Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1946. The dedicatee's copy of this anthology, which is dedicated to and signed by Ann Petry, whose story "Like a Winding Sheet" has its first book appearance in this volume, after its appearance in the NAACP publication The Crisis. 1946 was also the year Petry's first novel, The Street, was published, winning a Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship, and selling more than a million copies. Signed by Petry, first in pencil, now fading, and at a later point, over that, in pen. There are three edge-sunned slips of paper serving as bookmarks laid in (presumably by Petry): on the page with Petry's biographical note, on the page listing "Like a Winding Sheet" in the year's Roll of Honor, and on the page listing that story and "Olaf and His Girl Friend" in the Index of Distinctive Stories. Small Connecticut book store stamp rear pastedown. The book is foxed but otherwise near fine, in a very good, sunned and edge-chipped dust jacket. Other authors appearing in this volume include Vladimir Nabokov, Peter Taylor, Ray Bradbury, Elizabeth Hardwick, and many others. No mention is made in the text as to how Petry earned the dedication (which in other years of the series did not necessarily go to one of the anthologized authors). A unique contributor's copy of this collection, and probably as close to being the dedication copy as there was. [#031737] SOLD