33. Travel Lectures
Hawaii Shimmers in Travel Lectures
Travel lectures were the single most popular subject among professional lantern showmen, accounting for about 50% of all illustrated lectures.
Hawaii, given its exotic beauty and spectacularly dramatic scenery, was the perfect subject for an illustrated lecture. This huge broadside (27 x 40”) is for a 1910 show by C. N. Walker, and wins first prize for evocative promotional language, and sheer visual impact. It would be hard to walk by it.
The slide of Hawaii is by Branson DeCou, a travel lecturer known for the beauty of his coloring in his “Dream Pictures” and for combining music with his images.
The lantern-slide touring box for the Hawaiians Travelogue belonged to Mildred Clemens. Clemens, a distant relative of Mark Twain, combined lantern slides with native Hawaiian singers and dancers.
Archival Notes
