C. L. Derby & Company

Chauncey Lyman Derby was the youngest of four Derby brothers involved in nineteenth century book publishing. Born in central New York state (probably in the 1820s), by 1850, he ran the C. L. Derby & Co. bookstore in Sandusky, Ohio, in the Phoenix Block, the recently-demolished building on the 100 block of East Water Street. According to a 1948 article in the University of Rochester Library Bulletin, he sold pianofortes and melodeons along with books and stationery at the shop. C. L. Derby was also closely associated with the Cosmopolitan Art Association. Subscribers received a periodical subscription, as well as a chance to win an art object through a yearly lottery.

Pictured below is an advertisement from Derby’s column in The Daily Sanduskian, a predecessor to the Register newspaper, published by David Campbell & Son.

The advertisement features a person reading a book entitled C. L. Derby & Co. Booksellers & Stationers. Another book entitled Sandusky, O., is below the open book. This poem also appears in the ad:

This books can do-nor this alone; they give

New views to life, and teach us how to live:

They sooth the grieved, the stubborn they chastise,

Fools they admonish, and confirm the wise.

Crabbe.

Derby’s column contained several small ads for specific book titles he was selling at his shop. Titles included: The Great Harmonia!, Laugh and Grow Fat, When Doctors Disagree, and Hearts & Homes.