John H. Pollack
John H. Pollack is Curator, Research Services, in the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries. He has worked in this department since 1995. His responsibilities include providing assistance to students and scholars, and teaching and organizing class sessions centered on the collections. He is also responsible for the Furness Shakespeare Library, which is part of the Kislak Center.
John holds a PhD in English from Penn and a BA from Washington University in St. Louis. He specializes in Early American literature and history, and early modern book history. His research has focused on topics including Native American languages; colonial writings from New France; and Benjamin Franklin and colonial education.
In the presentation, Penn undergraduate and Kislak SHIP Summer 2021 intern Nicholas Brenner and Curator of Research Services John Pollack will present an extraordinary work of early photography. Entitled Constantinople Ancienne et Moderne, this oversize album includes 99 photographs of Istanbul (then known as Constaninople) and environs. Compiled in 1869, it contains handwritten captions in French.
The album itself bears the tuğra, or imperial monogram, of sultan Abdülaziz on its cover, and thus indicates that its makers were closely associated with the palace. The photographers who compiled this album, the Abullah Frères, were three Armenian brothers, Viçen, Hovsep, and Kevork.
Dr. Thomas Evans, the founder of the Dental School, worked as the doctor for the French royal family (more information about the Evans collections). In this capacity, he accompanied Eugénie, empress of the French, on her trip to Egypt to inaugurate the Suez Canal in 1869. He may have received the album at this time.
The presentation will investigate the contents of the album, present information about its creators, and speculate on its provenance.
