How to Mix Drinks, or, the Bon-Vivant's Companion, containing clear and reliable directions for mixing all the beverages used in the United States, together with the most popular British, French, German, Italian, Russian, and Spanish recipes, embracing punches, juleps, cobblers, etc. etc. etc., in endless variety. . . To which is appended A Manual for the Manufacture of Cordials, Liquors, Fancy Syrups, &c., &c., . . . Illustrated with Descriptive Engravings, the Whole Containing Over 600 Valuable Recipes. By Christian Schultz

New York: Dick & Fitzgerald, Publishers, no. 18 Ann Street, 1862. Octavo (19 x 13 cm.), 243, [8] pages; publisher's advertisements at rear. FIRST EDITION, later printing, with no price stated on the front cover, and with the title How to Mix Drinks... on the title page. The title had been The Bar-Tender's Guide... for the earliest appearances of the book, and the earliest three printings had prices of $1.50, $2.00, and $2.50 on the front panel of the cloth binding. There has always been some confusion over the variant title, but the book was originally advertised as The Bar-Tender's Guide as early as 1859, and the copyright was registered under this title (see David Wondrich, Imbibe, appendix I). ~ Before Jerry Thomas' Bar-Tender's Guide, there were bartenders, to be sure, and there were also more than a few books about spirits, some which even involved "mixing", mostly punches and the like, or recipes to cut cask strength booze down to size. Publishers Dick & Fitzgerald had intended to issue an anonymously-authored (like so many of their helpful publications) bar guide, and went so far as to register the copyright. But there is no evidence that they followed through with their plans, and so we are left with The Bar-Tender's Guide as the first real cocktail recipe book. And a dandy model it is for all the others to come. To begin with, Jerry Thomas was the real thing: a bartender who had traveled and worked in most of America's great metropolitan cities vacuuming up cocktail recipes as he went, and a true showman, an aspect of bartending which at various moments in cocktail history has been nearly as important as the drink mixing itself. "He is a gentleman who is ablaze all in diamonds… he is engaged as a "star". (Edward Hingston, quoted in David Wondrich's Imbibe). Dick and Fitzgerald had their doubts about the saleability of this new type of book, and so the first edition was padded out with Schultz' Manual for the Manufacture of Cordials… Thankfully, the publishers' fears were misplaced, and the book sold 8000 copies, with the price rising to $2 and then $2.50 in the first edition. Later editions dropped Schultz' addendum. Internally clean and sound; some light staining to edges of text block. Original publisher's brown cloth, gilt-titled to spine and blind stamped with the publisher's initials to the front and rear boards. Edges of cloth work and chipped at the head and foot of the spine. Internally very god or better but the binding is good only. [OCLC locates sixteen copies indicating 1862 with this exact title and fourteen with the title The Bar-Tender's Guide, but it is unclear which printings are held; Bitting, page 403; Noling Beverage Literature page 403; Wondrich, Oxford Companion to Spirits..., page 726 ].