Breaking News!

How can there be breaking news in a blog about an 18th century author?

I learned this morning that Vanderbilt University just acquired the Clulow and United States Playing Card Company collection of gaming literature. This is a truly important collection, including one of the most complete collections of Hoyle in the United States. The collection has not been available to researchers since I embarked upon my Hoyle project, but is documented in the bibliographical section of Hargrave, A History of Playing Cards and a Bibliography of Cards and Gaming. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1930, 368-446 (reprinted in facsimile New York: Dover. 1966).

I describe the Hargrave work in the essay "Where can I learn more about Hoyle's writing?".

The one book I'm most curious to see is Calculations, Cautions and Observations, by E. Hoyle Jun. London. 1761. The Clulow copy is apparently the sole copy extant; the copy at the British Library was destroyed in the London Blitz. I've written about it in the essay "Contemporary Reviews of Gaming Literature".

I'm seeing a trip to Nashville in my future.