Vogel, Margaret Almira.

[Scrapbook of a Female Cellist and Artist].

San Francisco Bay Area, California: 1925-1938. 11½” x 9” commercial scrapbook, cloth over boards, black string-tied, with 21 leaves and 4 professional 8” x 10” B&W photographs, 157 newspaper and magazine clippings, 43 programs, 15 letters and 16 pieces of other ephemera adhesive mounted both sides and laid in. Good: front board and first nine leaves detached, though string tie holding loosely to top board and firmly to remainder; some moderate chips to edges of photographs; light to moderate edge wear with some scattered spotting.

This is a lively conglomeration of musical programs, newspaper and magazine clippings, fan letters, photographs, original drawings and assorted other ephemera documenting the life and career of a cellist from the Oakland area, Margaret Vogel.

We were unable to discover much about Vogel besides what appears in this album. She was born around 1904 in Illinois but as of the 1910 census was living in Alameda, the island adjacent to Oakland in the San Francisco Bay.

The scrapbook reveals that Vogel played with various groups in the Bay Area, including all-female trios and quartets, the YMCA Concert Orchestra and the California Symphony Orchestra, from 1926 until 1932. She then went to New York where she studied under Alfred Wallenstein, principal cellist of Toscanini's New York Philharmonic, returning around 1935 and appearing in more group and solo concerts. She also taught cello; along with clippings announcing her performances (several of which feature her photographic image), there was an ad for her services as “Cello Soloist and Teacher”: “Demand for Cellists Is Increasing in Social Life, Vaudeville, Concert Stage. Learn While in School.” The book also holds a handwritten list of her “Cello Pupils” and a piece of stationery featuring her name and a sketch of a cello worked into the letter C of the word.

Dozens of programs document Margaret's performances, including concerts at local schools and the University of California, Berkeley, the dedication of an addition to the Oakland JCC and the 1932 Republican Women's Federation of California “Hoover Dinner and Rally.” There were several letters complimenting her playing, including a long heartfelt note from an “unknown admirer” at the Veterans Hospital in Livermore, as well as “Chorus Notes” and letters to “Fellow Musicians” from the YMCA of Oakland. She also saved reply letters to some of her own fan mail.

The scrapbook further contains great documentation of Bay Area musical events Vogel attended, or which held her interest. There are clippings and business cards of other groups, as well as a great illustrated Christmas card, signed “With greetings and love” from the cellist of the famed Arion Trio (who also happened to be named Margaret). Clippings also reveal other inspiring women, including “Young Artist” Mary Hughson, a cello prodigy who went on to tour with Leopold Stokowski's All-American Youth Orchestra, and Frances Warnecke, a YWCA leader from Berkeley. A handdrawn sketch of Warnecke was placed next to that clipping, and the album contains several other pieces of Vogel's original art.

Along with live concerts, Vogel performed on radio broadcasts, and many clippings concern the growth of radio in the Bay Area and the “Music Programs Galore on Air Tonight.” One photographic clipping showed an orchestra deemed the “Friday Night Fun Makers” on KTAB, another announced the first radio station in Hayward and one had an image of Vogel, who would appear solo “on the air over KLX, the broadcasting station of the [Oakland] TRIBUNE” in 1928. There were also clippings from issues of Broadcast Weekly. The scrapbook revealed celebrities like Harry Lauder, Charlie Chaplin and a young Yehudi Menuhin, appearing as soloist with the San Francisco Symphony for longtime conductor Alfred Hertz' last concert in 1930. Other clippings concerned women's health and athletics (Vogel also included a couple pages of handwritten notes on kung fu) as well as “music through the ages,” books and other items that piqued her interest. A few professional photographs revealed Vogel and the other four women of the “International Revue,” a 1926 performance of the YMCA Concert Orchestra and an orchestral group with its members listed on the back.

A vivid and revealing ode to music and radio in the Bay Area in the 1920s and '30s. Good. Item #4960

Price: $950.00