Laddie and Miss Toosey's Mission by Evelyn Whitaker - Antique Book, Vintage Book, 1900s

A pretty antique edition of Laddie and Miss Toosey's Mission by Evelyn Whitaker.

Written by Evelyn Whitaker. Illustrated by Henry Altemus (frontispiece) and Walter Cooper Bradley. Circa 1900. W. B. Conkey Company, Publishers. Chicago.

There is a long list of forgotten women authors, including Evelyn Whitaker, because they went uncredited for their work. They wrote anonymously or under pseudonyms using men's names, or gave up credit for their work to known male authors. Even in more recent times, many well-known women authors, from P. D. James to J. K. Rowling, have used initials rather than their full names, depending on the genre. All of Whitaker's 19 novels and short stories were published anonymously, until her identity was revealed in 1903. But even in later editions such as this one, published in 1905/6, she was only credited as "the author of Laddie" and "the author of Miss Toosey's Mission".

Evelyn Whitaker was a good writer, whose stories for children were better than "charming", "delightful", and "wholesome", though these are all good things. This edition was published as a pretty little gift book, popular at the time, and in fact carries a gift inscription dated December 25, 1906.

MISS TOOSEY'S MISSION (1878)

"Miss Toosey always wore a black silk dress on Sunday, and went three times to Church. Morning, afternoon, and evening, as soon as the bell clanged at the quarter, that black silk dress came out of Miss Toosey's little house in North Street, turned the corner in High Street, crossed the Market-place, passed under the archway into the churchyard, in at the west door, and up the middle aisle, past the free seats, which occupy the lower end of Martel church, and stopped at the second pew on the left-hand side, one sitting in which has been rented by Miss Toosey for many years. This pew is immediately in front of the churchwarden's seat, where those two dignitaries sit majestically, with a long rod placed conveniently on either hand, ready to be seized at a moment's notice, to execute judgment on youthful offenders in the free seats, though the well-known fact that generations of paint and varnish have made them fixtures somewhat takes off from the respect and awe felt for them. Miss Toosey is short, and the pew-door has a tendency to stick; and when you have a Bible, prayer-book, hymn-book, spectacle case, and umbrella in your hands, you cannot enter into a struggle on equal terms; and so when Mr. Churchwarden Wyatt happens to be in church in time, he leans over and opens the pew-door for Miss Toosey, "and very kind of him, too, a most gentlemanly man Mr. Wyatt is, my dear."

LADDIE (1879)

"Third-class forward! Her you are, mum. Plenty of room this way! Now then! All right behind here?" Doors bang; a whistle; and the train moves off.

"The guard had thrust into a third-class carriage, already nearly full, a bandbox with a blue spotted handkerchief round it, and a bunch of Michaelmas daisies, southernwood, and rosemary tucked under the knot at the top, a marketing-basket, one flap of which was raised by a rosy-cheeked apple emitting a powerful smell; a bundle done up in a handkerchief of the same pattern as that round the bandbox, only bright yellow; a large cotton umbrella of a pale-green color, with a decided waist to it; and a pair of patterns! Anything else? Oh yes, of course! There was an old woman who belonged to the things, but she was so small and frightened and overwhelmed that she appeared quite a trifle beside her and might easily have been overlooked altogether. ..."

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Condition*: Very Good. Lacks dust jacket as issued. The white cloth cover is embossed with a gold flower-and-vine pattern, and a gold-embossed oval frame topped with a ribbon and affixed with the original paper cut-out of pink and red roses. The front and back covers are only mildly soiled from handling, though the paper cut-out is loose on one side and should be professionally re-glued. The spine is cracked at the front endpaper but the hinge is intact and pages are well-attached.

* Based on guidelines of the Independent Online Booksellers' Association.