Photographs and Motor Trips 1918.

Various New England locales, April–November 1918. 4to (11” x 9.25”), three quarters pebbled black leather with black cloth, gilt title and date at spine. 53 silver print photos, 3.25” x 5.25”, mounted on black paper. All images with typescript captions opposite. 32 pp. of typescript (many consisting of relatively brief captions) on 64 leaves, plus 4 pp. typescript index on 8 leaves.

A meticulously composed album comprising photographs taken in Provincetown and other Massachusetts locations, New Hampshire, and Maine, during motor tours undertaken by a socially prominent couple from Winchester, Mass. as World War I drew to a close.

The private record of the travels of Mr. and Mrs. E. C. Mason, this album consists of photographs with typescript captions and occasional pages of longer narrative content, which occasionally offer clues regarding the couple’s social connections. The subjects captured include street scenes, architecture, social gatherings, picturesque views, World War I Armstice celebrations, etc. Each caption consists of a photo number, the date taken, location, subject, and the camera settings used for the shot (e.g. “Stop 7.5 and 1/35 seconds”). The captions for a few photos note the use of Heyde’s photometer in estimating proper exposure. Weather and light conditions are occasionally noted as well. The photo numbers (all of those included here are in the 500s) suggest that the couple compiled multiple albums of this sort.

The Masons motored to Provincetown (where Mrs. Mason and friend Mrs. Barney served as the hostesses at the Provincetown Club House for Men in Uniform), Gloucester (for dinner at “The Tavern” and to tour Cape Ann), Brunswick, ME (for the wedding of Lieut. E. Miles Langley and Miss Sarah E. Baxter, with stops in Portsmouth and Newburyport; a second trip to Brunswick followed), Nantasket Beach (including Allerton, Hull, Hingham, and Cohasset), and other Northeastern locales. Outings in their hometown of Winchester are recorded as well.

The images included here capture such subjects as the Club House for Men in Uniform in Provincetown; old doorways in Portsmouth, NH, Provincetown, Weston, Salem, and Hingham; a ship’s figurehead over a door on Commercial St. in Provincetown; the beaches and The Tavern at Gloucester, Mass.; a young girl named Marjorie Wood in a garden; children on the beach in Bayview, Mass.; wedding guests, women knitting, etc., in Brunswick, Maine; flag-strewn street scenes in downtown Boston; a victory parade in Winchester (featuring female nurses and others), picturesque paths, roads and rivers. Perhaps the most telling photos with respect to the Masons’ social connections are several taken at the cottage of Bowen Tufts Jr. in Allerton, Mass. Tufts was a member of a leading Massachusetts banking family and father of movie actor Bowen Charlton Tufts III, best known as Sonny Tufts.

A handsome album evoking the pleasures of the motor tour in early twentieth century New England and documenting the historic and picturesque appeal of the region as experienced by a privileged couple during the last year of World War I.

CONDITION: Very good, light wear to covers; photos very good, light wear to paperboard and typescript pages.