AUB and Ras Beirut in 150 Years of Photographs
William Tracy
Maria Bashshur Abunassar
2018, AUB Press, 978-9-95358-6-359, $50.
This coffee-table volume of photography focusing on the American University of Beirut (AUB) and the community of which it’s a part is one that readers familiar with the Lebanese capital will undoubtedly enjoy. Published as a companion to the eponymous photo exhibition marking AUB’s 150th anniversary in 2016, its 230 pages feature some 380 color and black-and-white photos, several previously published in AramcoWorld. The book includes photographs of landmarks such as the university, Bliss and Hamra streets, ’Ayn al-Mreisseh and the Saint George Hotel, as well pictures of the old tram line, Uncle Sam’s restaurant, Clemenceau and Sadat streets, Pigeon Rocks, Manara and the Corniche area. Historic maps and views from the sky show how the Ras Beirut area has grown and evolved from 1876 to the present.