Isaac Mendoza's First-Hand Account: "Booksellers of the Early [Eighteen] Eighties"

Mounted photograph from the author's collection

 Relatively few American antiquarian bookseller memoirs relating to the 19^th-century trade exist.  I recently acquired a holograph manuscript from Christine & Bob Liska of the Colophon Bookshop.  Written by New York bookseller Isaac Mendoza (1864-1937) it is a brief but entertaining autobiographical fragment entitled “Booksellers of the Early [Eighteen] Eighties.”  The work does not appear to have been published—until now.  My transcription of the text with a few pertinent notes can be found below.