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Photography, original
US NAVY ASIATIC STATION - CALDWELL, Harold Marcko. An album recording his service on the Asiatic Pacific Station.Various locations : 1925-27
An impressive album and collection of loose photographs recording the voyages of USS West Virginia and USS Beaver. The photographs, many taken by a fellow sailor, feature US ships underway, the recovery of a seaplane, and Pacific islands. A number show China in the warlord period of the mid 1920s, documenting the gruesome public executions of...Learn More
WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE. Two large-format photographs related to the imprisonment of suffragettes.Bristol & Oxford : 1909 & c.1912
The first photograph depicts a reception in Bristol welcoming Ellen Pitman and Mary Sophia Allen home following their release from Holloway Prison. Annie Kenney is pictured in the second row. The second photograph shows pro-suffrage campaigners, seated in a carriage outside St John's College, Oxford, protesting the arrests resulting from the 1912...Learn More
BAILEY, David. Well Hung.London : [1997]
First edition, inscribed by the artist on the verso of front wrapper, "To H. L. Love DB, 98." This is a scarce catalogue produced for an exhibition at Well Hung gallery in London, held in December 1997.Learn More
GEORGE, D. S. (attrib.). Photographs documenting the construction of the Aswan Low Dam.[Aswan, Egypt] : 1899-1902
Uncommon collection of large photographs likely taken by the British photographer D. S. George, who spent several years in Egypt producing official photographic material, including the commemorative albums for the completion of the Aswan Low and High Dams.
Planned as the largest masonry dam in the world, the Aswan Low Dam was built by John...Learn More
HAIRWORK. Family hair collection.[c.1850s]
An intriguing example of this Victorian family practice, likely composed during a period of mourning, with 23 locks of hair tied with blue ribbons for girls and red ribbons for boys.
In the Victorian period, it became common practice for bereaved family members to collect locks of hair from deceased loved ones. The practice was popularized...Learn More
ROCKHILL, William Woodville. Diary of a Journey Through Mongolia and Tibet in 1891 and 1892.Washington, DC : 1894
First edition, a superbly extra-illustrated presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the title page, "William Hallett Phillips, from his fellow crank, W. W. Rockhill." Bound in are 58 original photographs from the expedition, a sheet of Tibetan script likely in Rockhill's hand, and an autograph note signed on Department of State letterhead,...Learn More
YANGTSE RIVER. Album of photographs taken while cruising with the river steamer Wenchow.Jiujiang, China : 1938-39
An appealing group of photographs, the unnamed photographer perhaps an oil consultant sent upriver to Jiujiang to evaluate the impact of the Battle of Wuhan, a four-month engagement that saw one million Chinese troops defend five provinces. Japanese troops took Jiujiang in summer 1938 and killed almost 100,000 civilians.
According to the...Learn More
JOHNSON, C. The Yangtse Gorges: A Photographic Souvenir.[Perhaps Shanghai : c.1935]
First edition, first printing. The 14 original photographs, supported by descriptive letterpress, show the Wushan and Wind Box gorges, the Precious Stone Rock, and other famous Yangtze vistas between Yichang and Chongqing.
The author, about whom nothing further is known, marketed this photographic collection to those without a camera or...Learn More
CHINESE TRAVEL TO AMERICA. Cabinet cards showing the scholar Ko K'un-hua and his children.New York : [c.1885]
A rare photograph of the first instructor of Chinese at Harvard, a well-known example of travel against the west-to-east grain. Ko brought with him from China the books that would form the basis of the Harvard-Yenching library. We can trace only a handful of these cabinet cards in commerce.
In the late 1870s, Harvard decided to offer...Learn More
GEORGE V - BIRLEY, Oswald. Large presentation mezzotint portrait, signed.Cowes : 1931
A superb print of a portrait commissioned from Oswald Birley by the Royal Yacht Squadron when the king became their admiral and patron in 1910. The portrait fittingly shows him in a rattan yacht armchair, with his sailing cap and telescope on an ottoman beside him. It is signed in the lower margin by both the king and the engraver. This print...Learn More
HAWAI'I - FURNEAUX, Charles, James J. Williams, and others. Collection of 83 photographs.[Hawai'i : late 19th century]
An impressive collection documenting Hawai'i in the late 19th century, shortly before its annexation, offering a compelling visual narrative of the island's diverse social, cultural, and environmental landscape.
