GREAT NEWS IN THE WORLD OF BOTANY.

The eighth edition of Gray’s Manual of Botany, the final and most comprehensive edition of the foremost guide to the botany of the northeastern United States, is available at the Internet Archive—all 1686 pages. Although it was published in 1950, the librarian at the University of Florida appends this note: “Copyright status reviewed by UF staff – out of copyright.” Yes, you read correctly: the eighth edition of Gray (which is ridiculously expensive in the used-book trade) is out of copyright. It seems the copyright was never renewed. We have added this edition to the Botany page in our Eclectic Library, and we expect a stampede of botanically inclined readers in the direction of the Internet Archive.

Gray’s Manual of Botany. Eighth (Centennial) Edition—Illustrated. A Handbook of the Flowering Plants and Ferns of the Central and Northeastern United States and Adjacent Canada. Largely rewritten and expanded by Merritt Lyndon Fernald. New York, etc.: American Book Company, 1950.