Featured Mother Goose with Illustrations after Kate Greenaway

I collect children’s picture books and recently purchased this old beat-up copy of “Mother Goose or the Old Nursery Rhymes” with illustrations after Kate Greenaway. It was very inexpensive, and I thought I might be able to save some of the pages for future framing. Once I actually looked at it closely and began to research, it has proven to be a more interesting find than just an old, battered copy. The original version of this book was published in 1881 by George Routledge and very clearly says illustrations by Kate Greenaway. My copy according to the inscription on the front cover says copyright 1882 by McLoughlin Bros. illustrations after Kate Greenaway. I did a bit of research of McLoughlin and they were a popular well-established publishing house from the mid-19th century through the 1920s in New York and they were well-known for their colour reproduction techniques. I have found this book listed in the 1882-83 “Catalogue of McLoughlin Bros. Toy Books, Games, ABC Blocks, etc”. They list this title and say the “illustrations are enlarged from Kate Greenaway’s designs…..and printed in colors brighter than the originals” all of which is true. They have then added a copyright to their version. My book does not have a contents page as in the original book and the cover is different. The half title, frontispiece, title, and dedication are all the same. The order of nursery rhymes is different from the original, but the drawings are all the very same, though with a bolder colour palette and they are a bit bigger and brighter just as they advertise. It is a different overall size coming in at 195mm x 255mm (7.5” x 9.75”). My copy has 42 verses, and the original has 44 though there are several loose (and one ripped in half) pages in the middle of my copy so a single page could be missing. I have searched online for a version to match my book but to no avail though there are many copies of the original 1881 Routledge available and numerous more modern versions printed in the 1970s. I know that British copyright laws didn’t transfer to the US at that time so “pirate” copies of some titles were produced. I think that is what I possibly have here but would like a second opinion. Is anyone familiar with “pirated” children’s books and do you think this fits that criteria? Many thanks.

 

Copyrights were not very well enforced in the 19th Century, and, particularly, the lack of any legal agreement then between American and European publishers enabled a lot of "pirating" of other publishers' products -- US publishers could, without liability, remuneration, or penalty, reprint something that had been published and copyrighted in the UK, and vice versa.

As a footnote, more history of McLoughlin Brothers near the bottom of this page:
https://baseballgames.dreamhosters.com/BbMcLoughlin.htm

 

Thanks so much Baseball Games. Very informative site. I had already checked out the American Antiquarian Society which is where I found the catalogues for the books but I had not ventured into the games section which I found absolutely fascinating. Baseball is one of the few sports I remotely understand and follow, but I had no idea there were so many games from the 19th century. I think my book is indeed a "pirate" which is interesting and it must be somewhat rare as I haven't managed to find a single copy online. I think it is very cheeky of McLoughlin to take a copyrighted book from Routledge, use their popular images, re-colour them and then copyright their own version! Thanks again for the information.

 

You're very welcome, Bing, and thank you very much for the kind words!
American Antiquarian is where we, too, got a lot of our information and catalogue images. Our website's page of McLoughlin baseball games, of course, covers only that -- there are dozens more baseball boardgames and card games by several other 19th Century publishers, and countless scads of parlor games with other themes by McLoughlin and many other 19th Century game manufacturers. In fact, Pook & Pook very recently auctioned off part of the Bud & Judy Newman collection of antique boardgames, and the offerings were jawdropping (games start with lot 183):
https://pookandpook.com/auction/the...y-newman-new-hope-pennsylvania-12893/lots?p=1
McLoughlin were hardly alone in taking advantage of the lack of international copyright restrictions -- almost every publisher on both sides of the Big Pond copied successful books (popular novels as well as children's books) issued by publishers from across the Atlantic. Ethics aside, it would've been bad business not to do so...

 

Well I just spent a very fun hour looking at this auction site you posted and I started at the top and viewed everything. So many amazing items and the boardgames were definitely jawdropping! Quite an interesting company, McLaughlin. I'm going to have to do a bit more research. I have some early 20th cent children's blocks that might be theirs.

 

A few years ago the American Antiquarian Society published a book titled Radiant with Color & Art: McLoughlin Brothers and the Business of Picture Books, 1858-1920. I have a copy of the book, which includes a lot of their history and some illustrations from an exhibition of some of their publications.

The Mother Goose with illustrations "after Kate Greenaway" is not mentioned in this book, which could only touch on some of their thousands of titles. However, they do mention that "the McLoughlin brothers regularly issued editions of Mother Goose during all of the years they were publishing." These were illustrated in a variety of ways.

I also learned that McLoughlin frequently reissued their titles over and over, but even the ones with the same basic illustrations often varied in title pages, covers, and even the colors used in printing. So your book may possibly be a variant McLoughlin brothers book. It could also be a knock-off or pirated variant, as BaseballGames mentioned.

The American Antiquarian Society does answer reference queries received by email. You might consider asking them if they can help or give any information related to yours. They may not be able to, but maybe they know of some other resources. Contact info is on the right side of this page:
https://www.americanantiquarian.org/about

 

Thank you for your information Figtree. McLoughlin is such an interesting company and had such a huge selection of children's titles and games. There were so many different Mother Goose versions as you have said and with different illustrators. Greenaway was so popular it is no wonder they would have used her illustrations for their own version (they even kept her dedication page intact). The book definitely shows up in the 1882-83 catalogue and if I'm reading it correctly there were "six kinds" which sounds like a choice of six covers. Mine is The Little Maid. Retail was 12 cents each! At least they use the term "after" Greenaway rather than claiming the whole of the artwork. Like I told Baseball, cheeky of them to then copyright their version though to be fair they do say in the ad that they have re-coloured and re-sized the images. I will reach out to the Antiquarian site and they might have some more information. Given the lack of copies that I have been able to find online maybe they had to quit publishing this particular book. The plot thickens! I'll post an update if I find anything more to the story.

 

Sounds good. Yes, an update would be welcome!