Does this remind you of any 1900 cataloging system?
Look at the line of characters across the top of this flyleaf: " 7 = 1 = A = 25 "
On the inside back cover, " 1.00 " is written with a similar, pressure-sensitive nib.
Have you ever run across any cataloging system, or other notation system, that this sequence fits? I wonder if it was marked when the book went to a bookseller or a collection. The volume is otherwise completely free of markings, inside and out.
On close inspection, that string of characters was written using a different nib, and probably by a different hand.
ANY observations or tips much appreciated!
(This is the flyleaf of a copy of "Tolstoi: A Man of Peace..." by Alice Stockham, with a second essay by Havelock Ellis. Published by Alice Stockham in Chicago, 1900. The autograph is by James Minnick, a prominent social-relief organizer who knew Jane Addams and the founders of the Social Work program at the Univ. of Chicago.)
Posted Mar 6, 2026, 9:50 PM UTC