Guide to the Branson DeCou Archive, 1920-1941
Processed by Visual Resource Collection staff.
The University Library
Special Collections and Archives
University Library
University of California, Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, California, 95064
Email: specoll@library.ucsc.edu
URL: http://library.ucsc.edu/speccoll/
© 2002
The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
Note
Area, Interdisciplinary, and Ethnic Studies--African Studies
Area, Interdisciplinary, and Ethnic Studies--American Studies
Area, Interdisciplinary, and Ethnic Studies--Asian Studies
Arts and Humanities--Arts--Photography
History--African History
History--Asian History
History--Australiasian and Oceanic History
History--Modern European History
History--Latin American History
History--United States and North American History
Geographical (By Place)--Africa
Geographical (By Place)--Asia
Geographical (By Place)--Europe
Geographical (By Place)--North America
Geographical (By Place)--South America
Geographical (By Place)--Australia
Geographical (By Place)--Pacific Islands
Guide to the Branson DeCou Archive, 1920-1941
Collection number: MS 38
The University Library
Special Collections and Archives
University of California, Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, California
Contact Information:
- Special Collections and Archives
- University Library
- University of California, Santa Cruz
- Santa Cruz, California, 95064
- Email: specoll@library.ucsc.edu
- URL: http://library.ucsc.edu/speccoll/
- Processed by:
- Visual Resource Collection staff
- Date Completed:
- 1972
- Encoded by:
- OAC Unit
© 2002 The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
Descriptive Summary
Title: Branson DeCou Archive,
Date (inclusive): 1920-1941
Collection number: MS 38
Creator:
DeCou, Branson
Extent:
50 boxes,
8,000 lantern slides
Repository:
University of California, Santa Cruz. University Library.
Special Collections and Archives
Santa Cruz, California 95064
Abstract: Glass lantern slides, negatives,
photographic albums, notebooks, travelogues, and miscellaneous artifacts
that document DeCou's travels in five continents and subsequent travel lecture tours
ca. 1920-1941.
Physical location: Stored in Special Collections and Archives: Advance notice is required for access to the collection.
Language:
English.
Administrative Information
Access
Collection is open for research
Publication Rights
Property rights reside with the University of California. Literary rights are retained by the creators of the records and
their heirs. For permission to publish or to reproduce the material, please contact the Head of the Special Collections and
Archives.
Preferred Citation
Branson DeCou Archive. MS 38. Special Collections and Archives, University Library, University of California, Santa Cruz.
Acquisition Information
Gift of Elsie DeCou, August 1971
Funding
In 1999 the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation of New York,
http://www.delmas.org , provided a grant to support to preserve, digitize and catalog 1,475 lantern slides of Italy.
More details about the
Dream Pictures: Branson DeCou Archive digitization project can be viewed online
http://library.ucsc.edu/slides/decou/ .
Grants from the American Irish Foundation and the Friends of the UCSC Library have enabled small portions of the collection
to be indexed and preserved.
Biography
Photographer and travelogue lecturer Branson DeCou journeyed the world for thirty years before his death in 1941 at the relatively
young age of 49. He was born October 20, 1892, in Philadelphia, a city with a long history of photographic invention, from
the pioneer Langenheim brothers to the work of Thomas Eakins. The city also has a tradition of collecting and publishing photographs--the
Library Company of Philadelphia, American's oldest cultural institution, had exceptional holdings of photographic works well
before 1900--as well as active associations for professionals and amateurs such as the Philadelphia Photographic Exchange
Club and the Philadelphia Photographic Society.
DeCou's father was in the wholesale shoe business in Philadelphia, but the family relocated to New Jersey where Branson attended
Blair Academy in Blairstown. Upon graduation in 1910 he entered the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken where he more
fully developed his interest in photography. After a year, however, he left to initiate what would become a lifelong pursuit
of touring the world.
