The Rudder 1912

[NevadaBoy]

It's been a while since I posted on the forum but I found something a few days ago that I thought might pique the interest of a few people around here. I was browsing Google Books and discovered copies of the entire year of The Rudder for 1912, free to anyone with the bandwidth to download them. They are scans of bound copies posted in two volumes (Jan-Jun and Jul-Dec). There is also a listing for a 1914 volume but no actual file yet. You will probably need a high-speed connection as the files are 27 Mbytes and 21.5 Mbytes, respectively.

I tried to post a link with the sort already done but there were too many special characters. Just go to Google Books advanced search page (http://books.google.com/advanced_book_search) and do a search with "Rudder" in the Title field and "Thomas Fleming Day" in the Author field.

Enjoy!

[rbgarr]

I see that pages 44-5 of the January 1912 issue show plans for the Crowninshield schooner Heron which was run down last fall in the Delaware (?) Canal.

[dredbob]

The Google Books feature has a lot of old yachting, canoeing, etc, books available for full download. The drawback is that they are highly compressed PDFs (image, not text), and some of the scanning is poorly done. (skipped pages, half pages, occasional fingers, etc). But, still a great resource for those with the bandwidth. Some things are there that are very expensive on the used book market, such as Dixon Kemp's _Manual of Yacht and Boat Sailing_, and his _Yacht Architecture_. Thomas Fleming Day's own _On Yachts and Yacht Handling_ is there, but has a couple of pages missing due to the aforementioned poor scanning.

Just choose the "full view" option on the Google Books search page and start searching on whatever your interest is, then separate the wheat from the chaff.

Bob

[BrianM]

Very cool. I won't complain anymore about my old 500lb Albin 20HP diesel. They've got an article on a 9,500lb "Oil Engine" rated at 150HP.

How can you print exerpts?

[NevadaBoy]

How can you print exerpts?

If you download the Acrobat file, you can just print out the pages you want.

dredbob: You're right that some of the books are not scanned as well as one might hope. However in many cases, the originals are just not available. I searched for one particular book published in 1915 for a couple of years before snatching up a copy that was falling apart, but readable. (I wanted it for the content, not as a collectible.) When I posted word of my find on an online forum, someone pointed out to me that the same book had just been posted on Google Books a couple of weeks prior. Aaarrgghhhh!

I have found that in cases where I am searching for a particular old book, I can often find a copy online if it was published before 1923. It gives me a chance to find out if it's worth hunting down a real copy.

[dredbob]

I'm with you, it's a lot, lot, better than nothing!!! I was just pointing out the compromises made. I'm still stuck on dialup, or I'd need a couple of terabyte disks to hold what I'd probably end up downloading from Google Books. As it is, I've got almost a hundred so far, mostly related to boats and seamanship, with some old time woodcraft (campcraft) stuff as well.

Bob

Edited to Add: I have to correct myself; I stated that Tom Day's _On Yachts and Yacht Handling_ was missing some pages; it is not. It's one of the other books I downloaded and was reading, but which one I'm now not sure:)

Edited again: I think it is the old knot book _The Book of Knots by Tom Bowling_. It's missing the illustrated plates.

[Mike Field]

If you download the Acrobat file, you can just print out the pages you want.


No Acrobat file mentioned when I follow your instructions, unfortunately -- only "snippet" views and thumbnails of the title pages. <sigh>

I guess it comes of living on the other side of the earth....
.

[BrianM]

Mike,

If you open this link:

http://books.google.com/books?as_q=&num=10&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_libcat=0&as_brr=0&lr=&as_vt=rudder&as_auth=thomas+fleming+day&as_pub=&as_sub=&as_drrb=c&as_miny=&as_maxy=&as_isbn=

Then, on the right margin, there is an option to download the .pdf (27MB).

I hadn't seen that the first time I looked at it, but that may be because I hit "full screen" mode. When you do the right margin options disappear.

Great resource.

[jverl]

BrianM,
Thanks for the URL but it seems that this is only available to the USofA. :( All I get is a view of three books with the words "snippet view" at the bottom of each. On the right hand side all I see are "List view and Cover view"

John

[Mike Field]

Thanks to you both for your suggestions, Brian and Nautilus. But alas, still no option to download a PDF, darn it.

C'est la vie, et que sera, sera, and so on....

[jverl]

Thanks Nautilus,
It DOES work! After typing in the "books.google.com/ncr" and getting on the google site, I types in rudder on the Google book search and found (the second one down) The Rudder. This time it had the full view in green. I clicked on that and THEN had the download pdf on the right hand side! Thanks again all.

John