I’ve been trudging my way through Kate Bolick’s Spinster: Making a Life of One’s Own, a book about which I can’t articulate anything positive or negative that hasn’t already been said more thoroughly and eloquently than one could manage in an introductory paragraph to a blog post. However, in light of discussions around the book, I’ve been thinking about girls and women who defy society’s rigid expectations, those truly wonderful spinsters of fiction and their tomboyish counterparts— including, of course, “Romping Polly”, the free-spirited star of this week’s Bad Children of History.

Romping Polly is another of the ill-fated children from the classic Struwwelpeter, a book last featured in our first-ever Bad Children of History post. The illustrations of Polly below are again taken from the 1890 English translation of the book, published in Philadelphia by Porter & Coates.

At the very beginning of “The Story of Romping Polly”, we see her receiving a stern warning about her inappropriately-feminine styles of play:

I know that you will often see
Rude boys push, drive, and hurry;
But little girls should never be
All in a heat and flurry.

Nodding her tomboy-ish head, Polly acknowledges her aunt’s lecture, and then promptly scurries down some sort of decorative border and leaps toward her jumping and running playmates. Looks like fun, right?

WRONG! There’s nothing fun about falling down such that your leg detaches like a lizard’s tail. (Mind you, the text simply says that “her poor leg was broken”, but the illustration leads me to believe that it was something infinitely more drastic.)

Polly is carried away on a makeshift stretcher, while her detached leg (or should I say “the limb all wet and gory”) is carried away by her tearful brother.

Let’s choose to ignore the butcher’s knives in the lower left of that illustration, shall we?

What happened to poor, rough-playing, enthusiastically-frolicking Polly? How did her life turn out, in the wake of her inattention to compulsory 19th century feminine behavior?

Full many a week, screwed up in bed,
She lingered sad and weary;
And went on crutches, it is said,
Ev’n to the grave so dreary.

Yep. Little ladies, don’t try to play with the boys, or else you may end up a hunched woman in an unflattering bonnet walking with crutches toward your own gravesite. You wouldn’t want that, would you?

When I first learned of the Social Networks and Archival Context (SNAC) Project, I knew that we had to be involved and assume some leadership. Why? Because the driving force of SNAC is collaboration within the archival and library communities to improve discovery and access to archival materials. I am a huge proponent for collaboration and access – these are the central concepts that we have been incorporating into our strategic direction at NARA.

The National Archives has been a key partner with the SNAC project. Early on, we recognized the benefits and opportunities of the Cooperative, both for NARA and the international archival community. We were proud to recently announce the launch of the Pilot Phase of the project.  The two-year pilot phase of the Cooperative is generously funded by a $1 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to the University of Virginia. We will work with our Cooperative partners, the University of Virginia, and the California Digital Library, as well as a cross-section of U.S. archives, libraries, and museums.  This phase of the Cooperative has both social and technological objectives. The social objectives include developing the administrative structure and developing a shared understanding and governance structure with the inaugural members for how we will set best practices for content input and maintenance, provide input into the development of the editing user interface, and maintain the description and access data.  The primary technological objective will be transforming the SNAC prototype research tool into a platform that will support ongoing building and maintenance of the SNAC description and access data.

One of the great strengths of SNAC is the way that biographical and historical data can be used to provide researchers with convenient, integrated access to historical collections held by archives and libraries all over the world. This linking of people, their relationships, and the records that document their lives and work provides powerful research avenues — and some unexpected surprises.   For example, take a look at the record for the great jazz musician, Lionel Hampton.

Under “Archival Collections” you’ll see a list of links to materials related to his work as a musician, as well as a link to the finding aid for the Lionel Hampton Papers held at the University of Idaho. And you’ll also find something about him that you may not expect, a link to the National Archives Catalog and the record for the collection of sound recordings of meetings and telephone conversations from the Nixon administration. From our Catalog, you can read the tape log for February 19, 1971, which records that Hampton met with Nixon at the White House and that they discussed Hampton’s upcoming tour of Eastern Europe, his band, and his support for the President.  The technology and data standards that SNAC uses allows this rich, unprecedented access not only across archival collections, but into the social and biographical context of the people documented in these materials.

So I invite you to explore the resources available in the SNAC Research Tool. Whether you browse one of the featured individuals or do a specific search, you will find connections and resources about historical figures you may never have known about.  You may find something really special, as I did when I found this record, which links to my little-known correspondence with several Presidents!

