Buying and Selling Rare Books, Vintage Photography, and Manuscripts: Travel and Exploration, Rare Arctic and Canadiana, China, Chinese-Canadians. Rare items in ALL fields. 33 years' professional experience with advanced collectors, archives, and libraries. Appraisal services. Mailing Address: 885 Dunsmuir Road, Suite 214, Victoria, BC V9A 6W6 CANADA. bjarnetokerud@gmail.com Toll Free 1-888-869-5459 or (250) 381-2230. Member: ABAC/ILAB/PBFA
Some of the best articles and "best-reads" you can find on Arctic history are by noted author Kenn Harper. Under the heading TAISSUMANI, you can follow his recently-posted articles as well as previous ones. For example:
Taissumani, Nov. 21, 2014 Who Killed Charles Francis Hall?
Last week I wrote about the death of Charles Francis Hall on the Polaris expedition. Hall was the only person to die on that expedition. Eventually, when the survivors had returned to the United States, a government inquiry was held. George Tyson, the ice-master, spoke of Hall’s conviction that someone had poisoned him. He suggested that Captain Sidney O. Budington or the scientist Emil Bessels was responsible. At a subsequent inquiry, a crew member testified that Budington had said, “There’s a stone off my heart,” after Hall’s death..... To read more, go to: http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/article/65674taissumani_nov._21/ For further articles, go to: http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/category/taissumani
Kenn Harper has also published a wonderful volume of collected articles entitled:
We are purchasing
large collections of rare books, pamphlets, manuscripts and historical letters,
and vintage photographs. “Almost” all subject
matters, but in particular:
HISTORY
TRAVEL AND EXPLORATION
LITERATURE
SCIENCE AND MEDICINE
We also purchase: Documents
- Manuscripts - Correspondence with Historical Content or
Featuring Famous People in History
We are particularly interested in:
Photograph Albums
Individual Vintage Photographs by Notable 19th
Century and Early 20th Century Photographers
Postcard Albums
Postal History Related to Canada and China
Anything Related To China, Including Publications in
Chinese 中文
We make house calls anywhere in B.C. for large collections,
and can usually travel at short notice.
Appraisals
As a recognized and accepted appraiser, I also carry out
appraisals of collections or groups of important items, for which a
professional fee is charged. I do not
appraise single items.
We are offering for sale splendid copies of two of the most renown works of Scottish literature. A first edition of Robert Louis Stevenson's KIDNAPPED (1886), and the first "Edinburgh" edition of POEMS, CHIEFLY IN THE SCOTTISH DIALECT (1787) by Robert Burns.
Yuen Fong Company of Vancouver supplied Chinatown businesses and restaurants across Canada and some parts of the United States with traditional Chinese goods such as food stuffs, medicine, porcelain, fans, slippers, art scrolls, lanterns, drinks, canned goods, and more. They were retailers and wholesalers. The illustrated catalogues are all in traditional characters. The business closed soon after 1982.
REMARKABLE STUDIO PORTRAIT OF A WOODLANDS CREE (?) . Winnipeg: J. Penrose. 1875? Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 100 x 63 mm, verso with studio imprint of J. Penrose, Photo Studio, Winnipeg, Manitoba. A very strong print, with excellent tonal range in very good condition. Taken in the Winnipeg studio of J. Penrose in front of a painted backdrop with forest scenery, this striking portrait appears to depict a warrior. With beaded floral design on his tunic the subject wears a fur hat and fur mittens. At his waist are a hunting knife and pistol. In his right hand he holds a talking (?) stick.
We are always in the market to purchase vintage photographs and collections
Photographs Wanted by these photographers: Humphrey Loyd Hime, Frederick W. Steele, Oliver Buell, J.A. Brock, H.T. Devine, William Notman, Charles Mcmunn, Charles Horetzky, Richard Maynard, Hanna Maynard, Alexander Henderson, Boorne and May, Bingham and Thom, R.H. Trueman, etc. What do you have? Old photo albums also wanted.
