Murphy's Pets: fifty recipes for cooking potatoes. Compiled By Mrs. De Witt C. Owen.
Dixon, Ill. Star Job Printing Rooms, [circa 1899].
Cord-bound booklet (15 x 12 cm.), 16 pages. Privately published. Evident FIRST EDITION. A collection of potato recipes, another in the series of charming self-published cookbooks produced under the name "Mrs. De Witt C. Owen". The author, Ella "Nellie" Upton Leighton, was born in Steuben, Maine, and adopted into the Leighton family. Her husband, Dewitt Clinton Owen was a newspaperman, owner of Dixon Illinois' Tri-Weekly Star, whose thrice a week publication schedule was a considered a significant novelty in its day (as per the lead story in Newspaperdom, vol. viii no. 4 (New York, 1899). The cookbook is part of the Ripley's Series of Ten-cent Booklets, for which Owen self-published at least seven titles, and served as publisher and distributor. The significance of the series name "Ripley" remains a mystery. [OCLC locates five copies; not in Cagle (the only title of Owens recognized by Cagle is Sixteen Studies in White and Gold)].
Price: $90.00