Album by Ulrich Von Hassel (1881-1944) CONSTRUCTION... Lot 24

Album by Ulrich Von Hassel (1881-1944) CONSTRUCTION OF TSINGTAO (QINGDAO) IN CHINA, 1907/1909 Oblong album, lacquer binding, depicting a traditional dragon, 27 high quality silver prints, 200 x 250 mm, captioned in German. The album contains photographs of the city shortly before its inauguration, "entirely designed" by German architects on the shores of the Yellow Sea in northeast China. First occupied in 1897 by the German fleet which established a naval base there, the site was officially conceded to Germany the following year by the Manchus for 99 years, but the Chinese Republic took it over in 1922. It was during this period of German administration that the famous Tsingtao (Qingdao) brewery was established in 1903, initially for the personal consumption of the German community of about 4,000 people, but soon distributed throughout China, and today the world under the Tsingtao brand. A young diplomat, Ulrich Von Hassel, was the first consul posted to Tsingtao in 1907. He went down in history as a member of the resistance to the Third Reich, and a participant in the July 20, 1944 assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler. His name seems to have been scratched out on the first sheet, then restored in pencil.