John David Zumbrun’s Peking Art Series II

A vintage photo album titled “Peking Art Series II” from the Camera Craft studio on Peking’s Legation Street, run by the American photographer and entrepreneur John David Zumbrun (sometimes Zumbrum) from 1910 to 1929. The album contains 20 to 30 leaves of tipped-in photographic plates depicting scenes of Peking (with the Chinese characters for Peking on the cover) such as the Great Wall or Forbidden City and were sold as souvenirs. Pennsylvanian Zumbrun (1875–1949) was a former U.S. Army soldier who stayed in Peking over the period of transition from the Qing Dynasty to the Republic. He left China in 1929 for San Francisco.