Presentation Card with Ink Inscription and Signature by Beatrix Heelis [Potter] Including an Original Pen and Ink Sketch of Peter Rabbit!!

(Children's Literature / Original Artwork / Signed Ephemera) Presentation Card with Ink Inscription and Signature by Beatrix Heelis [Potter] Including an Original Pen and Ink Sketch of Peter Rabbit!!

Christmas 1936. 6" x 4-1/4" presentation sheet. Single off-white sheet. An exceptional, highly personal association piece featuring a hand-written ink inscription and signature from "Wm and Beatrix Heelis" to "Christopher and Phyllis Le Fleming, and the young man, from Peter Rabbit, Christmas 1936." Below the signed presentation, Potter has added a wonderful small original pen and ink sketch of Peter Rabbit accompanied by a hand-inked trail of winding "x" mark footprints. This unique item is accompanied by a formal Letter of Authenticity from PSA/DNA Authentication Services, alongside a FIRST EDITION copy of The Peter Rabbit Music Books: Book I (London: Frederick Warne & Co., 1935) housed in its original pictorial paper wrappers.

The physical condition of the item is graded NEAR FINE (utilizing the standard antiquarian book grading scale for works on paper). The presentation sheet displays one cleanly trimmed edge and instances of light scattered foxing across the surface, though the hand-written inscription, signature, and original ink sketch remain completely clear, dark, and visually striking. The accompanying first edition music booklet is in VERY GOOD + condition (utilizing the same grading scale), showing only light handling wear to its delicate paper wrappers.

The Peter Rabbit Music Books and the Le Fleming Collaboration

By 1935, the 69-year-old Beatrix Potter had largely retired from her literary career, dedicating her time almost entirely to farming, land conservation, and Herdwick sheep breeding in the Lake District. Despite suffering from failing eyesight and a pronounced tremble in her hand, she enthusiastically returned to the world of Peter Rabbit when the young composer Christopher Le Fleming approached her. Le Fleming had composed a series of whimsical piano pieces inspired by her classic tales, designed specifically for children. Delighted by his compositions, Potter embarked on a true artistic collaboration with Le Fleming, writing the forwards and selecting and adapting the mechanical reproductions for both Book I and Book II of The Peter Rabbit Music Books. This presentation card, gifted directly to the composer and his family at Christmastime in 1936, captures the profound personal warmth and mutual admiration behind this late-career creative triumph.

Series Bibliography, Census, and Market Scarcity

Original sketches by Beatrix Potter from her later years are of extraordinary scarcity on the open market, as her output had slowed dramatically and the vast majority of her personal papers and drawings were bequeathed directly to the National Trust. A current global sweep of the OCLC/WorldCat database locates only a small handful of institutional collections holding direct archival material related to the Le Fleming musical collaboration, making a privately held presentation piece with an unrecorded, freehand sketch a paramount rarity. Because authentic signatures from her married life as "Beatrix Heelis" paired with an original rendering of her most iconic character are almost non-existent outside of permanent museum vaults, this unsophisticated artifact carries immense biographical weight and exceptional investment value.

THIS UNMATCHED 1936 PRESENTATION SHEET, FEATURING AN INTUITIVE ORIGINAL PEN AND INK DRAWING BY BEATRIX POTTER AND DOCUMENTING HER LAST MAJOR LITERARY COLLABORATION, REPRESENTS A CRITICAL ACQUISITION FOR INSTITUTIONAL SPECIAL COLLECTIONS OR EXTRAORDINARY PRIVATE COLLECTIONS DEVOTED TO THE HISTORY OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE, ORIGINAL BOOK ILLUSTRATIONS, OR HIGH-ASSOCIATION LITERARY AUTOGRAPHS.

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