 1852. The railroad completed the rail link between Buffalo, New York, and Chicago, Illinois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stillman Witt</span> American railroad and steel industry executive

Stillman Witt was an American railroad and steel industry executive best known for building the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad, Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad, and the Bellefontaine and Indiana Railroad. Through his banking activities, he played a significant role in the early years of the Standard Oil company. He was also one of the founding investors in the Cleveland Rolling Mill, a major steel firm in the United States.

The Valley Railway was a shortline railroad which operated between the city of Cleveland and small town of Zoarville in the state of Ohio in the United States. The railroad was founded in 1871, but the first segment of track did not open until 1880 and the line was not completed until 1884. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) obtained a controlling interest in the Valley Railway in 1890. The railroad went bankrupt in 1895, at which time it was reorganized as The Cleveland Terminal and Valley Railroad Company (CT&V). The B&O took over operation of the CT&V in 1909, and the company was merged with the B&O in 1915.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cleveland and Mahoning Valley Railroad</span>

The Cleveland and Mahoning Valley Railroad (C&MV) was a shortline railroad operating in the state of Ohio in the United States. Originally known as the Cleveland and Mahoning Railroad (C&M), it was chartered in 1848. Construction of the line began in 1853 and was completed in 1857. After an 1872 merger with two small railroads, the corporate name was changed to "Cleveland and Mahoning Valley Railroad". The railroad leased itself to the Atlantic and Great Western Railway in 1863. The C&MV suffered financial instability, and in 1880 its stock was sold to a company based in London in the United Kingdom. A series of leases and ownership changes left the C&MV in the hands of the Erie Railroad in 1896. The CM&V's corporate identity ended in 1942 after the Erie Railroad completed purchasing the railroad's outstanding stock from the British investors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Kelley</span> American politician

Alfred Kelley was a banker, canal builder, lawyer, railroad executive, and state legislator in the state of Ohio in the United States. He is considered by historians to be one of the most prominent commercial, financial, and political Ohioans of the first half of the 19th century.

References

  1. Acts of the State of Ohio, 1871, p. 204
  2. Advertisement in Allingham, William (1882), Fistula, Hemorrhoids, Painful Ulcer, Stricture, Prolapsus and Other Diseases of the Rectum,, p. 43: ad for Woodman and Tidy's Medical Jurisprudence specifies "Price, Cloth, $7.50; Medical Sheep, $8.50; Law Leather, $8.50." These prices are roughly equivalent to $160, $180, and $180 respectively in year-2007 dollars.