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John Steinbeck

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:500.00 - 700.00 USD
John Steinbeck

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Auction Date:2014 Apr 16 @ 18:00 (UTC-5 : EST/CDT)
Location:236 Commercial St., Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts, 02109, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
TLS signed “John,” one page, 8.5 x 11, September 18, 1964. Letter to Howard Gossage. In part: “We went to Washington for the medal bit and it was very simple and good…There is a new horror let loose in the world. People send books to be signed, no rewrapping, no return postage and they do not ask, they demand. It is always as a surprise for good old Uncle Bob. This is happening with such regularity that I think I am going to throw them in a corner and forget them. I knew this presidential campaign was going to be dirty. But I could not have foreseen the quality of the dirt. Mr. Miller is about as fur [sic] as you can go. And he is quite a lot like another man who got his start in Munich not so very long ago.” In fine condition, with a small mild circular stain to lower right. On September 14, 1964, Steinbeck had been in Washington to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Lyndon B. Johnson, as referenced in the beginning of this letter. At the time of writing, the 1964 presidential election was fast approaching, with the Lyndon B. Johnson/Hubert Humphrey ticket facing off against Barry Goldwater/William E. Miller. Although Johnson ended up securing a lopsided victory, both sides were accused of running dirty campaigns—Johnson ran the controversial ‘Daisy’ ad, a watershed moment in the use of ‘negative’ campaigning, and Goldwater claimed to have taken Miller as his running mate simply because ‘he drives Johnson nuts.’ A fantastic letter in which Steinbeck comments on his books and his politics—the two driving forces in his life’s story.