I used a flat scanner to scan them in full-size (at 300 dpi), then used Paint Shop Pro to manipulate and shrink the image. Besides shrinking them, I had to put the front and spine and back together from separate scans, since all that would not fit on the scanner all at once. I also took one of the books and changed the cover color, so I would have more of a variety.
I cut out the pictures, and then I cut pieces of wood to fit inside the covers (about ¾ inch long). I made some of the wood different sizes, and trimmed the covers to fit the wood, just to add more variety. Finally I glued the covers around the pieces of wood.
I used to like to collect old children's books, and I mainly used books from that collection.
Here are the scans, which can be downloaded as gif files or as a pdf file to print, for others to use. Please use them only for personal projects and not items for sale!
To use the gif files, just right-click on them and save picture.
I'm also including a bit of detail about the books to make them more interesting.
It's a children's magazine called "Little Folk" (A Magazine for the Young, Cassell & Company, Limited), and the volume I have is from 1880.
It cost £14; one of the most costly purchases I made while I was there!
I then used Paint Shop Pro's colorize function to change the color of the book's cover, so it would look like I had a bigger variety of books!
Here is a link to the Paint Shop Pro file (cover.psp) with the main part of the cover already selected.
There is a boy's name written in the book; the former owner. I scanned it so I could include here, because I think it makes it more interesting. Here it is:
The first is called a Revolutionary War story called "Molly the Drummer Boy" by Harriet T. Comstock (with halftone illustrations by Curtis Wager-Smith).
The other is "The Kingfisher's Egg" by L.T. Meade ("and Other Stories by Ellis Walton, Geraldine R Galasow and Olive Molesworth").
Both books have the name (Alethea Edwards) written on the first page. I wonder who she was...
In "Molly the Drummer Boy" there is a second name (a friend of Alethea?), written on the inside front cover in a different handwriting. I scanned it and I'm including it here. I wonder what ever happened to Lydia.
I got this book from my friend Val in Utah as a birthday gift in 1991. He had gotten it from a cousin in California, who had found it in an old barn.
There is a name on the inside back cover, but it's too faded to make it all out. The first name might be "Mary".
It is full of beautiful black-and-white and color illustrations. I'm including one here. You can click on it for a high-quality picture (325 K).
I got it in 1978.
It is bigger than all the other books has a puffy red cover.
Sometimes I very carefully add a touch of gold coloring with a metallic gold marker on the cross and other spots.
Last but not least, here is the link to the PDF file of all the book covers together, that you can easily print out and cut out:
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