Flyleaf Scribblings

Poets and They Know It!
When you open the inside covers of a very old book, you may just find messages written in the past to people of that present! There may be drawings, doodles, or unrelated initials. Frequently you are wowed by a show of elegant Spencerian Script. Some of the more sophisticated entries are hand-inscribed poems; playful, possessive, sentimental, or even threatening. We'll even examine  few.
 
These artistic meanderings are often called “flyleaf scribblings,” “book rhymes,” or “flyleaf inscriptions.” Schoolbooks were convenient places for students to leave their musings. Blame boredom, runaway imagination, or the tradition of leaving a message on the last day of school to memorialize their experience.
 
At the turn of the 20th century, Clifton Johnson, author of The Country School, dedicated an entire chapter on flyleaf scribblings in another of his books entitled, (click on link)
​Old Time Schools and Schoolbooks.
​
Like initials carved into trees, school clapboards, or desks, like love locks chained to a bridge, flyleaf scribblings acknowledge a moment in time that says…“I was here.”  

Here are some examples I found in the front and back leaves of ancient copies of Town's Fourth Reader(1847), Dubb's Complete Mental Arithmetic (1893, and Course and Methods by John T. Prince (1886)

I'll wager you have a few good ones to share.
Flyleaf Poetry
Remember well, and bear in mind,
A constant friend is hard to find.
But if you find one just as true,
Leave not the old one for the new.
Valeria C. Moses   1851

May virtues attend you
And peace be your end
Are the sincere wishes
Of Jane, your friend.

Happy did we meet,
Happy have we been,
Happy may we part,
Happy may we meet again!
1851  Cyrene G. Webster Gilmanton, NH
 Written in the end page of Town’s Fourth Reader

​For photos below: Click on the photos to enlarge. Check out the ominous warnings of one book owner! I like this one: "See these leaves ain't (ant) torn apart, before this book is learnt by heart."