The fabulous Panama Pacific International Exposition of San Francisco's 1915 World's Fair attracted an enormous number of
visitors, including Branson DeCou, who in a series of photographs recorded the Fair's night effects so effectively that they
were brought to the attention of Underwood and Underwood, a leading American photographic concern, for publication. The wide
circulation of these images encouraged DeCou to begin his own work in travelogue lecturing, allying his interests in travel
and photography. He embarked in a field that was widely popular at the time as a form of entertainment and education. Since
the mid-1800s, public and private lantern slide shows were put on by photographers in clubs, schools, lodges, and museums
on a variety of themes including world travel, religion, temperance, comic subjects, or literary retellings. DeCou traversed
America speaking to local community organizations such as the Union League Club of Chicago, the New Jersey Orange Women's
Club, and also lecturing in academic and cultural institutions such as the University of Hawaii and the American Museum of
Natural History in New York.
In each venue the travelogue was illustrated with an average of 150 hand-colored lantern slides and the images synchronized
to music. He called his shows "Dream Pictures" and advertised them as a "fascinating new form of entertainment." His promotional
brochures exclaimed "with the aid of the dissolving shutter and double stereopticon exquisitely colored slides are projected
perfectly synchronized to the music of the masters reproduced on the Victrola, the combination of the two inspiring emotions."
DeCou was available for single engagements on selected subjects such as "Jungle Bound Angkor" or he could be booked for a
complete series given in the form of a continuous trip "Around the Southern Hemisphere: South Africa, South America, Australia,
Tasmania, and the South Sea Islands."
DeCou was apparently highly successful, as these testimonials from several engagements convey. "The slides were the most beautiful
that we have ever had the opportunity to view. As for the lecture, you had them so spellbound that they forgot to get uneasy
and restless even in the uncomfortable camp chairs. Your enunciation is clear and the little witty personalities that you
inserted were very kindly received. You have the gift of side-stepping the stereotyped line of talk usual in travelogues,"
observed a reviewer for the Newark Camera Club of New Jersey. "You surely have reason for a swelling of the chest over that
magnificent audience and its evidence of deep satisfaction with the evening," wrote Charles Atkins, Director of the Brooklyn
Institute of Arts and Sciences. Each of the programs had its own title: "Alluring Bali: The Last Paradise," "Ever Captivating
Paris," "The Garden of Allah: Algeria and Tunisia," and also its special music: Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C Sharp Minor for
"Nature's Supreme Spectacle: The Grand Canyon of the Colorado," the second movement of Haydn's Trio in G Major for the "Wonders
of San Marco."
In March of 1932 DeCou made a second marriage to Elsie Vera Stanley, a fellow lecturer. For the last nine years of his life
they traveled extensively, and together they continued to present what then were called "musical travelogues, illustrated
with masterpieces of art and photography." Often Elsie, in a booked two week long engagement, would lecture one evening on
a specific country and Branson would perform on the next. For reserved single admission the price would be 75 cents, for a
series ticket the cost was $2.00. Ever the constant travelers, the DeCous appear to have established temporary residencies
in several cities, including Hollywood, California, where they held screenings for cultural notaries. "I must tell you how
delighted we all were with the lovely DeCou pictures and music. My guests included Rex Ingram, Mr. and Mrs. William DeMille,
etc.--all of who enjoyed them tremendously," wrote Ruth St. Denis of Los Angeles.
Branson died of a heart attack on December 12, 1941, at the home of his mother, Mrs. Charles Berwin of East Orange, New Jersey.
He had come to New Jersey after completing a lecture tour in the Eastern section of the country. Elsie continued to lecture
for several years using Branson's slides. She lived in California in Carmel, Laguna Beach, and eventually San Marcos, where
she died on the first day of January, 1997, at the age of 96. In the decades after Branson's death she continued to travel,
often observing the changes in culture and landscape, and frequently commenting that the pollution of some world regions made
her heartsick. Some of her correspondence, for example, notes that in 1984, at the age of 83, she had spent the winter in
Europe, three months in Nairobi, and had also been to Manila and Hong Kong.
