President Franklin Pierce’s copy by gift from San Francisco’s first mayor
 
The Annals of San Francisco; Containing a Summary of the History of the First Discovery, Settlement, Progress, and Present Condition of California, and a Complete History of all the Important Events Connected with Its Great City. 
Frank Soule, John Giron, James Nisbet
New York, 1855
 
First edition, first printing of a comprehensive early text on San Francisco. 6 steel-engraved plates, 2 maps(one folding), numerous engravings throughout. Some foxing to flyleaves and plates, some offsetting to title-page and pages facing the plates, else a clean Near Fine copy. Later half-morocco, all edges marbled. Frank Deering bookplate - one of the most prominent book collectors of the last century. 
 
A beautiful copy with the heaviest of provenances:
 
Presentation copy inscribed by the city’s first mayor, John Geary, to the 14th President of the United States, Franklin Pierce:
 
"Franklin Pierce President. With the Compliments of Jno. W. Geary” 
 
John Geary(1819-1873) was one of the most accomplished Americans of the 19th century, having served as postmaster of San Francisco and then its mayor before being appointed by President Pierce as governor of the Kansas Territory at the height of antebellum tensions over slavery. Pierce’s successor, James Buchanan, relieved Geary of his position and he returned to his native Pennsylvania where he would soon serve as a Union general in the Civil War and governor of the state afterwards. 
 
A historic work on one of the nation’s most significant cities with an unsurpassably awesome provenance.