Les Transformateurs d'Energie. Générateurs, Accumulateurs, Moteurs.

Looking inside technology. A publisher's sample of this fabulous, chromolithographic flap book on fin de siècle technology. Normally published in two volumes, with the text in the first and the plates in the second, this copy is together in one, in a simple green cloth binding. A sample of the red cloth binding that would appear on the trade copies is bound in at the front.

This luxurious production was probably intended as a gift book for the Christmas market. The text portions include short histories, photos, and simple diagrams, and the 'atlas' section comprises attractive, die-cut chromolithographic flap illustrations allowing the reader to explore each piece of machinery from the outside in. Each individual part depicted in the chromolithographs is numbered, with a guide printed on the verso of the opposing page. Some of the featured machines include the steam locomotive, dynamo, motors and turbines, gas boiler, motorcycle, Daimler automobile, an airship, the Wright brothers' plane, a Voisin plane, telegraphic equipment, and a battery (accumulator).

Publishers sample; tall 4to, with pictorial cloth cover and spine samples bound in at beginning; diagrams and illustrations from photographs throughout the text; 13 card leaves with 22 chromolithographic illustrations with elaborate flap overlays, key to the illustrations on each opposite page, half title of the second volume partially loose, light spotting primarily to the plates; original green cloth boards, rubbed, bumped, joints splitting, good condition; vol. I 221pp.