Twenty-four (24) Autographed Portrait Leaves; Portraits of Thirty Authors
New York: Scribner's Sons, 1937. 9.5" x 7.25" sepia prints of original drawings tipped onto 17" x 13" heavy weight, beige paper. Each portrait accompanied by guard sheet with biographical notes by Desmond Hall. Issued in case. These pages are not excised, they were never bound in. Some of the sheets have age fade, particulary at the edges, but all of the painting reproductions and signatures are in fine condition. These 23 Authors have used various colored pens to sign beneath their prints.
Leonebel Jacobs (1883-1967) was a portrait painter of the Who's Who. She painted Herbert Hoover and Chinese Emperor Pu Ti. Her painting of Mrs. Lou Henry Hoover hung in the White House. In China, she was known as the paint lady. She painted many members of the old court and visiting foreigners, one of the latter being Rabindranath Tagore. In addition to her portraits of famous celebrities, artists, and authors she created several morale boosting Posters in support of WW I and did free lance graphics for Women's magazines like Ladies Home Journal. After graduating from the University of Oregon, she became the art educator for Eugene Public Schools. This collection came from the estate of Julia Burgess, who was an English Professor at U of O (1907 - 41). It would not be a stretch that these two talented and progressive women knew and respected each other in the small university town of Eugene.
Author's Portraits and Autographs include: John Erskine -- Sinclair Lewis --Edna St. Vincent Millay -- Royal Cortissoz -- Ida M. Tarbell -- James Truslow Adams -- Fannie Hurst -- Dorothy Thompson -- H.M. Tomlinson -- G.B. Stern -- James Shotwell -- Edna Ferber -- Lion Feuchtwanger -- Walter Lippmann -- Lowell Thomas -- Joseph Auslander -- Irving Bacheller -- Alfred Noyes -- Pertinax -- William Brown Meloney -- Alexander Woollcott -- Sir Philip Gibbs -- Rupert Hughes Walter de la Mare. Absent from the collection included in the book are: John Drinkwater -- H.G. Wells -- G.K. Chesterton -- Christopher Morley -- Rhabindranath Tagore -- Kahlil Gibran.
Three of these seven un-signed authors had died at the time of publication and another three were living remotely overseas. Most likely, but undocumented provenance is that it would have been easier for Leonebel to aquire the autographs as she had painted the relationships and Julia to have purchased them from her. Item #1675
"Photos of all author signatures available upon request"
Price: $1,250.00