April 4, 2010

Johnson, Richard D., et al. (eds.):
SPACE SETTLEMENTS, A DESIGN STUDY.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Washington, 1977.

Like the rest of us, NASA scientists know the uneasy claustrophobia of life on a finite, polluted planet. But they're going to do whatever it takes to find a way out of here...

<-- front cover

[multiple authors]:
[AUTOGRAPH ALBUM / COMMONPLACE BOOK].
Handwritten journal; England [Worcester?], 1833-35.

A collaborative blog for the quill-pen set: many artfully transcribed poems, epigrams, and musings, signed and dated by multiple contributors, and illustrated with occasional tipped-in engravings from other sources.

<-- p. 59 ["Few know the treasures in their own bosoms..."]

Hough, Walter:
FIRE-MAKING APPARATUS IN THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM
U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, 1928.

The author, a dedicated hands-on ethnologist, mastered every known pre-industrial technique of fire-making in order to write this monograph. Illustrated with drawings and photos.

<-- plates 10 & 11 (Malasian strike-a-lights and fire pistons)

Hurst, Sydney C.:
THE SILENT CITIES
E.P. Dutton and Co., New York, [1929].

Surfeit of slaughter organized in tidy rows: a comprehensive guide to British WWI memorials in France and Flanders, illustrated with photos and maps of 959 graveyards.

<-- pp. 272-273 (Somme)

n/a; Witold Janowski (design):
THE POLISH DOCUMENTARY FILM, 1961-2
Film Polski, Warszawa, [1962].

Bewitched by this catalogue's vivid graphic presentation, a vulnerable reader might lose an hour poring over descriptions of state-sanctioned travelogues and grim industrial shorts. (Text in English.)

<-- front cover

Van Yelyr, R.G.:
THE WHIP AND THE ROD
Gerald R. Swan, London, 1948.

Flagellation and religion; flogging as punishment for crime; the birch in education; medical aspects of flagellation; the future of corporal punishment; etc.

<-- frontis and title page