The Carpenter's New Guide: Being a Complete Book of Lines for Carpentry and Joinery. Treating Fully on Practical Geometry … the Eighth Edition

Philadelphia: M. Carey & Son, June, 1818. Second American edition. 4to. 84 engraved plates. vi, [7]-127, [1] pp. Rebound to style with contemporary calf boards red morocco spine label preserved; heavily foxed, some creasing and wear to plates, occasional staining including dampstain to top margins and gutter of first quarter of textblock, top edge of first few leaves worn with later Japanese tissue repair; a serviceable and sturdy copy The second American edition of the most important builder's manual of its time, first published London 1792, with editions continuing through the 1860s. The first two American editions were published by Carey in 1818 and are both adapted from the 6th London edition. Nicholson, through the continual republication of his technical plates in American handbooks, almost deserves to be called the father of American carpentry and joinery (Talbot Hamlin, Greek Revival Architecture in America, p. 340). Nicholson was a major influence on American architects, including Owen Biddle and Asher Benjamin. Benjamin praises in particular Nicholson's original method of stair and rail construction in the introduction to the former's Practical House Carpenter (1830). PROVENANCE: Thomas Jordan (early ownership inscription on title and p. 9, noting price $6.00); James H. Pine (early pencil inscription to ffep); John A. Glazebrook, Richmond, 1854 (pencil inscription to ffep); Frank B. Duford Jr, 1954 (inscription in ink on p. 1)REFERENCE: Hitchcock 830; Rink 1783; Shaw & Shoemaker 45105