George Parker Winship

“ The knowledge that the doctors expected him to live, and that for the first time in his life he was to have leisure and opportunity to do the things which he knew, as well as any one, that he could do better than anybody else, gave Livingston the interest in living which was worth more than all the medicines. ”

“ Most of his bibliographical work was done with books which were in his hands pending their sale by Dodd, Mead & Company. The unusual value of the catalogues issued by that house was recognized widely for some time before bookmen who were not conversant with the New York trade gossip became aware of Livingston's part in them. The extent to which his notes on rare volumes and peculiar editions have been copied by other book sellers is the convincing tribute to the thoroughness with which he exhausted each subject that he undertook to examine. ”

“ As these men and women came to see him, at first through neighbourly sympathy, their respect for his ability rapidly developed to admiration for his bravery and love for one of the sweetest natures this world has ever known. ”

“ Many of the choicest books that changed hands during the latter part of the nineteenth century became the property of Elihu Dwight Church of Brooklyn. When his library began to surpass other private collections of Americana and of English literature, Mr. Church asked Livingston to make a printed catalogue of his books. Much of the work of collating as well as the preparation of historical and bibliographical notes had been done before the books were sold to Mr. Church, but this material had to be revised and verified, and each volume re-examined for minute peculiarities. ”

“ His visit to London in 1911 strengthened personal friendships with nearly every English collector of consequence, and put him in the way to become the best known book seller on either side of the Atlantic.
By a curious fatality, it was on the day the Titanic sank, April 15, 1912, that Livingston collapsed under his own weight, with a broken thigh, at his home in Scarsdale. Six months before, he had slipped on wet leaves in the garden and broken a leg and arm, which healed unsatisfactorily. After the second accident, the doctors sought for the cause. ”

“ He was an active member of the group that tried to establish The Bibliographer as the American organ for those interested in bookish technicalities. During 1902 and 1903 he prepared for it facsimile reprints of two important early American tracts and of the first edition of Milton's Comus. Each of these was reissued in separate form. He also edited facsimiles of a rare German edition of the Vespucius Voyages and of the first edition of Bacon's Essaies. He planned to republish a number of other rare tracts of this character, in connection with his work at Harvard. ”

“ The appointment was recognized by every one as the best that could have been made. The business acquaintanceship between the book seller and the collector began soon after Harry Widener graduated from Harvard. It quickly ripened into warm personal friendship. 'He loved you, Mr. Livingston, and has talked to me so often of your knowledge and the help you were to him in advising him about books,' wrote the mother, in her first letter referring to the plans for the Memorial. ”

“ The trade catalogues of sets of Kipling and Tennyson proved so helpful to collectors that he was induced to prepare similar descriptions of the first editions of Pope, Mark Twain, Meredith and Swinburne. These were privately printed for the owners of sets of books by these authors, which Livingston had been largely instrumental in enlarging. These led naturally to his assuming the task of completing 'The Chamberlain Bibliographies' of Longfellow and Lowell, which were based on the researches and notes of Jacob Chester Chamberlain of New York City, and printed by Mrs. ”

“ In a hollow he had found a nest of alligator's eggs. 'As the man started to dig out the eggs we heard the little darlings down below barking like puppies. They were just hatching and several little lizards had their snouts out of the shells. ”