The Wonders of the Yosemite Valley and of California [Rare Edition with 20 Mounted Photos]

Boston and New York: Alexander Moore [and] Lee, Shepard & Dillingham, 1872. Hardcover. Very good. Third edition, revised and enlarged; second printing. Small quarto, pp. [v-x], xi-xii, 13-98, with two maps and 20 original mounted albumen photographs credited to Boston photographer John Soule. In publisher's green cloth with beveled edges; front board decorated in gilt, black, and rose; all edges gilt; each text page and each photograph bordered in red. A very good copy with rubbing and fraying to corners and spine ends, bookplate of Canadian bookseller and collector G. Ducharme on front pastedown, handwritten date of December 15, 1872 on front free endpaper, evidence of an erased ink stamp on title page. Lacks tissue guard over plate facing p. 35, all others present. Contents sound and clean. This is the rarest and most desirable edition of this work, as it is the only one to contain 20 (rather than 10) mounted photographs. Kneeland (1821-1888) was a physician, naturalist, and Professor of Zoology and Physiology at MIT. This book is based on his first visit to the Yosemite Valley in 1870, and includes a narrative of his trip from and return to Boston. "Kneeland made every effort to obtain current and accurate information and each of the later editions of the guide incorporates new material....Weston J. Naef [in his book Era of Exploration, the Rise of Landscape Photography in the American West, 1860-1885]...comments that the photographs 'are curious because there is no evidence that Soule, a talented landscape photographer, was ever in California...[which] suggests that he might have purchased the negatives from a California photographer, not an uncommon transaction'" (Currey & Kruska 225). Eadweard Muybridge and Martin Hazeltine are both considered strong candidates to have been the actual photographer. Farqhuar #10; Cowan p. 333. Only two copies of this edition have appeared at auction in the past 30 years, and there are no others on the market as of September 2025.