# Is "Millions of Cats" by Wanda Gág a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Millions of Cats by Wanda Gág (Coward-McCann, 1928) is identified by: New York: Coward-McCann, 1928. The census claim is confirmed: New York: Coward-McCann, 1928 is the true first.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- New York: Coward-McCann, 1928
- The title page ends with three lines: "PUBLISHED IN NEW YORK by / COWARD-McCANN, Inc. / IN THE YEAR 1928"
- The decisive first-printing point is the copyright page, which in the first printing runs to five lines and ends "By the Jersey City Printing Co."; later printings omit that printer's line while retaining the 1928 title-page date
- Bound in publisher's yellow decorated paper-covered boards
- First-printing dust jacket: front and back flaps blank white, back panel blank yellow, and the author's name set as "Gag"
- The second-state jacket adds a biographical paragraph on Wanda Gág, an endorsement by Rockwell Kent and a review by Anne Carroll Moore; sets the name as "Ga'g" (an apostrophe standing in for the accented á, which could not readily be typeset in 1928); and revises the birthplace wording from a desolate Minnesota village to a small Minnesota town
- Publisher imprint reads Coward-McCann

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Wanda Gág |
| Publisher | Coward-McCann |
| Year | 1928 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Children's / illustrated |
| Key point | New York: Coward-McCann, 1928 |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
New York: Coward-McCann, 1928. The title page ends with three lines: "PUBLISHED IN NEW YORK by / COWARD-McCANN, Inc. / IN THE YEAR 1928". The decisive first-printing point is the copyright page, which in the first printing runs to five lines and ends "By the Jersey City Printing Co."; later printings omit that printer's line while retaining the 1928 title-page date. Bound in publisher's yellow decorated paper-covered boards. First-printing dust jacket: front and back flaps blank white, back panel blank yellow, and the author's name set as "Gag". The second-state jacket adds a biographical paragraph on Wanda Gág, an endorsement by Rockwell Kent and a review by Anne Carroll Moore; sets the name as "Ga'g" (an apostrophe standing in for the accented á, which could not readily be typeset in 1928); and revises the birthplace wording from a desolate Minnesota village to a small Minnesota town. Dealer accounts of the jacket conflict — at least one ABAA member cites a rear-panel biography mentioning "Bohemian" as a first-edition point, which cannot be reconciled with a blank back panel — so rely on the Jersey City Printing line on the copyright page, not the jacket. A slipcased, signed and numbered limited issue of the first printing exists, accompanied by a Wanda Gág etching; it retains the Jersey City Printing line and was issued without a dust jacket.

## Is this the true first?
The census claim is confirmed: New York: Coward-McCann, 1928 is the true first. This is a genuine American first with no earlier foreign-language or British precedent — Gág wrote and illustrated the book in English, so there is no original-language trap on this title. The first British edition is London: Faber & Faber, 1929, which appeared in Faber's very first catalogue in the firm's founding year; it is a separate edition collected in its own right and is not the first. The Newbery Honor (1929) and the standing description of the book as the oldest American picture book continuously in print are reputational facts, not identification points, and neither appears on or distinguishes the first printing.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club edition of the 1928 first is documented. The controlling reprint tell is the copyright page: a copy dated 1928 on the title page but lacking the "By the Jersey City Printing Co." line is a second issue of the first edition, not a first printing. This is the most-missed distinction on the title, precisely because the 1928 title-page date survives on later printings and reads as conclusive. Second-state jackets (Rockwell Kent endorsement, Anne Carroll Moore review, "Ga'g" spelling, revised Minnesota wording) are frequently married to first-printing books and offered as complete firsts — jacket and book must be checked as separate items. Later Coward-McCann printings and modern reissues retain the 1928 copyright date.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Millions of Cats* by Wanda Gág a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/millions-of-cats
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.