The days of lecturing with lantern slides were long over, however. Commercial color slides had been available since the 1940s,
replacing the magical, hand-tinted and luminous lantern slides as a more accurate and expedient way to provide instruction
and entertainment to viewers. Elsie, at the suggestion of fellow Carmel resident Ansel Adams, proposed that the newly inaugurated
campus of the University of California in nearby Santa Cruz be the recipient of her late husband's photographic work. In 1971,
UCSC's University Library received Branson's artistic inheritance of 10,000 photographic images. The works covered every part
of the world: from Laplanders to South Pacific Islanders, from Japanese pagodas to Egyptian pyramids. Through DeCou's vision
we, who have inherited the images, can see life before industrialization, the destruction of World War II, the effects of
urbanization, and the loss of local craft and cultural traditions.
Biography by Christine Bunting, Head of Special Collections and Archives.
Scope and Content
The Branson DeCou Archive consists of 8,000 hand-tinted 3-1/4" x 4" glass lantern slides used in years of travel lecture tours
covering all countries of the world, from ca. 1920-1941. There are also accompanying negatives, 48 photographic albums, notebooks,
travelogues, slide storage boxes, and two slide projectors.
The 8,000 lantern slides and projection hardware are cataloged and stored separately in the University Library's Visual Resources
Collection.
The archive is divided into 7 series: Photographic Albums, Notebooks and Travelogues, Slides, Photographs, Negatives, Resource
Material, and Artifacts. The majority of the materials are arranged into geographic divisions, by country or area.
Indexing Terms
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
DeCou, Branson
Voyages and travels--Pictorial works
Africa--Pictorial works
Asia--Pictorial works
Europe--Pictorial works
North America--Pictorial works
South America--Pictorial works
Oceania--Pictorial works
Australia--Pictorial works
Ireland--Pictorial works
Italy--Pictorial works
Lantern slides
Collection Contents
Series 1
Photograph Albums
1920-1941
Physical Description:
47 albums
Scope and Content Note
The first series contains the photograph albums. The black and white photographs found in the albums do not necessarily correspond
with the lantern slides.
Arrangement
The material is listed in a donor order, following loose geographic divisions. The box numbers reflect the album numbers;
Albums 1-8,46 Africa and Asia, Albums 8-32,47 Europe, Albums 29-34,36-42,44-45 North America, Albums 35,41-43 South America,
Albums 44-45 Australasia
Box 1
Africa, California, Canada
Box 3
Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco
Box 4
Java, Singapore, Sri Lanka (Ceylon), Mombassa (Kenya), Zanzibar, Tanganyika, Republic of South Africa, Natal
Box 5
Zululand (Natal), Bechuanaland (Botswana), Rhodesia, South Africa, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, West Indies, Martinique
Box 6
Hawaiian Islands, Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia
Box 7
Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Bali, Java
Box 8
Portugal, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Israel, Egypt, Italy, Japan, China, Philippines, India, Austria, Central Europe
Box 9
Ireland, S. S. Normandie (ocean liner)
Box 11
England, Holland, Germany, Belgium, France
Box 12
Switzerland, Germany (Rhine), Belgium, Holland, England, Ireland
Box 13
France, Ireland, Scotland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark
Box 14
France, Russia, Finland, Denmark, England
Box 17
Germany, Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, France
Box 19
Italy, Switzerland, France, Spain, Monaco
Box 20
Italy, Austria, Germany, France
Box 23
France, Switzerland, Italy
Box 24
Madeira, Morocco, Portugal, France, England, Holland, Denmark, Sweden
Box 25
Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria
Box 26
Madeira, Spain, Italy, Capri, Sicily, Israel, Egypt, Rhodes (Aegean Sea), Turkey
Box 27
Syria, Israel, Egypt, Italy
Box 28
Spain, Morocco, Algiers, Carthage, Tunisia, Italy, Sicily, Yugoslavia
