Sale 2503 - Printed & Manuscript African Americana, March 28, 2019

108 “THE PEOPLE OF AFRICA ARE ANXIOUS FOR AN EDUCATION” 107 c   (AFRICA.) Tyesi, Julia Nichols. Letter from an African-American missionary in South Africa, with her calling card. Autograph Letter Signed as “Julia Tyesi, Missionary” to Helen Burrell of Asbury Park, NJ. 3 pages, 11 x 8 1 / 2 inches, on 2 sheets; folds, minimal wear. With original stamped and cancelled envelope from South Africa, and an illustrated printed card titled “Missionary in America on a Furlough,” 5 1 / 2 x 3 1 / 4 inches. Middeldrift, Cape Province, South Africa, 15 October 1934 (postmark) [500/750] Julia Nichols (1895-1968) was an African-American woman from Newark, NJ who met the Rev. David Tyesi (1875-1937) at the Virginia Seminary and then went to South Africa as a missionary. This letter was written shortly after she returned to South Africa. It was written to an African-American teacher in New Jersey named Helen Burrell (1892-1983): “What a great help the books you gave me are to our work. The children are just tickled to death (almost) with these books. . . . Even the parents come for books & we have a night school along with our day school which enables the parents who work in the day to come to night school. Really the people of Africa are anxious for an education. . . . Those yellow books called Study Lessons by Frederick K. Bannon & Helen Ganey are such a help. . . . We need books on canning & preserving, poultry raising, butter & cheese making, in fact all books on household hints. . . . There is a tendency of some here to keep the natives blind, limit his educational opportunities, but if I can get friends there to send me books, we will upset any such plan.” Accompanying the letter is a printed calling card with a photograph of Mrs. Tyesi and a short biography. 108 c   (AFRICA.) Collection of badges and photographs relating to Liberia. 12 items, various sizes and conditions, in one binder. Vp, 1926-56 and undated [400/600] Photograph of Charles E. Mitchell (1870-1937), the United States Minister to Liberia from 1930 to 1933, with his wife Elizabeth, apparently in Liberia. Mitchell was the grand-nephew of Frederick Douglass. 2 1 / 2 x 4 inches, mounted on his engraved consular invitation, with a duplicate * Photomechanical image of Mitchell, captioned “Monrovia, West Africa,” 4 x 5 inches, with two duplicates * 3 other uncaptioned photographs * 4 medallions: “U.S.A. and Liberia, Souvenir Sesquicentennial, Philadelphia, 1926” * and 3 badges from Liberian President William V.S. Tubman’s 1956 campaign. AFRICA LOTS 107 - 109