Geraldine Moodie took photographs of scenes on the Canadian Prairies in the late 1880's. She accompanied her husband to the arctic and lived there from 1906-1909.
I am trying to build up a collection of her photographs in the form of any vintage photographic prints, lantern slides, or her writings, watercolours, as well as any papers, documents and related materials associated with her life.
Although she is relatively unknown to collectors, she had a keen eye and a good sense of composition.
See below for a photographs she took while she was in the arctic.
By Geraldine Moodie
I also collect vintage photographs by noted Canadian photographers such as: Richard and Hanna Maynard, Carlo Gentile, Bailey, Steele, Daly, William Notman, and many others.
Photo possibly by Frederick Dally although sometimes attributed to Carlo Gentile
We are actively collecting old Chinatown paper from anywhere in Western Canada, particularly Chinatowns in Vancouver, Victoria, Barkerville, Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg. However, we are interested in anything Chinese Canadian. This search is part of an on-going preservation project.
Do you have anything like the following items? If so, give us a call or send an email.
In September of this year, I helped a client pack a very, very large collection of books for a move within Richmond. Our team had an efficient assembly-line approach to box assembling. The screech of packing tape rolling off tape-guns echoed in the garage for several days. I never thought boxes could look so chaotically beautiful....
Among the best photographs of the period... Approximately 55 photos related to China (Sold November, 2011)
Illustrated with 82 Albumen Photographs
[Photographs of China and Japan]. BLACK , J.R. ed. The Far East. A Monthly Journal, Illustrated with Photographs . Shanghai: ‘Far East’ Printing Office, 1876-1877. 2 Volumes. Quarto (26.5 x 22cm). 1st edition. New series. Volumes 1 & 2. iv +ii+152pp, with 43 original albumen photographs, and 1 illustration in the text (page 45); Iv + 138pp, with 39 original albumen photographs. Total: 82 tipped-in photographs (sizes ranging between 8.5 x 8cm and 20 x14 cm).
Volume One: original publisher’s crimson half morocco, moiré cloth. Volume Two: full red morocco, each volume re-spined in period-style matching red calf, gilt. Front and rear boards of Volume One moiré cloth discoloured. Pages wavy from the mounted photographs. Over all a very good set indeed with the photographs in very good to fine condition, with good tonality. Approximately 55 images relate to China. $29,000 U.S.
“It was in May 1870, that [Black] first conceived the idea of publishing a newspaper illustrated with photographs of the Far East.” [From the Introduction]. The photographs provide a vivid insight into to the daily life and personalities in China, including:
-buildings,
-shops,
-temples in Shanghai (Temple of Confucius),
-images of beggars,
-itinerant cobblers,
-coolies,
-high-ranking Chinese officials (incl. the Governor of Nanking, and the famous statesman Li Hong-zhang),
-a Shanghai merchant’s wife,
-a small number of missionary and political figures (incl. Sir Thomas Wade, Samuel Wells Williams, Robert Hart, Medhurst, Sir Harry Parkes),
punishment of the Cangue (Hongkew Police Station),
-Soochow,
-Sikawei,
-bound feet of a Chinese woman,
-Foochow,
-two group photos of American Presbyterian Mission Conference at Shanghai.
In addition, there are photographs of Japan, including:
-Nagasaki
-tea houses in Tokyo
-Japanese Buddhist priests
(See: Gernsheim. Incunabula of British Photography: Bibliography of British Photographic Literature, 1839-75, and British Books Illustrated with Original Photographs. Item 635).
Note: An index of all of the photographs is available.
"Those who possess old letters, documents, correspondence, manuscripts, scraps of autobiography, miniatures and portraits, relating to persons and matters historical, literary, political and social should communicate with Mr. Bjarne Tokerud, Bjarne Tokerud Bookseller Inc, Victoria, B.C. Canada, who will at all times be pleased to give his advice and assistance, either for their purchase or their preservation.
"In addition, we are actively seeking rare books, photographs, photo albums, antique maps, antique prints, and articles and artifacts with historical provenance."
