The Young Steam Engineer's Guide: containing an investigation of the principles, construction and powers of steam engines. A description of a steam engine on new principles, rendering it much more powerful, more simple, less expensive, and requiring much less fuel than an engine on the old construction. A description of a machine, and its principles for making ice and cooling water in large quantities, in hot countries, to make it palatable and wholesome for drinking, by the power of steam: invented by the author. A description of other patented inventions.
Philadelphia: H.C. Carey and I. Lea, [circa 1825].
Price: $4,500.00
About the item
2 engraved plates. xii,73,[3],[83]-139pp. 8vo. Contemporary tree calf, joints cracked but cords holding. Bookplate removed from front pastedown with staining. Rink 2939; Shaw & Shoemaker 6266, 8410; Thomson 17; Hindle, p. 66.
Item #369346
Evans was the first American to build steam engines. He was a pioneer in steam engine design, and this book describes his ideas in the early stages of this important 19th-century industry. The plates detail Evans' designs and his other patented machines.
The scarce second edition of Oliver Evans's Young Steam Engineer's Guide, first published in 1805 under the title The Abortion of the Young Steam Engineer's Guide. The present edition contains two plates instead of the original four, and omits one brief article, otherwise it contains the same text as in the original edition with a new title. The titlepage in this issue is undated, which has led many to ascribe a publication date of 1804 or 1805 (see Shaw & Shoemaker), but Rink points out that the printers did not begin identifying themselves as H.C. Carey and I. Lea until 1822. The work is listed as a "new publication" by Carey and Lea in the March 1825 U.S. Literary Gazette.
Both editions are scarce.
