Recently Grolier Club members received word that one of the brethren, Jay Kislak, had slipped away. Death can be delayed but not avoided and we know this because, were it possible to beat death, Jay would have. He was extremely intelligent.
Jay was a banker, opinionated to the point of certainty, with resources to buy the greatest material for his various collections. I visited Jay at his offices in Miami, at the suggestion of Bill Reese, in 1991. Jay was already a legend, but happy to spend several hours to tell me about his material. My motivation was to understand how the field functioned. Jay, then 69, was on another planet, on the verge of becoming a billionaire and pursuing whatever pleased him. Today he is acknowledged as a 20th century heir to the greatest collectors of the 19th century, in equal parts because he shared their single-mindedness, extraordinary wealth, and ultimate generosity.
When later in life Jay turned his attention to philanthropy, not surprisingly, it was on a level few could fully appreciate.
When I met him 1991 I was surprised to learn that he didn’t have a set of Servies’ Bibliography of Florida. It was a relatively expensive set, $400 or so at the time, and I, the would-be collector, gave it to him, a homage of sort, to the greatest collector of Americana of his era. Years later, when I established the Americana Exchange, he would become an ardent supporter, even now providing our services to the Library of Congress and I believe, four other institutions to which he gave portions of his collections.
His name will live on. It was a privilege to know him.
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 28th May 2026
Forum, May 28: Book of Hours.- Heures de nostre dame a l'usaige de Romme, Paris, Antoine Chappiel pour Germain Hardouin, [1504]. £6,000-8,000
Forum, May 28: Colonna (Francesco). La Hypnerotomachia di Poliphilo, second edition, Venice, Sons of Aldus Manutius, 1545. £15,000-20,000
Forum, May 28:The Christ Child holding a crystal orb and surrounded by banderoles with devotional exhortations, on a leaf most probably from a Book of Hours, [Southern Netherlands, last decades of the fifteenth century]. £2,000-3,000
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 28th May 2026
Forum, May 28: Jackson (Shirley). The Haunting of Hill House, first English edition, signed presentation inscription from the author to Claude Fredericks, 1960. £2,000-3,000
Forum, May 28: Lennon (John). In His Own Write, first edition, first impression, signed by the author, 1964. £3,000-4,000
Forum, May 28: Doves Press.- Keats (John). [Poems], one of 200 copies on paper, Doves Press, 1914. £5,000-7,000
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 28th May 2026
Forum, May 28: Rodrigues (João Barbosa). Sertum Palmarum Brasiliensium, 2 vol., first and only edition, Brussels, 1903. £8,000-12,000
Forum, May 28: Newton (Sir Isaac). Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica…editio ultima, auctior et emendatior, Amsterdam, Sumptibus Societatis, 1714. £8,000-12,000
Forum, May 28: Kepler (Johannes). Ad Vitellionem paralipomena, wuibus astronomiae pars optica traditur, first edition, Frankfurt am Main, 1604. £5,000-7,000
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 28th May 2026
Forum, May 28: Tagliacozzi (Gaspare). De Curtorum Chirurgia per insitionem, libri duo, first edition, Venice, Gasparo Bindoni, 1597. £7,000-10,000
Forum, May 28: Lootsman (Jacobsz). The Lightning Colomne, or Sea-Mirrour, containing the Sea-Coasts of the Northern, Eastern and Western Navigation..., 1670. £8,000-12,000
Forum, May 28: Ribelles y Helip (José), Attributed to. An album comprising 33 finely executed watercolours of Spanish costume, bull-fighting scenes, and other genre subjects, [circa 1830]. £10,000-15,000
