James Abram Garfield, 1831-1881.  20th President of the United States, 1881.  Copy of James Abram Garfield Life & Letters: Volume One 1831-1877, with Garfield's signature, dated at Mentor, Ohio, as presidential candidate, tipped in. 

This is an excellent first edition copy of Volume One of Theodore Clarke Smith's biography of Garfield, which was published by the Yale University Press in 1925.  Tipped onto the front free endpaper is a bold ink signature by Garfield, J. A. Garfield / Ohio, which Garfield dated at his home, Mentor, O / Aug. 23, 1880.  Garfield had been nominated for President on June 8, 1880, and thus signed as the Republican presidential nominee.

Smith drew this biography largely from Garfield's own writings.  He noted in the preface that set forth Garfield's life “so far as possible in his own words through extracts from letters, journals, reminiscences and speeches,” to which the Garfield family had given him access but “wished to have it clearly understood that his results were to be arrived at purely on the basis of historical criticism and construction, and in no sense as a family biography."  This volume covers Garfield's early life, his Civil War service as a Union general, and his post-war private life and service as a member of Congress to 1877.  His “letters and journals,” Smith wrote, “serve to illuminate the history of war politics and management and to throw light upon the Congressional history of seventeen eventful years, from 1863 to 1880." 

The book, which is hardbound, is clean, and the binding is tight.  It is covered in blue cloth.  The edges show only a bit of shelf wear, and the gilt embossing on the spine is bright.  The book has deckled pages and a frontispiece portrait of Garfield as a brigadier general in 1862.  There are no stray markings.  There are a couple of small stains on the autograph piece, but they do not affect the signature or writing.  The autograph piece is in very fine condition. 

This is as nice a copy of this book as one will find, and Garfield's black ink signature and writing are bold and strong.