Green, J[onathan]. H.:

$2,750 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

GAMBLING IN ITS INFANCY AND PROGRESS; OR A DISSUASIVE TO THE YOUNG AGAINST GAMES OF CHANCE. The rare second edition issued after the first of the year before, of Jonathan Green's warning about the dangers of gambling for the young. Green was arguably the most famous gambler in 19th-century America. He eventually repented of his ways, and became as famous as the "reformed gambler," writing a series of books warning the public of the methods and tools of gamblers and con artists. In this book he focuses specifically on threats posed to innocent youth by the lure of gambling. Green discusses a variety of games, including "pins," marbles, "pitching coppers," lotteries, and horse racing, and other vices including tobacco, lying, disobeying parents, and breaking the Sabbath. The illustrations depict boys tossing pennies in an alley, the death of a youngster at the race track, and more, and the gilt illustration on the front board of the Colton & Jenkins signed binding shows playing cards spilling out of a cornucopia.Green dedicates the book to three pastors, including Henry Ward Beecher of Plymouth Congregational Church, who himself would fall victim to another sort of vice when news of his adulterous affair became public two decades later. OCLC locates only four copies of this second edition, at the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library, Hofstra, SUNY Albany, and the Library of Congress.

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