Printed Page Bookshop
September 2023


She sold the Constitution
We read of the death of Dorothy Tapper Goldman a while ago, and while we'd never heard of her before, she's not one we're soon to forget.
Ms. Goldman, a philanthropist and major collector of American historical documents, sold her original printed copy of the U.S. Constitution for a record-setting $43.2 million in 2021. Her husband had bought it in 1998 for $165,000.
The sale of the document, at Sotheby's in New York, generated widespread attention for three reasons:
-It is one of only 13 known copies of the first printing of the Constitution in 1787, and one of only two copies held privately.
-The winning bid remains a record for a document, manuscript or book sold at auction.
-And the purchaser was Ken Griffin, the billionaire chief executive of the hedge fund Citadel, who outbid Constitution DAO, a group of cryptocurrency fans who had conducted a frenzied online crowdfunding campaign that in a single week raised $40 million.
Ms. Goldman used the proceeds from the sale to establish the Dorothy Tapper Goldman Foundation, which has made substantial contributions to the New York Historical Society, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.  She also supported the Grolier Society of the City of New York, and the Museum of the American Revolution in New York.
Ms. Goldman and her husband, S. Howard Goldman, a New York real estate developer who was also a collector of American historical documents, each sold the bulk of their trove of rare American documents.  Mr. Goldman, who died in 1997, sold much of his collection, except the Constitution.  Ms. Goldman became an avid collector herself and auctioned off all of her collection in 2021 -- including the copy of the Constitution.  
-New York Times



This Month's Puzzler
 On September 16, 1672, this woman died at age 60 in Andover, Massachusetts (then
a town in Massachusetts Bay Colony). Raised in an aristocratic English family,
she was given a full classical education typically provided only to male
children who were viewed as scions of the family. She was only sixteen when she
married a man who would ultimately go on to become the governor of the British
colony.

During her marriage, she raised eight children while writing poetry on the side
(she occupies a footnote in literary history as America's first published poet).
Today, she is remembered primarily for her single prose work: Meditations:
Divine and Moral (1664). She wrote the book for her son Simon, writing in
the dedication: "You once desired me to leave something for you in writing that
you might look upon when you should see me no more."

Even though her Meditations book was written more than 350 years ago, it
is filled with memorable observations. Perhaps the most famous is:

"If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome."

Who is this person? (Answer below)

Visit the Rocky Mountain Book and Paper Fair
next weekend -- on us!
Printed Page and 50 or so of our fellow bookseller friends will be participating in the Rocky Mountain Book and Paper Fair, September 8-9 at the easy-to-reach Douglas County Fairgrounds.  If you've never been to a book fair, you're in for a treat.  Imagine a big bookstore with a collection of books never before seen in one place -- and never to be seen again -- and you get some idea of what's in store.  Printed Page has free passes to the fair, and you can get one by dropping by the store. 

Puzzler answer

Anne Bradstreet.  If you like our Puzzler, find more on our Facebook page.  
Thanks to Dr. Mardy Grothe for the use of his puzzler.  Visit him at drmardy.com.

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