Hot off the Press

Distributed Proofreaders has reached another milestone: we’ve posted 30,000 unique titles to Project Gutenberg!

We’re celebrating this achievement with a collection of 30 works, the product of DP volunteers’ perseverance and hard work in making a wide range of books available online:

• Beadle’s Dime National Speaker, Embodying Gems of Oratory and Wit, Particularly Adapted to American Schools and Firesides, by various authors (1863) – an economy-priced anthology of “unusually valuable and beautiful pieces for the school-stage,” culled from famous speeches and poems.
• Lay Down Your Arms: The Autobiography of Martha von Tilling, by Bertha von Suttner (1914) – an English translation of the 1889 pacifist novel Die Waffen nieder!
• After Taps, by Rachel E. Baker and George M. Baker (1891) – a three-act drama set during the American Civil War.
• The Works of William Shakespeare (Cambridge Edition, volume 5 of 9, 1864) – the premier 19th-Century edition of Shakespeare’s works.
• Historia de las Indias (volume 1 of 5), by Bartolomé de las Casas (1875) – a 19th-Century edition of a 1561 history of the West Indies, written by a Spanish friar and historian who decried the enslavement of the natives.
• A Plain and Easie Method for Preserving (by God’s Blessing) Those that are Well from the Infection of the Plague, or Any Contagious Distemper, in City, Camp, Fleet, &c., and for Curing Such as Are Infected with It, by Thomas Willis, M.D. (1691) – a 17th-Century medical text by an influential English physician and researcher.
• Days Before History, by H.R. Hall (1908) – a children’s book about prehistoric life in England.
• Princess Napraxine (volume 1 of 3), by Ouida (1884) – a tragic novel of erotic obsession.
• C.A. Coey’s School of Motoring, 1424-26 Michigan Ave., Chicago, by C.A. Coey (1912) – a brochure from the early days of the automobile, advertising a driving school for aspiring chauffeurs, with many photographs.
• Mr. Punch’s Scottish Humour, by various authors (c. 1907) – ethnic humor from the famous British magazine Punch.
• La lanterna di Diogene, by Alfredo Panzini (1920) – a philosophical novel in which a bicycle trip in the Italian countryside becomes a study of man’s pursuit of happiness.
• Deutsch-Ostafrika. Geographie und Geschichte der Colonie, by Brix Förster (1890) – a history in German of the colony of German East Africa (present-day Burundi, Rwanda, and part of Tanzania).
• Les derniers paysans (volume 1 of 2), by Émile Souvestre (1851) – a collection of French short stories reflecting France’s passage from the old régime to the new republic.
• The Lake Dwellings of Ireland: or Ancient Lacustrine Habitations of Erin, Commonly Called Crannogs, by W.G. Wood-Martin (1886) – a study of Irish archaeology.
• “Great-Heart”: The Life Story of Theodore Roosevelt, by Daniel Henderson (1919) – a biography of the American president, for young readers.
• An Essay on Contagious Diseases: More Particularly on the Small-Pox, Measles, Putrid, Malignant, and Pestilential Fevers, by Clifton Wintringham (1721) – a medical text by an 18th-Century English physician.
• Cadet Days: A Story of West Point, by Capt. Charles King (1894) – an illustrated novel set in the U.S. Military Academy.
• A Sheaf of Verses, by Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall (1908) – an early collection of poems by the ground-breaking lesbian poet and novelist later known as Radclyffe Hall.
• A Satyr Against Hypocrites, by John Phillips (1655) – a satire in verse attacking Puritanism in England.
• Dalziels’ Illustrated Goldsmith, by Oliver Goldsmith (c. 1865) – an anthology of the 18th-Century English writer’s works, lavishly illustrated with engravings.
• The Osage Tribe: Two Versions of the Child-Naming Rite, by Francis La Flesche (1928) – a report of the Bureau of American Ethnology to the Smithsonian Institution, authored by the first Native American anthropologist.
• Young India: An Interpretation and a History of the Nationalist Movement from Within, by Lajpat Rai (1917) – an account by a leader of the Indian independence movement.
• The Epicurean, A Tale, by Thomas Moore (1827) – a novel set in ancient Athens, by the Irish poet and songwriter best known for “The Minstrel Boy” and “The Last Rose of Summer.”
• Coplas por la muerte de su padre, by Jorge Manrrique (c. 1897) – a critical edition of the 15th-Century Castilian poet’s verses upon the death of his father.
• Radioisotopes and Life Processes, by Walter E. Kisieleski and Renato Baserga (1967) – an informational pamphlet from the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.
• Conservation of Marine Birds of Northern North America, by various authors (1979) – papers presented at an international wildlife symposium, published in a report by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
• Seventy Years among Savages, by Henry S. Salt (1921) – reminiscences and criticisms of English life and customs.
• Storia degli italiani (volume 1 of 15), by Cesare Cantù (1874) – the first volume of a monumental history of the Italian people.
• The Boy Scouts for City Improvement, by Scout Master Robert Shaler (1914) – a novel for young readers.
• And finally, the 30,000th title, Graded Literature Readers: Fourth Book (1900) – a reader featuring classic works by a number of authors, designed to introduce students to the variety and depth of literature.

These titles are an excellent illustration of what DP volunteers do every day:  We preserve and make available, for the delight and enlightenment of readers everywhere, a broad array of books on many subjects and in many languages. Congratulations to all who made this achievement possible!

This post was contributed by Linda Cantoni, a Distributed Proofreaders volunteer.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 7th, 2015 at 4:58 pm and is filed under Project Gutenberg, Special Day. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.