Steinbeck, John (illustrated by Dennis, Wesley) - The Red Pony - Viking Press: New York, 1945 - First Illustrated Edition / First Printing - “Illustrated Edition First Published In 1945” stated on the copyright page with no mention of later printings as required in order to denote the first printing of the first illustrated edition.
The book has a small tasteful book plate on the front end page and two small spots on the rear board but otherwise an easily very good or better example. Book issued without a dust jacket but instead in a slipcase. The slipcase has soiling, rubbing, staining to the open side edge, and is beginning to split along the rear joints but still remains intact and presentable. There is an area to the lower rear closed edge which has a tear and may chip in the future but is currently still attached. All together a still handsome copy of this beloved Steinbeck title. Basis for the 1949 film of the same title which starred Myrna Loy and Robert Mitchum. This is the first edition to have the beautiful water color illustrations by Dennis Wesley which were printed using four color lithography.
This book has the most variants we can think of. There are variations of nearly everything involving this book. To the best of our knowledge there is yet to be any definitive conclusions as to either what would be considered the first variant or, believe it or not, how many variants there are. In our experience and research we are able to locate copies with three different colors of slipcase (green, tan, and gray), three different printers, two different book binderies, two different colors of stain to the page edges, and some with stain to all three sides of the block and some with stain to only the top edge. I wish I were kidding. Within all these variations there are multiple combinations. This particular example has the tan slipcase, blue stain to all three sides of the block, was printed by Zeese-Wilkinson and was bound by H Wolff.