Mystery Page in 50th Anniv Hobbit I Bought

Can't imagine the publisher doing such a rough job. I wonder if it was to remove an ex-libris stamp or somesuch. Then again, you would think if someone was trying to hide something, they would do a much tidier job, rather than just ripping a page out.

[Edit: Ignore - wiser and knowledgeable heads prevail :) ]

Christina and I have a copy of this too, which I document in the Descriptive Bibliography, p. 63, as "another, presumably later impression [of the Houghton Mifflin 50th anniversary edition] (but simultaneous publication?)". The "H" at the foot of the copyright page, absent from other copies, suggests a later or subsequent printing, and I suppose (at this great distance of time) that I had some evidence that this copy came out at the same time as the others we owned, probably from knowing then when we acquired them. Houghton Mifflin may well have needed multiple printings before publication to meet demand. In our copy, the original title-leaf was similarly removed a little roughly, as shown by the tear at the bottom, but the cancel leaf has been pasted in better, so that the rough stub isn't obvious unless one looks closely.

Wayne

Thank you both. Like Stu wrote, it's such a shoddy job that I don't think the book's seller was trying to pull one over on me. The rest of the book is perfectly like new, really sweet considering it's nearly three decades old. So I bet she didn't even look closely enough to notice the cancel leaf.

Which is certainly what it is, thank you Wayne. I had never heard of a cancel leaf until this morning.

Thank you again for solving my mystery.