We are keen to purchase vintage photographs, and photo albums of Canadian scenes, particularly the Canadian Prairies, Canadian Rockies and British Columbia.
Photographers we are seeking include:
William Notman, Thompson Studio, Carlo Gentile, Richard Maynard, Frederick Dally, Steele and Co., Bailey and Neelands, Ernest Brown, Charles Mathers.
Usually, 19th century books were illustrated with steel engravings, woodcuts, photo-lithographic illustrations, or lithographs. One of the most important books on exploration in the arctic in the late 19th century is the work by George Nares.
We are offering for sale a near fine copy of one of the three books to use actual photographs for illustrative purposes.
The other two arctic books that used actualphotographs were:
Allen Young. Cruise of the 'Pandora.' From the Private Journal kept by Allen Young, R.N.R., F.R.G.S., F.R.A.S., &c., Commander of the Expedition. [London: William Clowes], 1876. 8vo. Folding lithographed map and 12 mounted sepia photographed plates by W. J. A. Grant. And....
A book we recently sold with a period-style binding by Courtland Benson of Victoria, B.C.
Krusenstern, Adam Johann von. VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD, IN THE YEARS 1803, 1804, 1805, & 1806, by order of His Imperial Majesty Alexander the First, on Board the Ships Nadeshda and Neva. Translated from the Original German by Richard Belgrave Hoppner, Esq. London: Printed by C. Roworth [Vol. 1] and T. Davison [Vol. 2] for John Murray, 1813. 2 volumes bound in one. 4to. 1st edition in English. xxxii + 4pp (Contents) + 314pp; 1pp (title leaf) + 7pp (Contents) + 404pp. 2 hand-colored aquatint frontispieces, folding engraved chart of the “Northwest Part of the Great Ocean.” Finely bound by Courtland Benson: period-style straight-grained morocco, raised bands with elaborate gilt decorations in spine compartments, marbled endpapers. A very clean copy in a very attractive binding.
This is the narrative of the first Russian circumnavigation of the globe, sent jointly by the Russian government and the Russian-American Company.
Since 1997, Bjarne Tokerud has operated from Victoria, B.C. Canada, buying, selling, and appraising rare books, archives, documents, vintage photography, and ephemera. Prior to moving to Victoria, Bjarne Tokerud operated a bookshop in Edmonton, Alberta from two locations on Whyte Avenue: starting out in 1980 above a German delicatessen in the Scona neighbourhood, and later in 1992 on Whyte Ave in Strathcona, premises which were shared with Traveller Antiques until 1997.
Bjarne Tokerud is a member of the ABAC and ILAB [Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of Canada and the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers], as well as a Past President of the ABAC. He is also a member of the PBFA [Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association, Great Britain].
Specialities include Travel and Exploration, Canadiana, Artic and Polar Exploration, Rare books in most fields, Vintage Photography and Photo Albums, Rare books on China, Chinese cartography, and historically interesting ephemera. We are also interested in purchasing Canadian Chinatown history. Documents, photographs, business histories, and more...
Would you like to receive one of our recent catalogues?
Are you disposing of an estate or a large book collection? We purchase outright, carry out rare book appraisals, and act as selling agents for rare and important individual items and complete collections. We travel extensively across Canada. For a confidential consultation:
Send us an email at bjarnetokerud@gmail.com or call us at (250) 381-2230
Victoria, B.C. (250) 385-5795 courtlandbenson@shaw.ca
A book we recently sold with a period-style binding by Courtland Benson of Victoria, B.C.
Since 1997, Bjarne Tokerud has operated from Victoria, B.C. Canada, buying, selling, and appraising rare books, archives, documents, vintage photography, and ephemera. Prior to moving to Victoria, Bjarne Tokerud operated a bookshop in Edmonton, Alberta from two locations on Whyte Avenue: starting out in 1980 above a German delicatessen in the Scona neighbourhood, and later in 1992 on Whyte Ave in Strathcona, premises which were shared with Traveller Antiques until 1997.