Lise Summers
Tuesday, August 18, 2015 – 14:21

This week we launch our new Archives management system, based on the Canadian software Accesstomemory (AtoM).  When you click on the ‘search our archives catalogue’ button on our home page, it’s one small click for you, but a giant step for SRO.We first developed a computer catalogue in 1986 using a Sun database, but it was for internal use only.  In 2004, we were able to take up the Microsoft based system developed for the State Records Office in New South Wales. We undertook a minor enhancement in 2009, with funding provided by the Friends of Battye Library, to enable us to add digital images, but no other major development work has been undertaken since.The need for a fast, modern archive management system and responsive public access catalogue led us to the search which identified AtoM, an open source software system, as the most likely candidate.  All the systems we looked at required some modification to enable us to meet Australian descriptive standards, as well as international standards, but AtoM seemed to us to be the most flexible, and it had the blessing of the International Council of Archives.  We joined forces with technology consultants, Gaia Resources, and the work began.  Shortly into our first explorations with AtoM, Libraries and Archives Canada picked up the system, and as a result of their funding and research, AtoM took a huge leap forward in terms of design and user experience, which we were able to incorporate into our work.Users looking for access to our maps online may need to access our old system for a few weeks, or contact the staff at SRO for a copy of a plan, or visit the SRO for a copy from the CD backups we hold in the Search Room.  We apologise for the delays, but hope that the experience of better searching and browsing, as well as online ordering will more than compensate for the slight difference in access.Please join us on our exciting new adventure.

This week’s Art//Archives Visual Research Hours will also serve as our first sneak preview of some items that will be featured in the upcoming 2016 exhibition and program series, Portals: History of the Future.

We’ve been poking through scores of old science magazines from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and we’ve picked a few highlights for your pleasure and entertainment.

An odd shout-o-phone! A potato-like Arctic face mask! A royal coach made out of pipe cleaners! If you’d love to spend some time with this fabulous 1940 issue of Popular Science or similar magazines, swing by Special Collections on Tuesday between 10:30 and 1:00.

Happy birthday, Napoleon!

Born on the French island of Corsica in 1769 on August 15th, Napoleon Bonaparte is known for being the steadfast emperor of France who conquered much of Europe during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. After winning most of his conflicts against relentless European coalitions, Bonaparte was ultimately defeated by the British at the famous battle of Waterloo in 1815. He was imprisoned on the remote island of St. Helena where he died at the age of 51 in 1821.

Just after Napoleon’s passing on the island, one of his doctors created a customary death mask for the remembrance and final portrayal of the great leader. In addition to over 20,000 rare books and manuscripts from this significant era, the Special Collections Department at FSU houses one of the few remaining authentic death masks of Napoleon Bonaparte.

In the early 1960s the Department of History established the Institute on Napoleon and the French Revolution which thereby led to the creation of this rich collection currently held in Strozier Library. Together, FSU’s Department of History and the Institute allow students a unique opportunity to study this historical period without traveling to Europe. Visitors to our Research Center can access French Revolutionary newspapers, primary source materials, letters, and, of course, Napoleon’s death mask.

Feel free to stop by the Special Collections Research Center at Strozier Library to wish Napoleon Bonaparte a happy birthday and learn more about the fascinating history surrounding his life.

We may have just missed #MuseumCats day, but you might still enjoy some stories of historic felines in our holdings. We recently received feedback on our archives.gov website survey asking for historical photos of cats in the National Archives. I was reminded of the fact that when Robert Connor, the First Archivist, was assessing the records situation in Washington, he came across the records in one “depository crowded with archives of the Government the most prominent object to one entering the room was the skull of a dead cat protruding from under a pile of valuable records.” (From an editorial entitled, “Our National Archives”, The Nation, February 1931.)

While we obviously don’t want actual cats roaming our stacks, we consulted our online catalog and found this selection of photogenic archival felines:

Daughter of Charles B. Lewis, miner, holding her kitten, 7/10/1946. National Archives Identifier 540563

A patron of “Sammy’s Bowery Follies,” a downtown bar, sleeping at his table while the resident cat laps at his beer, 12/1947. National Archives Identifier 541905

First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s Press Secretary, Pamela Turnure, with Caroline Kennedy’s cat, 1/24/1961. National Archives Identifier 12010054

Amy Carter with her cat, Misty Malarky Ying Yang, 2/3/1978. National Archives Identifier 177850

Photograph of Socks the Cat Perched on the Backseat of a Van, 9/16/1993. National Archives Identifier 6036906

Military Photographer of the Year Winner 1998 Title: Cat Lady Category, 1/1/1998. National Archives Identifier 6504073

Last but not least, you won’t find this picture in our holdings, but do you recognize the young man in this historical cat photo?

