Piet Schreuders - The Dell "Mapbacks"
010 Publishers
Published 1997

History of Dell Books with a focus on the highly collectable "mapbacks". Includes 30 plates of representative mapbacks - front and back. The book is actually in the format of a desk calendar... for 1998.

Tags:   collecting vintage paperbacks dell dell books mapback

© All Rights Reserved

A homage to Piet Schreuders, this is my version of the back cover of his Book/Calendar "The Dell 'Mapbacks'"

Most of the lettering on Dell covers was the work of Bernie Salbreiter. His free style of handlettering is reminiscent of American advertising art of the 1920s and '30s, ranking with the best of the lettering of movie posters, book jackets and newspaper ads of the period.
It can especially be enjoyed on the spines of the early Dells.

Tags:   dell vintage paperback mapback murder mysteries romance salbreiter

© All Rights Reserved

The early Dell Books featured the image of an eye peering through a keyhole on the front cover. Over the years they tweaked the keyhole in various ways. Here are examples from my collection (not all first instances):

1st Row from left to right:

Dell 1 Original Mystery keyhole design – Death in the Library
Dell 5 First Mapback keyhole design – Four Frightened Women
Dell 25 Mapback keyhole with “A Dell Book” – Speak No Evil
Dell 47 Mapback keyhole with Lines – Keeper of the Keys
Dell 49 Mapback keyhole with Book Number – The Feathered Serpent

2nd Row from left to right:

Dell 73 Mapback - First Romance keyhole – Week-end Marriage
Dell 195 Mapback - Adventure keyhole – Beam’s End
Dell 281 Mapback - Historical keyhole – Anthony Adverse in Italy
Dell 317 Mapback - Western keyhole – Alder Gulch

Tags:   dell vintage paperback mapback keyhole keyholes paperback collecting

© All Rights Reserved

Hervey Allen - Anthony Adverse in Italy, Africa & America
Dell Books 281/283/285, 1949

"This story is about — Anthony Adverse, a slim, handsome young man with blue eyes and fair, curly hair, has a face that bears a haunting resemblance to the face of another, long since turned to dust. It is this resemblance and its effect on an old man that shape the future life and adventures of Anthony Adverse, child of destiny."

Tags:   dell books vintage 40s romance adventure paperback spines

© All Rights Reserved

1st Mapback - Dell Books 5 - Four Frightened Women by George Harmon Coxe, 1943

Last Mapback - Dell Books 937 - Murder at Hazelmoor by Agatha Christie, 1957

Dell used maps as a standard feature for a significant amount of time: 1943 - 1951.

In the Dell 25¢ reprint series, 577 books had back covers of maps or designs. Of those 577 original mapbacks, 25 exactly duplicated previous maps, so there were 552 different maps in the series. Of these, 24 revised earlier maps, so all together 528 original maps exist in the 25¢ series.

The decline of the maps was part of an overall re-design instituted by Frank Taylor, executive editor. At the time many readers complained about the omission of the maps, but the kinds of books Dell was beginning to publish then did not need maps and having an in-house artist prepare them was expensive. For a short period the maps were revived in a more decorative form by Walter Brooks "if the books demanded them". But they never became a standard feature after 1951; collectors thus have only 577 books with maps on the back covers.

Tags:   dell vintage paperback mapback paperback collecting

© All Rights Reserved