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The format is approximately 8.375 inches by 10.875 inches. 40 pages, plus cover. Catalogue subscription insert laid in. Maps. Illustrations. 206 items listed followed by 117 items listed in an Additamentum on Renaissance Modern and American Scientific Depictions of Europe. This is followed by Twelve Top General Reference Books on Historical Cartography and List of Authorities Frequently Cited, and Not Found Among Reference Books for Sale. The focus of the catalogue is American and the sections are I. American Prints; II. Rare Books and Atlases; III. Atlantic Ocean; IV. North and South America; V. Northeast States; VI. Southeast States; and Additamentum. This includes at item 35 and offering of Audubon's Chromolithographed Birds, Natural Science, War and Politics--a set for the 1979 price of $85,000. This is a fascinatingly and largely well annotated catalogue that can now serve as an invaluable reference work with information on many now seldom seen materials. Walter Graham Arader III is an American art dealer, focusing on rare maps, prints and natural history watercolors. His father, a Philadelphia businessman, former Pennsylvania Secretary of Commerce and map collector, lent his son one hundred and fifty thousand dollars and Arader began to travel the antique-show circuit. He established his business in 1974, focusing on rare maps. In The Island of Lost Maps, author Miles Harvey credits him with transforming what had been an "insular realm of aficionados," giving maps "unprecedented visibility, not only as investments. but as mass-media artifacts." Arader has brought a similar acumen to the sale of natural history prints, books, and watercolors, and he is the largest dealer of John James Audubon's highly prized double-elephant folio prints from The Birds of America. In 1981, he introduced the Arader Grading System to determine the value and significance of rare maps, prints, and books. This system evaluates items based on their conceptual importance, aesthetic quality, condition, and rarity. He also invented a method of selling by syndication, a form of retailing with an added touch of gambling. For a fixed amount, clients purchase shares in the distribution of a set of prints or watercolors. By process of lottery, numbers are drawn to determine the order in which clients make a selection. Such a method was used by Arader in the fall of 1985, when he bought the original watercolors for Pierre-Joseph Redouté s masterpiece, Les Liliacées. Sotheby's had planned to auction the flower watercolors one-by-one, but Arader created one of his syndicates and in a remarkable coup purchased the whole group with a single unchallenged bid of five million dollars. Each of his investors acquired four watercolors for a share price of $63,250. He was profiled in the October 24, 2011 issue of Forbes magazine. He is discussed by Sarah Vowell in episode 86 of This American Life, and in her book The Partly Cloudy Patriot, and by Simon Garfield in his book, On The Map. Arader owned galleries in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, New York City, NY, and St. Helena, California.
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