Between the Covers

Hardcover. Oblong small quarto. String-tied Japanese-style lacquer-illustrated boards. 38 mounted gelatin silver photographs, black and white, various sizes (between 3¼" x 4¼" and 7" x 5"); laid in are an additional 17 black and white snapshots (mostly 3¾" x 2¼"). Boards detached but present, overall very good, internally near fine. Pictures in the album feature the Hot Shot Swing Band, a jazz band made up of mostly African-American Air Force servicemen, presumably in Japan during the occupation in the late 1940s (two of the service men we could identify both enlisted in 1946). A clipping tipped-in shows the probable owner and compiler of the album, saxophone player, Private Donald L. Turner. The band (piano, sax, bass, drums) shares top billing in the album with Japanese exotic dancers, several featuring full nudity (most of the laid in pictures depict the dancers nude; the images of dancers that are mounted in the album are mostly just scantily clad). An interesting vernacular album kept by a young African-American serviceman playing jazz in Japan.

Item #391740