By examining the manufacturing, commercial, and cultural activities of the maverick industrialist Chen Diexian (1879-1940), Eugenia Lean illustrates how lettered men of early-twentieth-century China engaged in "vernacular industrialism," the pursuit of industry and science outside of conventional venues.

Eugenia Lean is professor of history and East Asian languages and cultures and current director of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University. She is the author of Public Passions: The Trial of Shi Jianqiao and the Rise of Popular Sympathy in Republican China (2007).

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: Gentlemanly Experimentation in Turn-of-the-Century Hangzhou
1. Utility of the Useless
Part II: Manufacturing Knowledge, 1914-1927
2. One Part Cow Fat, Two Parts Soda: Recipes for the Inner Chambers, 1914-1915
3. An Enterprise of Common Knowledge: Fire Extinguishers, 1916-1935
Part III: Manufacturing Objects, 1913-1942
4. Chinese Cuttlefish and Global Circuits: The Association of Household Industries
5. What's in a Name? From Studio Appellation to Commercial Trademark
6. Compiling the Industrial Modern, 1930-1941
Conclusion
Glossary
Notes
References
Index