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Lecture, “Around the World” by Sergt. J. A. Brobst…
Philadelphia: Ledger Job Print; A. Little, [engr.], [ca. 1882]. Illustrated broadside, 39.5” x 14”, printed within a decorative border. CONDITION: Good, 1.75” x 2” loss to lower-right corner affecting the border, 1” x .5” loss to lower middle affecting parts to two letters in the imprint, remnants of four pieces of tape on the verso, chipping and short tears along margins, and several punctures affecting a few letters. A large and apparently unrecorded broadside promoting a lecture by a young U.S. Navy officer that featured projections of sites in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia by the “sciopticon”—a type of magic lantern. Sergeant J. A. Brobst is depicted here in a Navy uniform and sporting a mustache. In the winter of 1882, he undertook a lecture tour across Berks and Lehigh Counties in Pennsylvania, after which he intended to lecture at school houses in the south before continuing to tour through Pennsylvania. The broadside begins with the exclamation: “The wonderful progress in the photographic art has made possible the obtainment of beautiful and absolutely correct representations of all places of interest throughout the world! As I could find no more pleasing or thorough means of presenting my travels and researches, without the expense or fatigue of travel, I have, in connection with the lecture, a powerful sciopticon!” (The name sciopticon comes from the Greek words, skia, shadow, and opsis, view or picture.) Through its projections, “the imagination is carried to far distant lands, and where we may gaze upon the art treasures and wonders of the world, or on the ancient temples and pyramids of the river Nile. From the great quality, I have chosen such photographic views as to give you a representative idea of all places of interest in a TRIP AROUND THE WORLD.” Scenes and locales depicted in Brobst’s lecture include Egypt (“pyramids and sphinx”), the ascent of Mt. Vesuvius, the ruins of Pompeii, Mt. Etna, Athens, the site of Ancient Troy, the ruins of Ephesus, Smyrna, Constantinople, the Suez Canal, China, and Japan. Brobst’s lecture offered a “full description” of Jerusalem “as it stands today,” covering its “various chambers and excavations”; the “dilapidated appearance of the place”; the “degrading exhibitions of Christianity”; “its superstitious people”; the “customs and habits of the natives”; “Moslem worship in the Mosque”; “postures of prayer,” and so on. “Magnified and illuminated by the intense lights used,” the images “convey to the mind of the spectator a better idea of the places and scenes depicted than could be had by reading volumes upon volumes of books of travel.” An article in The Allentown Democrat published shortly after the start of his lecture tour explains that, “In all cities and in all sections visited he had sketches made of such objects as he deemed of interest, and these subsequently photographed on glass in Paris,” thereby creating the sciopticon slides (“Sergt. Brobst in the Lecture Field”). Brobst’s lectures were well-received and often stretched across three consecutive nights to cover his entire travels. John A. Brobst was born in Steinsville, Pennsylvania, to hotel-keeper Jonas L. and Didema (née Hermany) Brobst. He spent much of his childhood in Fogelsville, and enlisted in the Marines in December of 1877. Following his training in Washington, D.C., he was assigned to the steamer Wyoming, which, recently recommissioned, set sail for Europe with cargo for the 1878 World’s Fair in Paris. The Wyoming visited Rouen, France, and Southampton, England, and briefly returned to the U.S. before arriving in France again in December, 1878, and cruising the Mediterranean and Black seas from January, 1879 to November, 1880. By November, 1881, Brobst had returned home and was working in a Philadelphia job printing office while planning his tour. Three years later, he was a medical student at the Baltimore College of Physicians and Surgeons, after which he spent many years practicing in Macungie. While there, Brobst married Hannah R. Schaller (with whom he would have two children), and the two later spent a year in Europe while Brobst pursued further medical training in Germany and Austria. Additional courses in New York and Philadelphia enabled him to specialize, and he became a respected eye, nose, and throat doctor. He died of “blood poisoning” in 1914. No copies recorded in OCLC. REFERENCES: “Lehigh County Boy in the Holy Land,” The Allentown Democrat, July 2, 1879, p. 2; “Sergt. Brobst in the Lecture Field,” The Allentown Democrat, Dec. 27, 1882, p. 2; “Wyoming I (Sloop of War)” at Naval History and Heritage Command online; “Dr. John A. Brobst Passed Away…,” The Allentown Democrat, May 5, 1914, p. 5.
Item #9566
Price: $950.00
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