Sammelband of 8 publications related to Philadelphia-area institutions and prison reform, 1844-1845, and a rare copy of Dorothea Dix’s Memorial Soliciting a State Hospital for the Insane, Submitted to the Legislature of New Jersey, January 22, 1845

8vo, half leather with marbled boards, black gilt spine labels. Loss to leather at lower front corner, heavy rubbing to the front joint, discoloration and 1” split at the spine head. Rubbing to paper at board edges. Content with mild foxing, several tracts (and spine) labeled “J. Baily.”

Contents:
(1) Monteith, A. H.  A Course of Lessons in the French Language, on the Robertsonian Method; Intended for the use of persons studying the language without a teacher. New York: Wilson & Company, 1845. Fifteenth American edition from the eighth Brussels. 80pp.
Closed tearing in the gutter of the first two pages.

(2) [Hyman Gratz]. Proposals and Rates of the Pennsylvania Company for Insurances on Lives and Granting Annuities. Incorporated March 10, 1812. Charter perpetual. : Capital $500,000. All paid in and invested in well secured first mortgages and ground rents…. Philadelphia: “U. States” Book and Job Printing Office, 1845. 22pp. (OCLC 4: Yale, AAS, Millersville, Moravian)

(3) Annual Report of the Board of Directors of the Pennsylvania Institution for the Deaf and Dumb for 1844. Philadelphia: Published by order of the contributors, printed by E. G. Dorsey, 1845. 14, (1)pp.

(4) Dorothea Lynde Dix. Memorial Soliciting a State Hospital for the Insane, Submitted to the Legislature of New Jersey, January 22, 1845. Second edition. Trenton: Printed by order of the Legislature of New Jersey, 1845. 46pp. "I come to solicit your attention to the condition and necessities of Idiots, Epileptics, and the Insane poor in the State of New Jersey.'' Rare address from the fierce advocate of the indigent and mentally ill, charging New Jersey to stop dragging its heels and join the other sister states in taking care of their people.  Includes her assessment of existing prisons and poor houses and case studies in the people who occupied them. She makes a point about “mental disease, or, more accurately speaking, of physical disease affecting and disturbing the natural and healthful functions of the brain” (37) and frames the issue as a matter of public safety.

(5) Journal of Prison Discipline and Philanthropy Vol. 1, No. 1. January, 1845. (2), 96pp. Bound with (2) table of contents; bound without wraps.  [Philadelphia] : [Josiah Tatum], 1845. The first issue of this prison reform journal published by the organization later referred to as the Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons. With folding frontis engraving of the “New Prison of Dauphin Co. on Haviland’s Plan” and two woodcut floorplans of a the “Model county prison for 60 prisoners on Haviland’s plan” (surrounded by a vegetable garden).

(6) [John Hart, Principal]. Twenty-Sixth Annual Report of the Controllers of the Public Schools of the City and County of Philadelphia, composing the First School District of Pennsylvania, for the year ending June 30, 1844: with their accounts. Philadelphia: Published by order of the Board of Controllers, printed by Mifflin & Parry, 1844. Among the budgets and curriculum stats is an interesting survey of parents’ occupations. 96pp. (1 copy, Library Co Phila)

(7) Nineteenth Annual Report of the Board of Managers of the Prison Discipline Society. Boston, May, 1844. Boston: [for the society at 63 Atkinson St], 1844. (331)-446pp. Concerning Black prisoners. (2 OCLC: Library Co Phila, AAS)

(8) Chadwick, Edwin. A Report on the Results of a Special Inquiry Into the Practice of Internment in Towns… Philadelphia: C. Sherman, 1844.48pp. Only the British edition is recorded in OCLC.