13 stone lithograph plates ( 1 double page) bound in accordion style with over 40 images + 7, [1] text pp. Printed ad on rear pastedown. (oblong 12mo) 12x14 cm (4¾x5½) original red embossed cloth lettered in gilt. 

Presentation copy, with "compliments of" written in ink at the top of the W.W. Gavitt Bankers and Brokers ad that is the rear pastedown of the volume. Rare, profusely illustrated promotional volume for Topeka, Kansas.

Published in a variety of versions with varying number of plates, this piece includes the exceedingly scarce real estate promotion intended by W.W. Gavitt & Co. Bankers to extoll the civic virtues and history of Topeka, along with mentions of how over 2000 homes were built in Topeka in 1887, and how the city had annexed more land forecasting 1888 would be even more successful. Also included are tables for population growth, and total real estate valuation for the city. Gavitt (1840-1922) was a banker and business man who moved to Topeka in 1868, and established his banking and loan, which by 1882 had grown enough to erect the large Office Building on SE 5th between Kansas and Quincy, and whose real estate and banking businesses would grow to include the W.W. Gavitt Medical Co., and the W.W. Gavitt Printing and Publishing Co. His son Harry E. Gavitt, was a famed inventor, manufacturer, chemist, and salesman, who by the 1930s was operating a network of 6000 sales agents for his direct mail medical operation in Topeka.