Adolph Sutro and the Bradshawe Library Pamphlets (English Civil War)

Sponsored by The Book Club of California

6:00-7:15 pm Pacific time; In-person and virtual presentation

In the Sutro Library, now housed in the J. Paul Leonard Library of San Francisco State University, are 40 bound volumes containing some 1400 pamphlets mostly from the period of the English Civil War (1640-1660). Each volume, with one or two exceptions, is inscribed with the name “Henry Bradshawe” on the title-page of the first pamphlet. Who was this “Henry Bradshawe,” and how did his invaluable collection find its way into the library of San Francisco’s great benefactor Adolph Sutro?

The Bradshawe library was sold at auction in 1784 by a later member of the family; a century after the sale, Adolph Sutro purchased the 40 volumes of pamphlets from James Crossley, a Manchester magnate who had assembled a magnificent library of his own, and was consulted as an expert on Bradshawe ownership signatures. Documentation concerning the Crossley-Sutro transaction survives in the Sutro Library archives.

In addition to the Civil War pamphlets in the Sutro Library, Professor Nelson will comment on local books from the Bradshawe Library, including books in the Robbins Collection in the Berkeley School of Law, Stanford University Library, a 1632 2nd Folio Shakespeare at the University of California, Davis, and books which he himself has collected and will place on display.

An in-person and virtual presentation via Zoom by Alan H. Nelson,
Professor Emeritus, Department of English, University of California, Berkeley

REGISTER HERE: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Z2hWm3rMT0WcvUopQVlk-w?mc_cid=b01d1ff05f&mc_eid=55809a2ee8