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Book RecommendationsA
Rare Pitcairn Book:A
DOCTOR’S LETTERS FROM PITCAIRN - 1937
By Dr. Rufus Southworth, 182
pages, illustrations, paperback. This is a private printing of only 500 copies
by the family of sea voyagers Irving and Electa “Exy” Johnson. Available
only through the Pitcairn Islands Study Center, Pacific Union College, Angwin,
California USA. At
last comes a true picture of life on Pitcairn Island rivaling Pitcairner Rosalind
Young’s classic of 1894. Recounted in unusually straightforward and yet
sympathetic detail, the book tells of a physician’s half-year medical-care
stay among the Pitcairners. No detail of Pitcairn life escapes this writer’s
keen attention - including the ineptitude and standoffish-ness of a government-sent
doctor and representative. Only
500 copies of this small, information-packed book available. Each is hand-numbered,
sure to become a rare treasure among Pitcairn literature for those lucky enough
to acquire a copy. Samples
of what one finds in this book: The
Forward is by Electa “Exy” Johnson, wife and fellow adventurer of
Captain Irving Johnaon of the schooner Yankee, written shortly before her
death. Doctor
Southworth learns how Nordhoff and Hall’s Mutiny on the Bounty came
to be written. (p 19). The
joys of living in Pitcairn teacher-postmaster Roy Palmer Clark’s home. (p.
31). Treating
Pitcairners’ medical and psychological illnesses. (Many pages.). Learning
of Pitcairn “mystery man” Richard B. Fairclough and sister Jessie
Westall.. (p. 30).
The drama of longboats loaded with “must ship” oranges, fighting their
way out to a ship in the teeth of a Pitcairn storm. (p. 62).
Meeting a “Cookie” on Pitcairn before the island’s present “Cookie.”
(p 64) Dry roasting
Pitcairn coffee in the damp weather of the island. (p. 68). Who
prepares the “best” meals on Pitcairn? (Many pages.). Some
“bul-a-ma-kow” is added to the author’s Pitcairn diet. (p. 82). Mature,
young women, even children attend Pitcairn sex-education classes. (p. 122). Pitcairn
gardens and chickens marked as “tithe produce.” The doctor disputes
an author’s assertion about Pitcairn’s “tithe house.”
(pp. 147, 148).
ORDERING:
For your limited edition copy, in the U.S. send check for $22.00, or send your
VISA, MasterCard or Discovery credit card particulars to Pitcairn Islands Study
Center, 1 Angwin Ave., Angwin, CA 94508. Or use the quick VISA-MasterCard button
below. For order by PayPal.com use this address: PISC@pitcairnstudycenter.org.
For those outside the U.S. please contact hford@puc.edu
for book & postal cost. For
more information: 707-965-6625, or 707-965-2047, Herbert Ford, Pitcairn Islands
Study Center, Pacific Union College, 1 Angwin Ave., Angwin, CA 94508 USA [Special
Recommendation Those who wish to have reliable information about
Pitcairn from some of the latest books published may find the following helpful.
All but the last book are available from the Pitcairn Islands Study Center. U.S.
dollars, checks in U.S. dollars, and VISA, MasterCard or Discover credit cards
accepted. Phone credit card orders to 707-965-6625, or 707-965-2047. FAX orders
to 707-965-6504. Write checks to: Pitcairn Islands Study Center, Pacific Union
College, 1 Angwin Avenue, Angwin, CA 94508 USA. - Guide
to Pitcairn
This highly-colorful, heavily-illustrated 70-page
book (2000 edition) is the official book published by the Government of The Islands
of Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno. The book includes a host of subjects:
Pitcairn history, island characteristics, Adamstown and the neighborhood, earning
a living, community life and leisure, education, health, communication, administration
and law, the other islands, from the pen of Roy P. Clark, general information
and appendices.
[$20.00 plus $3.00 packaging and postal cost in the U.S.;
Check with hford@puc.edu for book and postal
cost outside the U.S.]
- Pitcairn - Port of Call
Written
by Herbert Ford, director of the Pitcairn Islands Study Center, this 500-page
maritime history of Pitcairn, published in 1996, records some 200 years (1790-1990)
of life on the island. The call of thousands of ships from every port in the world
at Pitcairn in the 200-year period is recorded, along with particulars about the
ship and the often heart-wrenching circumstances of the call. Shipwreck, romance,
danger at sea, and the joy and strain of life on the tiny island are recounted
by the author as drawn from his extensive research during five years in eight
different countries, including Pitcairn itself.
[$20.00 plus $6.00 packaging
and postage in the U.S.; Check with hford@puc.edu
for book cost and postage outside the U.S.]
- Special
recommendation: Hill, Kenneth. The Hill Collection of Pacific
Voyages. 2nd ed., revised & enlarged, 2004.
The scholar,
researcher or adventurer - armchair or otherwise - who desires what is likely
the most complete compilation of books having to do with Pacific voyages will
surely want to acquire The Hill Collection of Pacific Voyages for his or
her library. This beauty of a book of nearly 800 pages, listing
particulars and extended notes on the 1,937 titles of the collection, is yet another
in the growing number of outstanding works published by Hordern
House, Australia’s premiere dealers in rare books, manuscripts, paintings
and prints. The book has been published in concert with the William Reese Company
of New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A. The Hill Collection of Pacific
Voyages, now a standard reference work about Pacific Voyages, is an enduring
tribute to scientist-financier-conservationist Kenneth E. Hill. In his mature
years, Hill one day spied a copy of William Bligh’s A Narrative of the
Mutiny, on board His Majesty’s Ship Bounty . . . in the window of a New
York City book store. He bought the book, and thereafter became an inveterate
collector of the best volumes obtainable about Pacific voyages, explorers and
western America. The result, now housed at the University of California at San
Diego, is a pure treasure of Pacific voyaging and exploration knowledge.
Kenneth Hill believed in dipping deep into the subjects of his book interest:
as but one example, 14 volumes authored by Bligh are in the collection. Similar
depth is found on the whole range of Pacific explorers: Bougainville, Cook, Drake,
La Perouse, Magellan, Wallis . . . The notes on each book in the collection bring
excitement as the reader’s mind is transported back to the wallowing ships
of these explorer-giants as they traverse the trackless Pacific in search of far
away lands with strange sounding names. Few if any other book
in their library will find as frequent or as productive a use by scholars, researchers,
or adventurers of the Pacific, as will The Hill Collection of Pacific Voyages.
It is a book of great value! [The Hill Collection of
Pacific Voyages may be ordered from Hordern
House, PO Box 225, Potts Point, Sydney NSW, 1335 Australia, or at www.hordern.com
or books@hordern.com.]
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