Jung Da-hyun is a reporter at The Korea Times, covering social issues in Korea, including foreign residents, education, environment and politics. Driven by a deep interest in people’s stories, she focuses on investigative and feature reporting through direct interviews and field coverage. She received the Amnesty International Korea Media Award for her “Deepfake Crisis at Schools” series. Reach her at dahyun08@koreatimes.co.kr. Always open to hearing your stories.
163 recently unveiled photos reflect Seoul's history from perspective of US diplomats, journalists
The photo shows U.S. Army soldiers passing through Seoul after Operation Chromite in 1950, the first year of the Korean War. Courtesy of Seoul Museum of History
By Jung Da-hyun
The Seoul Museum of History has unveiled a captivating collection of books featuring 163 photos of Seoul's bygone era after its first survey on the U.S. Library of Congress’s photography and print division.
This compilation is the outcome of the U.S.-based Seoul Studies data survey, initiated in 2020. The collection spans Seoul's late Joseon era to the 1960s, offering a unique perspective through the lenses of U.S. diplomats, travel journalists, the Japanese Government-General of Korea and the U.S. media.
The survey aims to proactively discover, investigate and share with a global audience hard-to-access, forgotten items and study materials related to Seoul.
Among the collections, photos from George Foulk highlight Seoul during the late Joseon era, featuring photos captured by Foulk, a naval officer and U.S. diplomat stationed at the U.S. legation in Joseon. Foulk, who also served as an adviser to King Gojong's modernization project, provides a glimpse of Joseon from a diplomatic standpoint.
The compilation also includes photos from Frank Carpenter, an American photographer and travel writer. He is also known as a journalist who interviewed King Gojong in 1888.
Adding to these collections, unreleased photos that were not previously registered in the U.S. Library of Congress have also been released for the first time. These images, sourced from documents of the Japanese Government-General of Korea, which were obtained by the United States after liberation, offer insights into the living and economic conditions during the Japanese colonial era.
The Japanese Government-General of Korea extensively documented living and economic conditions throughout the country during the colonial era through photographs. Covering diverse regions and fields, these images offer a comprehensive view, providing insights into the various contexts under which the Japanese Government-General of Korea conducted investigations during its colonial rule.
Additionally, unreleased photos from the New York World Journal Tribune, a daily newspaper published in New York from the 1920s until its closure in 1967, will also be unveiled in the collection. These images capture the period from liberation to the early 1960s, portraying the nation's reconstruction after the Korean War.
The collection of books featuring the photographs is available from Wednesday at Seoul Bookstore and a souvenir shop in the Seoul Museum of History.
“This research aims to provide viewers with an opportunity to compare Seoul's evolution over 80 years, from the end of the Joseon era to the modern era, as captured through the lenses of various individuals,” said Choi Byung-gu, the director of the Seoul Museum of History.