Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc.

Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc. is an antiquarian bookshop founded in 1953 in New York City by Bernard M. Rosenthal. In 1970 the bookstore was moved to San Francisco and then moved to Berkeley, California in 1989.

Caroline Boeing Poole, wife of John Hudson Poole, collected many first edition books and was a patron to many authors. When she died in 1931 her books were left to her 11 year old son John H. Poole, Jr. In 1950 the library was housed at the Huntington Library until its sale between 1977 and 1996 by Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc.

Biographical Information

Bernard Rosenthal, founder of Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc., was born in Munich, Germany in 1920, into a family of rare and antiquarian booksellers. Escaping Adolph Hitler in the 1930s, Rosenthal's family immigrated to the United States. Ultimately, Rosenthal attended the University of California, Berkeley, as an international student. He served in the U.S. military from 1942-1946, and returned to Berkeley when his service was over. He worked as a chemist and an interpreter before deciding to enter the rare book business. He married his wife, Ruth, in 1950.

Three years later, Rosenthal opened his own rare bookstore, Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc., in New York, NY. In 1970, he moved the bookstore to San Francisco, CA where it remained until 1989 when Rosenthal moved it to its current (2007) location in Berkeley, CA.