Writing in the margins: Mary Paley Marshall on International Women's Day 2022

 Mary Paley Marshall was Alfred Marshall's wife and the founder of the Marshall Library of Economics, after Alfred's death in 1924. She was the first female librarian and an accomplished economist and scholar in her own right. 

In 1871 Mary was one of the first 5 women admitted to Newnham College, where she spent 3 years studying for the Moral Sciences Tripos. Mary and a fellow student, Amy Bulley, were the first women to be allowed to take the men's Tripos. Even though Mary passed all her exams, as a woman, she was not permitted to graduate. Nevertheless she was invited to become the first woman lecturer in Economics at the University of Cambridge and she soon took over the teaching from her former teacher, Alfred Marshall.

In 1876 Mary and Alfred became engaged and they were married the following year. Due to limitations on marriage for Cambridge Dons at that time Mary and Alfred relocated to Bristol, where Alfred was offered a post. Together Mary and Alfred wrote the Economics of Industry, which was published in 1879 under both their names. The book was highly rated by John Maynard Keynes and other leading Economists of the day. Alfred, however, disliked the book and allowed it to go out of print. There was no evident protest from Mary about this. Later Alfred's own seminal work, Principles of Economics, was published in 1890 under Alfred's sole name. However, we are in possession of one of the proof books and we can see how much Mary contributed to the editing of this great work from her handwriting in the margins.

Take a look at a digitised proof book of Principles of Economics in Cambridge Digital Library here:

https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/marshall/1

When Alfred died in 1924 he left many of his books and donated much of his money to the library. Mary acted as volunteer librarian and looked after the collection for nearly 20 years, until she retired at the age of 87.

Throughout her life Mary enjoyed painting and produced a bound volume of watercolours, which was passed to the Marshall Library for safe keeping.

The Return of Alfred Marshall’s Book V, Ch.VII of Principles of Economics (annotated) from Japan

Prof. Shoichiro Uemiya visited the Marshall Library Archive on 9 March, 2017 to return a book that belonged to Alfred Marshall. The book appears to have been in Japan for some time and possibly since the 1920s. 

As Prof. Uemiya  explains in his own words:

“I am an Emeritus Professor of Kobe University in Japan. My major field is the history of economic thought. I studied for a year (1977-78) as an Honorary Research Fellow under the late Prof. R.D.C.Black at Queen’s University, Belfast.

Just before my retirement in March 2012 Mrs. Taeko Minakata, the wife of my supervisor the late Prof. Kanichi Minakata (1923-1985), asked me to return this book, which is part of Marshall’s Principles of Economics. The book contains pages with bound-in pages of written script – possibly in the handwriting of Marshall himself. Her husband told her that he received this particular book from his old-time supervisor Prof. Yasaburo Sakamoto (1894-1981). Prof. Minakata’s major field was Marshall’s Economic Theory. He came to Cambridge for a year (1962-63) to study and stayed at St. Edmund’s House. However, Mrs. Minakata has no idea when or where Prof. Sakamoto got the book. He did travel between 1919-1927 in England, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.”

The book comprises Book V, Ch. VII  pp. 449-610 of Principles of Economics. Many of the pages include handwritten insertions in coloured pencils and ink. There is also a stamp showing 15 Jan. 90, University Press, Cambridge. Clare Trowell, Marshall Librarian and Simon Frost, Deputy Librarian can confirm that the inserted pages are in Marshall’s handwriting as the Library Rare Books collections contain many examples of Marshall’s handwriting and it is clearly recognisable.

The Marshall Library Archive contains several photographs, including an intriguing picture of Mrs Mary Paley Marshall entertaining a Japanese visitor and his wife at her house, Balliol Croft, in 1928. This visitor is Prof. Tsunao Miyajima (1884-1965) who translated the Memoirs of Alfred Marshall (1925) into Japanese. Between 1919-1928 Prof. Miyajima was Prof. at the Kansai University, Osaka. In 1928 he also visited France. Between 1948-1952 he was Chief Director of Kansai University. There does not appear to be a link between Prof. Miyajima , Prof. Sakamoto and the mysterious annotated book that has just been returned to the Marshall Library Archives.

We plan to catalogue the returned book as a Rare Book and make it available to scholars of Alfred Marshall as soon as possible.

Prof. Uemiya also kindly donated a copy of his translation of the work:

The Scope and Method of Political Economy / J.N. Keynes    Marshall Library   20 F 18  http://bit.ly/2lZhbpu