Inscribed by Joseph Lehn in German script: Joseph Lehn Sein Buch, Geschreiben den 10th tag Februarius 1845 (Joseph Lehn His Book, Written on the 10th day of February 1845.)
Above: John Baer was everywhere in 19th century Lancaster County. Every household was a potential customer for the reams of almanacs, newspapers, books and broadsides he printed.
Joseph and Elizabeth Lehn were willing and ready customers. Joseph was a Mennonite farmer and barrel maker who is well known today for the brightly-painted wooden ware he crafted: saffron boxes, sugar buckets, miniature chests.
Lehn's colorful wooden ware is highly coveted by collectors of Americana, who have been known to hand over mid-five-figure checks to purchase red-and-white seed chests by Joseph Lehn.
Joseph Lehn gave this Mennonite catechism to his music-teacher son Henrich (Henry) in 1843. Henry probably created this watercolor-and-ink bookplate himself.
The second book I show above is another John Baer imprint, the1843 Evangelium Nicodemi (The Gospel of Nicodemus) a book of the New Testament Apocrypha.
Unfortunately, most books printed by John Baer have no fraktur bookplates and no famous associations. But the search for those books is as much fun as finding them.