GREAT KANTO EARTHQUAKE.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Reconstruction Album: Containing the Final Report on the Reconstruction of the Tokyo Imperial University Library, 1923-1929. Sole edition, presentation copy, inscribed on the first blank, "Earl Hopper Peace Memorial, March 1932 - Compliments of Tokyo University, Tokyo, Japan".Tokyo's Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 obliterated the library and its holdings of 700,000 volumes. Rebuilding was undertaken with the financial support of the League of Nations, the Library Association, the British Academy, and other overseas organizations, many of which also donated books. The Marquis Tokugawa gifted his family library of 100,800 volumes, and philanthropists such as J. P. Morgan and John D. Rockefeller, Jr. also donated funds for acquisitions.The photographs in this album show the building of the new library, its librarians at work, and ceremonial presentations of gifts. One shows a copy of the Kelmscott Chaucer, which was included in the British government's gift of 200 books showing the history of fine English printing.Provenance: Earl Hopper Peace Memorial Collection, Oglethorp University, with its various pressmarks and browning from a now-removed bookplate.

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