Oct 13, 2022 - Sale 2617

Sale 2617 - Lot 274

Price Realized: $ 5,200
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
Norton, John Randall (1890-1962)
Protestant Missionaries in Republican China: an Archive of Photographs and Letters, St. John's University, Shanghai, 1910-1922.


Including approximately 322 handwritten and typed letters from Norton to his mother and father from a variety of locations written between 1910 and 1922; beginning with his student days at the University of Vermont, and continuing to cover his travels to China by train and ship;

[Together with] a photograph album of the same period containing original black-and-white images taken overwhelmingly in China, original images of Norton's life, students, and colleagues, travel images, including shots of the Great Wall, and a panoramic view of the Altar of Heaven, street scenes, images of daily life, children, the Boy Scout camp in Shanghai, and other subjects, almost all people and places with provisional captions on the black pages; yielding approximately 190 photographs in total, all mounted in a period album, 11 1/2 x 7 1/2 in.

Norton's letters home record his experiences as he traveled to the West Coast in Vancouver to China and Japan, and other destinations in the Far East. He also describes his life in China, where he studied Chinese while teaching and working at St. John's University in Shanghai. He met his wife at the University. Josephine M. Graves was in China because her father, Frederick Rogers Graves, was serving in China as a Bishop. Their May 29, 1919 wedding in Shanghai, China is described in the letters, and a number of Josephine's letters to her mother-in-law are also present here. Elsewhere, Norton details his travels to Japan, Philippines and throughout China. Photographs in the album range of size from 2 1/4 x 2 in. to 10 1/2 x 3 1/2 in. Most measure 3 x 2 in.