# Is "The Covered Wagon" by Emerson Hough a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Covered Wagon by Emerson Hough (D. Appleton and Company, 1922) is identified by: Census claim confirmed. US-only first in book form; no UK edition found that precedes.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The first is D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1922, and the first printing is identified by Appleton's numeral code in parentheses at the foot of the last page: "
- " = first printing, "
- " = second printing, and so on — the Quill & Brush publisher guide states this rule for D. Appleton & Co., and dealer descriptions of this title cite the "1" on the last page as the first-printing point
- Binding: original red ribbed cloth stamped in black on the front cover and spine, with a map printed on the endpapers and a black-and-white frontispiece by W. H. D. Koerner; dealers collate it [6], 378, [2] pp
- The jacket carries a Koerner design and should be a priced jacket
- Copies with 1923 on the Appleton title page are later and are regularly mis-catalogued as firsts, so the title-page date and the last-page numeral must agree
- Publisher imprint reads D. Appleton and Company

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Emerson Hough |
| Publisher | D. Appleton and Company |
| Year | 1922 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The first is D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1922, and the first printing is identified by Appleton's numeral code in parentheses at the… |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
Census claim confirmed. The first is D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1922, and the first printing is identified by Appleton's numeral code in parentheses at the foot of the last page: "(1)" = first printing, "(2)" = second printing, and so on — the Quill & Brush publisher guide states this rule for D. Appleton & Co., and dealer descriptions of this title cite the "1" on the last page as the first-printing point. Binding: original red ribbed cloth stamped in black on the front cover and spine, with a map printed on the endpapers and a black-and-white frontispiece by W. H. D. Koerner; dealers collate it [6], 378, [2] pp. The jacket carries a Koerner design and should be a priced jacket. Copies with 1923 on the Appleton title page are later and are regularly mis-catalogued as firsts, so the title-page date and the last-page numeral must agree.

## Is this the true first?
US-only first in book form; no UK edition found that precedes. The first-thus trap is the serialization: the novel ran in The Saturday Evening Post beginning 1 April 1922 with Koerner illustrations, so the Appleton book is the first book appearance rather than the first appearance in print. Only the Appleton 1922 is collected as the first edition.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
The standing trap is the Grosset & Dunlap photoplay reprint issued for the 1923 Paramount film directed by James Cruze: both the book and its jacket are illustrated with stills from the film in place of the Koerner frontispiece and jacket art, and the G&D imprint appears on the spine and title page. Any copy with film stills, or with a Grosset & Dunlap imprint, is a reprint regardless of the copyright date shown.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Covered Wagon* by Emerson Hough a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-covered-wagon
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.