Sloop Spray Souvenir, Joshua Slocum 1901 Signed Canvas. This unique book about sailing around the world on your own is titled "Sloop Spray Souvenir" and was written by a unique author, Joshua Slocum, in 1901, with notes arranged and supplied by Henrietta E. Slocum, the wife of Joshua Slocum. Joshua Slocum (1844 - 1909) was the first person to sail solo - single-handedly - around the world. He was born in Nova Scotia and became a naturalised American who was a seaman and adventurer, and he was a noted as a writer for his exploits. In 1900 he wrote a book about his journey, "Sailing Alone Around the World", which became an international best-seller. He disappeared in November 1909 while aboard his boat, the Spray, and was never seen or heard from again. The boat was an oyster boat almost 37 feet long that Slocum rebuilt in Fairhaven, Mass. between 1891 and 1892, and in April 1895, he set sail from Boston. After an extended visit to his boyhood home at Brier Island and visiting old haunts on the coast of Nova Scotia, Slocum departed North America at Sambro Island Lighthouse near Halifax, Nova Scotia on July 3, 1895. Slocum intended to sail eastward around the world, using the Suez Canal, but when he got near Gibraltar, he realized that sailing through the southern Mediterranean would be too dangerous for a lone sailor because of the piracy still going on there at the time, so he decided to sail westward, in the southern hemisphere. He headed to Brazil, and then to the Straits of Magellan. At that point he was unable to cross the Pacific for forty days because of a storm. Eventually he made his way to Australia, sailed north along the east coast, crossed the Indian Ocean, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and then headed back to North America, and he did all this without a chronometer, relying instead on the traditional method of dead reckoning for longitude, which required only a cheap tin clock for approximate time and noon-sun sights for latitude, and he normally sailed the Spray without touching the helm. Due to the length of the sail relative to the hull, and the long keel, the Spray was capable of self-steering (unlike faster modern craft), and he kept it on course relative to the wind by adjusting or reefing the sails and by lashing the helm fast. He sailed 2,000 miles west across the Indian Ocean without touching the helm once. On one long passage in the Pacific, he used a lunar distance observation, which allowed him to check his longitude independently. However, Slocum's primary method for finding longitude was still dead reckoning; he recorded only one lunar observation during the entire circumnavigation. It took a little over three years to complete his voyage around the world - he returned to Newport, Rhode Island on June 27, 1898, having circumnavigated the world and sailing a distance of more than 46,000 miles - and his return almost went unnoticed. The Spanish-American War dominated the headlines, and after hostilities ended, American newspapers finally published articles describing Slocum's adventure. In 1899, he published his account of the voyage in "Sailing Alone Around the World", first serialized in The Century Magazine and then in several book editions. On November 14, 1909, Slocum left Vineyard Haven, Mass. and set sail in the Spray for the West Indies on one of his usual winter voyages. He also had expressed interest in starting a new adventure, exploring the Orinoco, Rio Negro and Amazon Rivers - the great rivers of South America - and he was never heard from again. In July 1910, his wife informed the newspapers that she believed her husband was lost at sea. Despite being an experienced mariner, Slocum never learned how to swim - he considered learning to swim to be useless - many mariners shared this thought, as swimming would only be useful if land was close by - and this attitude probably cost him his life. In 1924, Joshua Slocum was declared legally dead. The book measures 6 x 4 in. wide, with tan wrappers, a drawing of the Spray and "1895 - 1898 U.S to U.S." on the cover, the sticker of Henry Howard of the Wamsutta Club in New Bedford, Mass. on the front cover, then the title page, the copyright date and monogram of the Gilliss Press on the next page, a total of 48 pages in the book, an ad for Slocum's book "Sailing Alone Around the World" on the inside wrapper at the back of the book, and the book has an original piece of canvas from the Spray signed by Slocum and pasted in after the copyright page; the sail was torn beyond repair in the gale off Cape Horn and several pieces were cut from the sail after he returned to the states, and his wife must have included pieces of the sail in copies of this book. The Wamsutta Club is a private social club in New Bedford, Massachusetts, founded in 1866. It was a club for the affluent members of New Bedford, which at the time was supported by the flagging whaling industry as well as the up-and-coming textiles industry, and the club still exists as a social center in downtown New Bedford. The front cover has creases and there's wear on the spine, the pages are disbound from the wrappers and there's tape at the top and bottom of the title page, and the text and margins are actually very clean. The book is also rare - there are only two copies in Special Collections, according to WorldCat. One is at the Buffalo & Erie County Public Library in New York and the other is at Yale; there's one other listed at the Peabody Essex Museum in Rowley, Mass., but when we checked, we found out the book is listed, but not held in their collection anymore, and we found only one copy offered for sale on the rare book website we use, and that copy is going for $1750. We found one copy that sold at auction on October 12 this year for $1140, with an estimate or $400 to $600, so we are starting the bidding here low, to get things going. Slocum's book "Sailing Alone Around the World" is rare as well and goes for $4500 in good condition, and two letters written and signed by Slocum sold at Swann's in 2021 for a little over $800. So a unique book and a unique author who was the first to circumnavigate the earth all by himself, and in the end, his adventurous spirit cost him his life. #153 #1609