Description
Valley Fine Arts Press, Redlands, California [Published date: 1937]. Hardcover, xii, 129 pp; 21 cm. First edition. Printed by The Citrograph Printing Company, Redlands, California. Blue cloth boards stamped in black on front and spine.
Rare, out-of-print & unusual books · Since 1997
120
Turn the pages with the arrows, keyboard, or a swipe.
Catalog notes
Condition & notes
In very good condition / NO dust jacket. Light shelfwear and faint nicking to cloth at corners and spine ends, mild sunning to spine. Binding tight. Light toning to end papers. Otherwise pages are clean and unmarked. Publisher's prospectus leaf laid in before title page. Ownership label on rear pastedown: "A League of Western Writers Book." Written by Conrad F. Wedberg (Field Assistant, Bureau of Speech Correction, California State Department of Education; Director of Speech Therapy, Redlands City Schools), this is a first-person account of the author's thirty-year struggle with severe stuttering and his self-devised recovery. Combining autobiography and early speech therapy psychology, Wedberg argues that stuttering is not merely a mechanical speech defect but a manifestation of deeper emotional conflict. His narrative aims to help other stutterers achieve "emotional freedom and speech control" through self-understanding rather than mechanical drills or quack cures. Dedicated to his wife Alma and to Mabel Farrington Gifford, a noted pioneer in speech pathology in California. Contents include: Foreword; And Then They Laughed; Stumbling Along; Facing the Facts; Emotional Sham Battles; Mental Cow Paths; The Stutterer Speaks; What Happened Then?; Freedom; Your Challenge; Bibliography. A significant Depression-era contribution to American self-help and speech therapy literature, reflecting early twentieth-century therapeutic approaches to stuttering grounded in emotional regulation and personal psychology.