I’ve acquired a first edition of H.G Wells’ “The War of the Worlds.” Don’t go all crazy…it’s a first US edition. It’s in pretty good shape, the head & tail are well worn but the binding is good except where one of the illustrated plates is half-loose–the binding is a bit cracked there.
Here’s my question: does anyone have a pic of the dust jacket (AKA dust cover) that was originally on this edition? I’d like to create a fake one just for fun. I promise I won’t try to convince anyone that it’s the original DJ.
Hmm - first published in 1898 in the UK, so the US is probably that year or within a year or two. My guess would be that the dj would be a plain, white or buff or light-colored piece of paper with some info on it like the title, author and publisher - maybe a line design or something to accent the writing.
As a rule, dj’s were just packaging to protect the book for shipping back in the day. It was customary to toss them upon getting home and putting the book up on your shelf - up through WW2 even. Heck, that’s why a first edition of The Great Gatsby in great shape, no dj, can go for ~$5,000 or more, but *with *a dj can go for $200,000 or more - dj’s were so commonly thrown away that finding one is a big deal - and it was published in 1925.
Here’s a book from 1922 with a dj more or less as I describe - I think that it is pretty typical…
Oh, and here (scroll down about a page) is a pic of the dj for the First US of The Hound of the Baskervilles - again, pretty typical…
