New York: Clarkstown Country Club; American Import Book Company; Vedic Research Press, 1944; 1919; 1929. First editions. Sammelband of 3 publications, 22x16cm, 12pp; [5], 47pp; and 24pp. Few plate illustrations in the middle pamphlet. Modern Indian binding of soft red leather tooled in gilt with brown spine label and gilt lettering, metallic silk endpapers. Samuel Weiser ticket to front pastedown. Some natural splitting at front hinge due to binding technique, few smudges to pages else clean and complete internally. Housed in a red slipcase.

3 scarce publications from the controversial man who became known as America's first Yogi, Pierre Arnold Bernard (1875-1955).  Bernard founded the Clarkstown Country Club at Nyack, New York in 1918 and with his wife, Blanche DeVries, popularized Yoga and Eastern philosophy among the affluent population, which spread from New York to other cities in the ensuing decades.  The first pamphlet advertises a year long lecture course in yoga at the club which was free to members ($100 membership fee + $25 in yearly dues).  Apparently, to qualify for club membership, you must have been "free, white, and twenty-one."

The second publication contains 47 pages of blurbs from various figures from Nietzsche to Max Muller (with MANY of them by Bernard) on the Vedas and other aspects of Hinduism.  A large section of the quotes read like a modern dust jacket, with many in praise of Bernard and his teachings.  One plate in this pamphlet shows Bernard in the midst of his famous "Kali Mudra" death trance demonstration where he would enter a deep meditative state of self hypnosis and allow physicians to pierce him slowly with needles, showing no pain response.  Seemingly a self-promoting publication from the time when Bernard had just opened Clarkstown.  

Price: $450.00