The other Mosher book in the exhibit was No. 33, A Little Garland of Celtic Verse (1905), one of ten printed on real vellum and bound in the same year by the Club Bindery in full crimson crushed levant morocco with gold tooling and inlays for Henry William Poor and later acquired by Cortland Field Bishop as both men’s bookplates proudly testify. These owners were real powerhouse collectors of the early 20th century, and Tom Boss is likewise a powerhouse collector of Club bindings in the 21st. What a magnificent little specimen of the bookbinder’s art! During the evening Tom and I briefly discussed the two bindings and he mentioned that in his opinion Norman Strouse had all but depleted the available market of Mosher books in Club bindings. I tended to agree, of course, and only added that what Strouse failed to completely do, Boss completed. For me, personally, I’m not sure if I will ever be able to acquire even one Mosher book in an elaborate Club binding. This is somewhat ironic since I acquired the Smith & Mansell, the Club binding on the Atalanta in Calydon, the “French Binders” binding (successor to the Club Bindery), and once owned that two-volume Wharton set, now all in the Boss collection and on exhibit at the Grolier Club, but never managed to get even one for myself. And will there ever come a time that Boss might tire of the bindings and sell me one? Well, certainly not in the next five years because any Grolier Club member who has an exhibition of his or her books has to sign an agreement that no item from the collection, nor the collection itself, may be sold in the next five years. And after that? Who knows. Maybe there will be an opportunity, but somehow I rather doubt it, yet stranger things have happened and I’d be the first to admit that when the possibilities seem almost nil, something seems to occur to fly flat against my pessimistic prophesies. And if not from Tom Boss, then someone else might miraculously find and offer me elaborate Club binding on a Mosher book. We’ll just have to wait and see–won’t we?
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