This time of year, it is common to be on the hunt for engaging books to read, and the Macmillan's Pocket Classics are always top of the search list. This November I found Poe's Prose Tales on eBay from a seller in Sheldon Connecticut. The inscription on the inside cover of one of the previous, possibly the original owner is Robert O. Boyd. There is also the word Enterprise, most likely a town as it is capitalized, as well as what appears to be Oregon (although it is squished along the edge, the g is distinctive from the the y and p in the other writing).
Engage research mode on the interwebs... we found the most likely match for Robert.
Robert Osborn Boyd was born on 29 July 1903, in Kennewick, Benton, Washington, United States, his father, Daniel Boyd Sr, was 27 and his mother, Mary Ethelwyne Axtell, was 28. He lived in United States in 1949 and Portland, Multnomah, Oregon, United States in 1950. He died on 10 September 1979, in Alexandria, Fairfax County, Virginia, United States, at the age of 76, and was buried in Enterprise, Wallowa, Oregon, United States.
We were a bit miffed at first why this book was in Connecticut if the previous owner wrote they lived in Oregon. Old books of this age usually don't travel quite so far east from a westerly home, especially in early to mid 20th century. People moving west was a normal course of trajectory in that age and time. This book seemed a long way away from home but the information we found tells us that when Robert passed away in Virginia this book stayed behind on the east coast and his body came back to Oregon.
Always interesting to research where the books in our collection have traveled.
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