Box 29
Turkey, Russia, Greece, Bermuda, Canada (Quebec), California, Arizona, New Mexico
Box 30
Sweden, Russia, Denmark, France, West Indies, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands (U.S.), Jamaica, Haiti, Cuba
Box 31
New Mexico, California, Washington, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Madeira, Portugal, Spain, France, New England
Box 32
Arizona, Nevada, California, Utah, New Mexico, Madeira, Portugal, Spain, France, Ireland, Scotland, Norway, Denmark
Box 34
Canada, Wyoming, California, Montana, Washington, Oregon
Box 37
California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming
Box 38
Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Utah, Oregon, California, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado
Box 39
Bahamas, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona, California, Ohio, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Idaho
Box 41
California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Florida, West Indies, Curacao, Haiti, Virgin Islands (U.S.), Antigua, Venezuela, Colombia,
Guatemala, Mexico,
Box 42
Peru, Argentina, Chile, Cuba, California, Arizona, Mexico
Box 43
Panama, Colombia, Equador, Peru
Box 44
Hawaiian Islands, Samoa, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Java
Box 46
Unbound photo album containing Thailand, Cambodia, Japan.
Box 47
Unbound photo album containing Europe, architecture, sculpture, painting.
Series 2
Notebooks and Travelogues
1920-1941
Physical Description:
2 boxes
Scope and Content Note
This second series contains notebooks and travelogues covering the North American, Asian, and European countries. Most books
accompany programs, pamphlets, and flyers on various lectures.
Arrangement
Material is arranged virtually in an alphabetic order.
Box 48-49
British Columbia and the Selkirks
Box 48-49
Egypt, Living Pageant of the Nile
Box 48-49
Granada and Alhambra (Spain), and France, notes
Box 48-49
Glorious Switzerland: The Spell of Lake Geneva
Box 48-49
Glorious Switzerland and Danzig and Zoppot, notes
Box 48-49
Magnificent Iceland and Norway
Box 48-49
Our American Wonderland Series: Colorado
Box 48-49
Our American Wonderland Series: The Pacific Northwest and Glacier National Park
Box 48-49
Our Romantic California and our Pacific Coast
Box 48-49
Springtime Motoring in California
Box 48-49
Venice and Northern Italy
Series 3
Lantern Slides
1921-40
Physical Description:
8,000 items
Scope and Content Note
This series contains 3 1/4"-4" hand-tinted glass slides. The material is housed in the University Library's Visual Resource
Collection. The Italian glass slides were the first set of images available online through a generous grant from the Gladys
Krieble Delmas Foundation in 1999. The funding enabled the preservation and digitization of close to 1,500 images depicting
Italian urban and rural landscape between the time of the Great Wars. Since then the University Library has digitized the
California, German, Russian and Irish glass slides.
Arrangement
The collection is first arranged by geographic divisions then alphabetically by country.
Series 4
Photographs
1921-40
Physical Description:
1 photo box
Scope and Content Note
This series consists oversized black and white photographs. Details to follow as archive is proceessed.
Arrangement
Arranged geographically into eight sections; China, Japan, Italy, Switzerland, Cambodia, Chile, Morocco, Capri
Series 5
Negatives
1921-40
Physical Description:
19 boxes
Scope and Content Note
This series consists of lantern slide negatives.
Arrangement
The negatives are arranged geographically.
Switzerland, Italy, Sicily, Germany, Alaska
Series 6
Resource Material
1921-40
Physical Description:
1 box
Scope and Content Note
This series consists of books and old magazines on various countries, such as
Ireland of the Welcome by D. L. Kelleher, and
Ireland: a guidebook. More details to follow as the archive is processed.
Series 7
Artifacts
1921-40
Physical Description:
3 items
Scope and Content Note
This series consists of two slide viewing projectors and a slide carrying case. The items are currently stored in the Visual
Resource Collection room.
