Severnaia Manchzhuriia I Kitaiskaia Vostochnaia Zheleznaia Doroga [Northern Manchuria And The Chinese Eastern Railway] -

Harbin: Tipografiia Kitaiskoi Vostochnoi Zheleznoi Dorogi, 1922.

Quarto (30 × 23 cm). Original embossed cloth over boards; gilt title to spine; [46 leaves of advertising], IX, 692, XXIII, III [2], pp. With photo-Illustrations, maps, charts and graphs throughout. Owner stamp to title and map on p. 104. Light discoloration to title and first pages, still a very good copy. A detailed economic overview of the Chinese Eastern Railway in Northern Manchuria (southern branch of the Trans-Siberian railway built in 1898-1903), published for the twentieth anniversary of the railway. Intended to promote international trade, the text covers geography, climate and population of the region, as well as the role of the railroad in colonial conquest, and contains sections on agriculture, grain production, livestock, lumber, manufacturing industries, financing and credit, railroad operations and tariffs. Numerous maps, some in color, rare photographic material, and sixty-two appended diagrams complete the volume. The railway was conceived as part of the expansionist ambitions of Imperial Russia in Asia, by Sergei Witte, then prime minister of the Russian Empire, who saw the construction as part of a "peaceful conquest of Manchuria." The text was compiled in Harbin, established in 1898 as the administrative center for the future railway. By 1920, the city had a population of over two hundred thousand, and was a major center of international trade, connecting the Russian Empire through China and the Pacific with North America.

Dozens of leaves of full-page adverts before the text read as an encyclopedia of international trade for 1922, containing ads for wholesalers of grain, wood, coal and machinery, trading and cargo companies, factories taking orders, banks providing credit and insurance of goods, as well as the General Electric Company advertisements for electrification of factories and commercial spaces. Many of the companies list offices across the globe in Shanghai, Berlin, Paris, London, and New York. The text was published in the transitional period after the Bolshevik Revolution, when many White émigrés flocked to Harbin, but before the management of the railway was officially taken over by the Soviet Government in 1924 (in conjunction with the Chinese government). The railroad would eventually fall under full Chinese control in 1929. An English translation titled North Manchuria and the Chinese Eastern Railway was published in 1924. Bakich 184. Polansky 752.

As of July 2020, KVK and OCLC show only the copy at the National Library of Israel.