"The Life of Robert Fulton" by his friend Cadwallader D

New York: Kirk & Mercein, 1817. Samuel Postlethwaite's copy with autograph on title page and fly paper. Samuel Postlethwaite (ca. 1772-1825), was a native of Carlisle, PA. By 1802 he settled at the Natchez district of Mississippi. In 1803, he married Ann Dunbar, daughter of William "Sir" Dunbar, a wealthy local planter. He handled business affairs of his ailing father-in-law, and upon his death in 1810, acted as an executor of his estate. In 1810, 1811, and 1813, he journeyed up the Red River to supervise the restoration of Dunbar's salt business there. In 1815, Samuel Postlethwaite was one of the incorporators and original stockholders of the Bank of Mississippi; he also was one of the owners of the Natchez Steamboat Company. 8vo. 371 pages. Hardbound, uncut, deckled edges, includes frontispiece and fold-out, uncut, original printed paper boards. Read before the Library and Philosophical Society of New York: comprising some account of the invention, progress and establishment of Steam-boats; of improvements in construction and navigation of canals and other objects of public utility, with an appendix. Back broken, foxed, front fly page missing corner, old bookplate pasted down of of Herschel v. Jones, fair.