Jesse Brown Cook scrapbooks documenting San Francisco history and law enforcement, ca. 1895-1936

Summary

Creators:

Jesse Brown Cook

Extent:

39 albums containing ca. 8000 photographic prints and ca. 4000 newspaper clippings and ephemera; 14< x 10< in. 4131 digital objects

Language:

Collection materials are in English

Background

Scope and content:

The Jesse Cook scrapbooks consist of thirty-nine volumes containing an estimated 12,000 items, including photographs, newspaper clippings, and ephemera, primarily centering on the history of San Francisco and police activity in the city. The collection is thought to have once numbered fifty scrapbooks.

The photographs described in the container list span a wide range of locations and topics, but most were taken in San Francisco. They include early twentieth century mug shots of criminals; pictures inside the city prison, morgue, and coroner's office; and many group shots of police officers. Also depicted are historical events such as the building of the Bay Bridge, President Taft breaking ground in Golden Gate Park, the Democratic National Convention with a photograph of Franklin Roosevelt, and the openings of the cable car lines, the transcontinental phone line, and the Panama Canal. Numerous street scenes in San Francisco are included, as well as shots of Chinese immigrants and Chinatown, the architecture and neighborhoods of San Francisco, police work and crime in San Francisco, city events, and views from the 1906 earthquake and fire.

Jesse Brown Cook compiled these scrapbooks with the help of official police photographer George Blum. Most captions were handwritten by Cook, and some were typed. The thirty-nine volumes were originally comprised of thirty-four ledger books and loose photographs and clippings. Due to their very poor physical condition, four of the original ledger books (volumes 2, 5, 6 and 29) have been disbound, fully preserved by the Conservation Department of The Library, and newly bound into nine volumes. These volumes are marked 2:1, 2:2, etc. to preserve the original numbering of the ledger books. The loose items have been foldered and boxed and labelled as volume 35. The pages in each volume are numbered, and the photographs are numbered with the page number followed by suffixes of "a," "b," etc. when multiple photographs appear on a single page.

As part of the scrapbooks' preservation, digital facsimiles have been produced of many of the photographs. These are the photographs listed in the finding aid. Users may browse the finding aid and digital facsimiles in order to limit physical browsing of the original scrapbooks. The photographs were selected according to the following guidelines: no copy prints; only photographs in relatively good condition were selected; and no photographs with violent content were selected (coroner's and police photographs of corpses). Where duplicate photographs were found, only one was selected. A total of 4,348 photographs have digital facsimiles. Photographs from volumes 2, 5, 6 and 29 do not have digital facsimiles, but are listed in the finding aid. These volumes are available for use in the library.

The ephemera includes materials such as postage stamps and Chinese lottery tickets, while the newspaper clippings focus on police activity and San Francisco history. Neither the ephemera nor the newspaper clippings are described in detail in the finding aid.

Biographical / historical:

Jesse Brown Cook (1860-1938) was a member of the San Francisco Police Department from the 1890s to the 1930s. He began as a beat cop, and then rose through the ranks to become Sergeant of the Chinatown Squad; he retired as Chief of Police and later returned to the force as Police Commissioner. Before his years of service in the police force he studied taxidermy, worked as a sailor, drayman, and butcher, and toured Europe as a contortionist. His police career began in San Antonio and San Diego before he relocated to San Francisco.

It is unclear what motivated Cook to compile thousands of photographs and clippings into what is a unique portrayal of early twentieth century San Francisco, with its rare police department photographs and documentation of events not available to the general public at the time. Over the course of a decade, Cook had approximately 1300 street scenes professionally photographed, and he meticulously recorded the exact location of each photograph. Whatever the motive for his care and persistence, his passion for San Francisco history is apparent.

Acquisition information:

Unknown

Rules or conventions:

Finding Aid prepared using Describing Archives: a Content Standard

Location of this collection:

UC Berkeley, Bancroft Library

University of California, Berkeley, The Bancroft Library

Berkeley, CA 94720-6000, US

Contact:

510-642-6481

bancref-library@berkeley.edu

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