From the Niagara Falls Review:
It was one of those decisions that really didn’t require a lot of thought. Bob Gale found the book online and knew he had to have it.
“I really like the history of Niagara Falls and I’m always searching for all kinds of things,” he said.
A few weeks ago, Gale purchased a piece of Niagara Falls history: A first edition, first issue English copy of “A New Discovery of a Vast Country in America,” containing the first published sketch of the falls and the first eyewitness account.
Gale said he often searches online auction houses for interesting and unique items to add to his collection of artifacts. When he saw the book being offered by a heritage book shop in California, he jumped at the chance to own it.
“I don’t think it would be as valuable to someone in California as it is to us here,” he said.
The 355-page book was published in 1698 and chronicles the voyage of Father Louis Hennepin, a French missionary and adventurer who explored the Great Lakes region of Canada and the United States, the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico in the 1670s. It contains sketches and pullout maps that accompany the text.