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Earp Collection

The Earp Collection was donated to the Alexander Turnbull Library by Edgar Allen Earp in 1939 in memory of his late wife. It is part of the Turnbull Named Collections.

The collection is comprised of about 400 volumes, chiefly concerned with bee keeping and bee culture, including six editions, ranging from 1877–1929, of ABC and XYZ of Bee Keeping by Amos Root; a title that remains in publication.

The collection also includes several volumes of bound miscellaneous pamphlets from various sources regarding bee-keeping, as well as editions of the New Zealand Bee Keepers Journal from 1914–1922. A number of the volumes are bound in beautiful examples of nineteenth-century cloth publishers’ bindings with bee motifs.

Cover A.I. Root's The ABC of bee culture, illustrated with an inlaid gilt bee.
A.I. Root, The ABC of bee culture, 1881. Record page

Mr E. A. Earp (1874–1963) was a senior governmental apiary instructor. His duties involved advising the Minister of Horticulture on technical matters in regards to bee- keeping and honey grading. He also wrote and contributed to a number of texts concerning bee keeping.

E A Earp (second from left), Auckland Star, 17 January 1934.

Access items in this collection

Original items in this collection can be requested through the Library’s catalogue and consulted in the Katherine Mansfield Reading Room.

This collection is catalogued online and may be called up as a list on the National Library catalogue by searching ‘Earp’ using the ‘in call number’ search option in the NLNZ catalogue advanced search.

Spines from the Earp collection, showing the common bee motif.
Selection of bee-themed binding stamps.