Octavo; First Edition, 258 pages plus 12 page subscriber's list at rear. Contemporary calf leather binding, tender joints, much discoloration to the text. Front cover has detached. Ex libris Bishop Charles Standford Olmsted (which covers an older bookplate), other inked names of James Duane, and others; lacks rear free end paper. Bishop Olmsted was grandson of Zahnon and Rebecca "Barlow" Olmsted, so there was likely a family connection to the author. The first bookplate may be significant.
First edition
Published in 1787 by subscription, subscribers including George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Louis XVI of France. The Vision of Columbus was enormously successful with the American reading public.
This copy once belonged to James Duane as indicated in the inked writing. In 1767, Duane served as Attorney General of New York during the absence of John Tabor Kempe. From 1776-1783, Duane was a New York delegate to the Continental Congress and was a signatory to the Articles of Confederation in 1781. As a member of the Convention of the Representatives of the State of New York, James Duane was a supporter of the New York State constitution. DDuane became Mayor of New York in 1784 and served in that office for four years. He was elected to the New York Senate where he served from 1782-1785 and from 1788-1790. On September 25, 1789, President George Washington nominated Duane to the Federal District Court in New York and following confirmation by the United States Senate, Duane held that judicial office until he resigned due to ill health in 1794. James Duane died in 1797 and is buried at Christ Church in Duanesburg, Schenectady County, the township to which Duane had been granted a patent in 1765.