[Dime Novels] Peeps into our Sub-Literary Past and 19th Century Peep-Show: A Repository and Treasury of Notes and Queries on the Popular Writing of the Nineteenth Century, a Serial Revelation of a Vanishing Underworld of Romantic Composition Left in Darkness by Literati

1937. Good Condition/None. [Dime Novels] Peeps into our Sub-Literary Past (Issue 1-4) and 19th Century Peep-Show (Issue 5-13)--A Repository and Treasury of Notes and Queries on the Popular Writing of the Nineteenth Century, a Serial Revelation of a Vanishing Underworld of Romantic Composition Left in Darkness by Literati--1937

Thirteen issues bound into homemade black paper wrappers with taped spine and manuscript label on front. Mild chipping and wear to wrappers. Short tears at head and foot of spine. Light corner wear otherwise clean text block and interior. Some wrappers possibly missing. Good Condition.

Curious little periodical published by Fred T. Singleton of Coral Gables, Florida whose apparent obsession with dime-novels led to this "fanzine" for collectors and enthusiasts.

Fred Singleton had a background as a typographer, designer and student of modern posters. He variously published a journal called "Poster Lore", designed covers for "The Papyrus" and worked for Will Bradley's Wayside Press in Springfield Massachusetts. Later he worked for Conde Nast and the American Type Founders Company in New York City.

Singleton was a self-proclaimed collector of "trashy literature", his euphemism for nickel and dime novels so popular in the later 19th and early 20th centuries. Each issue serves as a check-list of sorts noting "opening installments of the inspiriting serials, or peep further into the past at the popular print of their immediate forebears."

Later issues, especially when Singleton changes the title to "19th Century Peep-Show" also includes ads from collectors and dealers of pulp and dime novels. Issue 8 includes a tipped-in miniature facsimile of a cover from a Beadle publication from the 1870's. These issues constitute a valuable record of an important sub-genre of literature.

This is a broken run of the first 13 issues, of what we believe to have been 21 issues in all. For more information see John Adcock's excellent blog "Yesterday's Papers", from which we have borrowed.