The Harmonizer.

1897. EARHART, John F. The Harmonizer. 7, [1], 240, [4] pp., illustrated with 2 plates of ink colours and 240 "colour-plates." With a final leaf of letterpress colophon. 8vo, 182 x 120 mm., bound in original publisher's gray cloth with red, yellow, blue decorations and black-stamped lettering. Cincinnati: Earhart & Richardson, 1897. First and only edition of this very scarce colour manual. A very good copy of this exciting tour-de-force of American nineteenth-century bookmaking. The book demonstrates a highly imaginative use of colour and was intended to show the different effects of the colour on varying paper stocks. Robert Herbert said "Among books which are themselves exemplars of unusually beautiful printing, Earhart stands out. The Harmonizer (1897) has extraordinary platen-press work of varied design, based upon twelve pure inks, and twenty-four more derived from mixtures of the initial group." The binding is slightly soiled, nevertheless a more than acceptable copy of a desirable and scarce book. A Color Bibliography II, Yale Library Gazette, 1978, p. 134. Birren Collection 215. Not in the Burke Printing Collection. Not in Romaine. Not in McKinstry.