Abstract by Melissa Dollman (Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute)  James and Margaret Cook Thomson's home movies depict children's birthday parties, snowball fights, and excursions, most of them shot in the households of fellow white, upper middle-class families -- except these activities take place in a suburban Chinese neighborhood. In between shots of the Thomson kids at play, we also see local Chinese farmers setting out in the mornings with their wheel barrels down country roads, local Chinese children, a market square, and other scenes of daily life. We also view moments at the children's Quaker kindergarten. We don't, however, find in these films much intermingling of the cultures, save for the Thomson family's (beloved) Chinese governess. There is also footage of writer Pearl Buck, who was a family friend. The Thomson children's oral history also details how their parents' positions as visiting foreign professors forced them to flee Nanking for a time during the massacre of 1937, a period captured on film as a pleasure trip to the Great Wall and religious sites. I will focus on the roll of film shot at the Ginling College. As the intertitles (not done for the other two films) state, the footage contains shots featuring "Ginling students heading out for church," "Scenes from the Outdoor Spring Field Meet," "Winter Indoor Gymnastic Work," "Smith-Ginling meeting at Ginling," "Ginling Faculty," and "Smith Building in the Spring," among others. |