Beschreibung:

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN IMPRINT - PENNSYLVANIA] Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives of the Province of Pennsylvania. Beginning the Fourth Day of December 1682 [ - September 26, 1776] . Volumes 1-3: Philadelphia: B. Franklin & D. Hall, 1752-53-54. Volumes 3-6: Philadelphia: Henry Miller 1774-75-76. First editions. The first volume in 20th century cloth, the balance in contemporary calf. 14 5/8 x 9 1/4 inches (37.5 x 24 cm); the Franklin & Hall volumes complete as per Miller, the balance not collated. Generally sound copies with some foxing, toned leaves, short tears, creases, etc. The leather bindings worn with covers detached and losses to lettering labels, these volumes each with a Bar Association label reporting these gifted by James C. Carter other stamps. Rarely encountered complete in six volumes, the Franklin & Hall volumes here represent some of the most ambitious work of the firm. Volume I is particularly scarce as it seems only fifty official copies were ordered by the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1751 (the "Minutes of the Assembly from the first settlement of the province, be printed with all convenient speed ... fifty copies thereof"). Franklin & Hall brought the work up to 1744 and it was completed by Miller in 1777. The title page of volume I is signed by Rowland Evans (1718-89) who before the revolution was a member of the Philadelphia Legislature, Justice of the Peace, and was a member of the Provincial Assembly from 1761-71, thus a germane association. Evans noted that complete sets are very rare. We track only one complete set through the rooms over the past 100 years, this being a set signed by John Penn that was owned by Rosenbach as early as 1917 and was sold most recently at Sotheby's in 1992. Miller Benjamin Franklin's Philadelphia Printing, 563, 579, 596; Evans 6908, 7086, 7286, 13525, 14372, 15000. C The New York City Bar Association