Moving Image |  | Images from the Countryside
Northeast Historic Film, Moving Image, 00:03:56
Clip excerpted from original films donated to Northeast Historic Film by Joan Swan Branch, daughter of Joseph E.C. Swan. The Joan Branch Collection, Accessions 0706 and 0712, is 7400 feet of silent 16mm reversal film shot between 1920 and 1940, primarily in Maine and China. Joan Branch's grandfather, Forrest Colby of Bingham, Maine, was Maine Forest Commissioner. Forrest Colby's daughter, Lena Mary Colby, married Joseph E.C. Swan in Shanghai, China, in 1923. The China footage was shot by Swan's father, Joseph E.C. Swan, between 1928 and 1936. This clip shows: 1. An American family drives in a convertible into the countryside and passes through villages. Views include a stone bridge with a bench, another bridge with pavilions, and views of the road ahead from the moving car. The camera pans a village scene with Chinese people interacting with an American woman. Views of the village, waterway and road, showing a harvest, the car parked near a building, an elderly man. The moving car passes people by roadside; views over the windshield through a town. The American woman walks by thatched and tile-roofed buildings. Driving along canal or waterway at high speed, speeding through a village with people and chicken by side of road, in the countryside, people stopped to observe. Western man in hat is on ground, reclining. Chinese boy turns and looks at camera.
2. West Lake holiday; men paddle covered boats with upholstered sofas. A view from a boat of the hotel with upturned roof line, trees on the lakefront. Large car stopped on the road while American family walks among Chinese people. Pan to stone building by the road. A water buffalo plows with a man walking behind next to the road. View of the road receding into the distance with mountains. Joseph E.C. Swan (1898-1960) was a founding member of Swan, Culbertson & Fitz, a banking and brokerage firm in the Far East. He was associated with the firm from 1926 to 1936. He lived with his wife and three children in Shanghai.
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