Many of the images are by Furneaux (1835-1913), a Boston-born artist. Originally a tourist in Hawai'i, Furneaux soon settled and...Learn More
TASMANIA - WOOLLEY, Charles Alfred (photo.). Twin photographic portraits of Trugernanner (Truganini) and William Lanne, taken at Oyster Cove in 1866;Hobart : [c.1870]
These compelling studio portraits of Truganini (c.1812-1876) and William Lanne (1834-1869), issued in the 1870s by Hobart photographer Alfred Winter, have long been burdened by the colonial myth of "the last of the Tasmanians". Truganini, a Nuennone woman and daughter of Mangana, endured the killings of close family members, forced relocation to...Learn More
PEARY, Robert E. - DODGE, Arthur Malcolm (photo.). Album of evocative photographs taken during Peary's 1896 Greenland expedition.Greenland : 1896
A visual document of Peary's fourth expedition to Arctic latitudes, compiled by one of the six Boston-area academics invited by Peary to undertake scientific research in Greenland. The well-composed photographs capture the appearance of human habitations and of icy vistas at Karajak.
During the US North Greenland Expedition, 1893-5, Peary...Learn More
SENDAK, Maurice. Photograph inscribed to his UK publishers, The Bodley Head.1976
A relaxed photograph of Sendak, gently holding a baby rabbit in his cupped hands, inscribed in lower right corner, "To Bodley Head - with pleasure! Maurice Sendak. Febr. '76". There is a pencil note on reverse stating name of photographer, together with request "for M[aurice] S[endak] to sign for M[ax] R[einhardt]", then managing director of the...Learn More
MALAYAN EMERGENCY. Archive of material, including the photographs of Private Edward Allen.[Malaya and Singapore : c.1950]
A progressively more shocking record of the violent and coercive underpinnings of British control in postwar Malaya, including many photographs taken by a young private tasked with stamping out communist resistance.
Private Edward Allen was deployed with the Fourth Queen's Own Hussars at the beginning of the Malayan Emergency. Between 1948...Learn More
SILVER, Horace; WOLFF, Francis (photog.) "J. R. Monterose Sessions 10/21/56" - original photograph.Stamford, CT : 2001
Delightful image of Silver at the keyboard during the sessions for Detroit sax-player Monterose's sadly underrated self-titled debut for Blue Note. Cofounder and house photographer Francis Wolff's extensive archive of images, the majority previously unseen, had remained in storage for many years before Blue Note revivalists Mosaic began to use...Learn More
PENCE, R. D. Album of photographs taken while serving with the United States Asiatic Fleet, recording the sights and sounds of Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, and other cities.China, Hawai'i, Philippines, and at sea : [c.1921]
A valuable pictorial record of East Asia in the immediate post-war period, almost entirely composed of amateur photographs, including over 60 shots of Shanghai, 41 of Hong Kong, and many taken in Beijing, Chefoo, Canton, and Vladivostok.
The photographer was a young American sailor who was promoted to pharmacist's mate, third class in 1918...Learn More
MIDDLE EAST; WORLD WAR I. Memorial album of letters and photographs, recording the service of 2nd Lieutenant John Graham Wilkinson, 1st/4th Battalion the Hampshire Regiment.India, Mesopotamia, and Persia : 1918
An unpublished and otherwise untraced First World War album recording the experiences of an officer serving in India, Mesopotamia, and with Dunsterforce in Persia. It preserves his lively letters home and over 150 photographs taken on duty, the final letter written only days before he was killed in action at Resht.
Most letters are...Learn More
PHILLIPS, Robert. Albumen portrait photographs showing six Sikkimese women.Darjeeling : 1872-6
A collection of rare albumen portraits from the studio of Robert Phillips (d. 1882), the official photographer to two successive viceroys of India. They are made in carte-de-visite format, likely for the sake of convenience, but very much reflect the Western ethnographic gaze. Through such photographs, taken a decade after Sikkim became a de facto...Learn More
CHINESE TEA CULTURE. Photographs of the famous Willow Pattern Tea House, Shanghai.United States : [1900-36]
A collection of scarce photographs of Shanghai's renowned Willow Pattern Tea House in the late Qing and early republican eras. These images capture the bustling atmosphere of sociability, consumption, and conversation in this quintessential Chinese urban institution, and show how tea houses acted as barometers of socio-cultural change during...Learn More
