Herschel V. Jones - Adventures in Americana

Adventures in Americana

But it was his last collection of early Americana that was the most remarkable. The collection of 1,700 volumes, primarily first editions, covered 400 years of American history dating back to Columbus. Before his death, Jones supervised the publication of a two-volume catalog of about 300 of the most valuable of these books, which was titled Adventures in Americana, 1492-1897: The Romance of Voyage and Discovery.

As an example of this last collection, for the period from 1492–1608, Jones had three of the printed Letters of Christopher Columbus (from the late 15th Century) and three of the printed Letters of Amerigo Vespucci printed in 1503 and 1504. Also in the collection was a copy of Cosmographiae Introductio printed in 1507, which is the booklet written to accompany the first map to suggest that the new continent be called America. He also had a copy of Globus Mundi, printed in 1509, which was the first book in which the name America was really adopted.

According to the New York Times, it was through his friendship with Theodore Roosevelt, whom he met while covering the 1900 presidential campaign, that Jones developed an interest in American literature.