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George Wharton James (27 September 1858 – 1923) was a prolific popular lecturer, photographer and journalist, writing more than 40 books and many articles and pamphlets on California and the American Southwest. ==Biography== James was born in Lincolnshire, England. He was ordained as a Methodist minister and came to the United States in 1881, serving in parishes in Nevada and southern California. However, in 1889 he was sued for divorce, accused by his wife with committing numerous acts of adultery. He subsequently underwent an ecclesiastical trial, charged with real estate fraud, using faked credentials, and sexual misconduct. He was defrocked, although he was later reinstated. He had a long-running feud with Charles Fletcher Lummis, another writer with similar regional interests.〔Starr, Kevin (1985). ''Inventing the Dream: California through the Progressive Era''. New York: Oxford University Press.〕 James' books included the well-received ''The Wonders of the Colorado Desert'' (1906), ''Through Ramona's Country'' (1909), ''In and Out of the Old Missions of California'' (1905), and ''The Lake of the Sky'' (1915). Characteristics of his writing included romanticism, an enthusiasm for natural environments, idealization of aboriginal lifeways, and health faddism. He was associate editor of ''The Craftsman'' (1904–05), editor of ''Out West'' (1912–14),〔 and 〕 and lectured at the Panama-Pacific and Panama-California expositions 1915–16. In Pasadena, James lived with his second wife at 1098 North Raymond Avenue which, according to Lawrence Clark Powell, "became a kind of museum salon in the same way that El Alisal served as the center for his rival booster Lummis' Los Angeles followers. He also created the Pasadena Browning Society as well as the Anti-Whispering Society. According to Powell, the Anti-Whispering Society was "devoted to the suppression of (1) talking audiences, (2) peanut fiends, and (3) crying babies." The California State Library and the University of California, Berkeley have collections of James' books and pamphlets. A collection of his photographs is on file at the University of New Mexico. The Southwest Museum in Los Angeles also has some of his papers and photographs. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「George Wharton James」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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