Dating Beatrix Potter books and Observer’s Pocket Series books
Have you ever wondered when your vintage Observer’s Books were actually printed? Dating vintage books can sometimes be a tricky process. Often dates are given on the back of the title page, and include edition details, as well as reprint dates. Information in this format makes it very simple to identify key publication dates. However, sometimes such clear information is not available in early editions.
In the case of publications from Frederick Warne (the publishers of both Beatrix Potter’s books and the Observer’s Book Series) we know that Warne became a Limited Company in 1919, so books without the reference to ‘Ltd’ will always predate 1919. This is because limited companies are legally required to specify that their shareholders’ liability is limited to the capital they originally invested. They must do this with the addition of the letters ‘Ltd’ after their name. Post 1919, it is necessary to check the back of the title page of Warne books for publication details, and hope that the information given is clear.
Understanding printer codes
However, Warne made dating their Beatrix Potter and Observer’s Pocket Series books much, much easier from 1942 until 1984, as they used their own unique printer’s codes. These codes are six to eight digit long numbers which can be found at the foot of the back of the title page or last few pages of their books, and read something like this: ‘1656.165’. The first digits do not help with the date that the book was printed, but after the first three or four digits a full stop appears and the next digits give us the month and year the book was printed. So ‘776’ represents a book printed in July 1976, and ‘1162’ represents an earlier book printed in November 1962, and so on.
From 1984 you can be confident that sufficient detail will available on the back of the title page to give you all the detail you need to date your more modern Beatrix Potter books.
To see the vintage Observer’s Books which I currently have available in my Etsy shop, please click HERE (by clicking this link my Etsy shop will open in a new tab).
