seeing the world

I've accumulated quite a few old books that describe the larger world. I think turn of the last century was an exciting time, as travel became more feasible for many, and photographers brought back a record of the exotic for the rest of us.

I've got the full set of John L. Stoddard Lectures published in the 1890s and the Lands and Peoples set by The Grolier Society, which was first published in 1929. The tinted photographs in the Grolier books were the fore-runners of the National Geographic world bazaar presentation.

Here are two samples:

Closer to home, I inherited this cool item -

I shall try to remember to scan some pencil drawings from Sven Hedin as artist when I get home. Drawings from the 1880s to the 1930s, depicting people and towns in Central Asia.

And scan the book cover, too.

Yep, I have some covers from the last months I haven't gotten around to scanning yet.

I've picked up a couple of Theodore Roosevelt's expeditionary books from the 1910s. They are on my TBR pile, though they are borrowed by a daughter at present.

A Book-Lover's Holidays In the Open is a trek through the Grand Canyon, with his sons along
.
Through the Brazilian Wilderness with the sub-title "American Museum of Natural History of New York
Geographic and zoologic reconnaissance expedition
Complete with a fold-out map of the continent showing the routes travelled."

They seem to have been published as part of a set, both being bound in handsome embossed fake leather.

I remember my mother treasuring her copies of Stoddard's Lectures.

I have several of Richard Halliburton's books from the twenties detailing his travels in Latin America and around the Mediterranean.

I have few Victorian era travel books.

Overland Tales by Josephine Clifford is a collection of travel writing about the western US that originally appeared in Overland Magazine in the 1870s

Letters on Egypt, Edom and the Holy Land is just what it sounds like, illustrated with engravings.

My copy of Heroes of the Dark Continent is only a salesman's subscription sample, so it's missing most of the text but has fascinating engravings of Africa (both realistic and imaginary) in the 19th century.

Finally, I have a fascinating memoir from the 1970's called Soaring: the diary and letters of a Denishawn Dancer by Jane Sherman. It tells about her travels in the far east in the twenties as a member of the Denishawn Dance Company, and is illustrated with photos of both her company and native dancers in the areas she visited.

You seem to have a right nice collection there. The last sounds most intriguing.

I enjoyed it quite a bit, though it's been a while since I read it. Worth looking for, I think, if you can find it in a library near you. What I recall being interesting about it is that she's writing about being a dancer on tour in a company that draws elements of their dances from different cultural traditions, so she's not an explorer, but a young girl seeing the world because of her art.

Thrift shop find last weekend was a full set of The Story of the Bible published by Wm. H. Wise & Co., New York. They appear to have specialized in the same kind of early photo-jounalism as the Grolier Society. This set was published in 1940, and is half pictorial; many art pages, but mostly "modern" tinted black and white photos of the holy land and it's people, much like above in post 1.

*happy dance*

Not that I'm reading it yet, but I acquired The Romance of the Martin Connor, and thought you'd enjoy seeing this pretty dust jacket



Oh, and the webpage where I found the image:
http://www.yesterdaysgallery.com/advSearchResults.php?action=browse&category...

Mark those prices!

Lovely!