In 1975, Staines won the National Yodeling Championship at the Kerrville, TX.  Listen to the skills that won him the honor in this November 30, 1985 concert.

Throughout the 1980s, host Dave Sear put on a series of live concerts at Spencertown Academy in New York. The shows were broadcast on WNYC as the Folk Music Almanac and included some of the most popular singers and songwriters of the day.

Bill Staines performed several times on the show. Staines, who has been active in the folk scene since the 1960s, has had his songs recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary, The Highwaymen, Nanci Griffith, Grandpa Jones, and others.  Staines has also released 22 of his own albums. 

“This is a program of cruel, hard truth. This is the truth about our enemy!”  

Every episode of This is Our Enemy, a World War II era radio series about Axis activities, begins the same way. The announcer insists that the program is the truest of truths, provided by the U.S. government for the edification of the general public.

Of course, This Is Our Enemy is not “the truth.”

 The “German” with the terrible accent who claims that he wants nothing more in life than to loot and steal? He is not a real German.

The “Norwegian” with an American accent who rants about democracy? Also an actor.

Even the “news broadcasts” at the end of every show have a particular agenda.

This isn’t remarkable. Any presentation of information will have bias, no matter how much it strives for objectivity.

But the show’s repeated attempts to convince its audience that it is true are interesting in and of themselves. They are part of a larger story—the story of propaganda in the United States. In this episode of Backtrack, we go into that history, and look at the effect it had on this radio show in particular.  

This piece is the fourth episode of Backtrack, a summer mini-series from the WNYC Archives. The rest of the episodes can be found here.

We drew on a number of sources for this episode, but especially Sydney Weinberg’s article “What to Tell America: The Writer’s Quarrel in the Office of War Information,” Paul Hirsch’s article “This is Our Enemy: The Writer’s War Board and Representation of Race in Comic Books,” and Thomas Howell’s “The Writer’s War Board: U.S. Domestic Propaganda in World War II.”

You can also listen to OWI news broadcasts from the WNYC archives.

“I don’t know myself how it happened,” Mr. Demetrious says, “I’m no kid.”

He goes on to tell the audience about the four thousand dollars he stole from his company’s welfare fund. The only explanation he can give? His own loneliness.

Mr. Demetrious is a radio play character, but he is (somewhat loosely) based on a real inmate who was brought to Rikers Island back in the 1946.

His story was one of many featured on Toward Return to Society.

TRtS was a series of radio programs that the New York Department of Corrections produced with WNYC about the city prison system. Each episode begins with a criminal and his life story, dramatized for radio. A boy from a broken home turns to a life of crime. (Several boys, actually.) A man goes mad for his paramour and becomes an embezzler. An accountant becomes a larcenist to deal with his feelings of inadequacy.

But the show doesn’t end when these unlucky men reach prison. Instead, their case is brought before the classification board; a group of prison officials, medical and psychiatric experts, religious figures, and educators. Together, these men come up with a plan for the prisoner’s term.

“The object?” the announcer declares at the beginning of each show, “Rehabilitation!  The subject is regarded as a person in need of readjustment to a useful niche in society. No steps in this direction are overlooked.”

And the members of this radio-reenactment of a classification board certainly do consider a wide range of options—everything from pig farming to plastic surgery.

We’ve sampled some of those options in the episode above, along with some quality 1940s psychobabble.

We’ve also, though, collected some material that might sound a little more familiar. The most interesting thing about Toward Return to Society might not be that it shows how much our prison systems have changed. It might be, instead, that it shows how much they have remained the same. 

This piece is the third episode of Backtrack, a summer mini-series from the WNYC Archives. The rest of the episodes can be found here.

The internet is a great place to learn. There are MOOCs and Wikipedia articles and political blogs and seemingly infinite other educational resources.

There are also cat videos, listicles, and absurd quizzes.

Think of 1940s radio as something similar. Educators in the 1920s dreamed that everyone would be tuning into lectures and political speeches and classical music all of the time, and that learning would become this great, democratic process.

And yes, some people tuned into the various educational programs on the air. But by the 1940s, it was clear that many, many more people tuned into the soaps and the mysteries—the 1940s radio equivalent of the cat video.

So, people tried to spice up their educational shows by turning them into dramas. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t.

In 1945, CBS released a paper called “Showmanship in Radio Educational Programs.” It walks through the qualities that can make or break an educational docudrama.

This episode, on Backtrack, we explore that CBS article using, as examples, two WNYC docudramas from the 1940s and 50s: This is My Block (1951) and New York Queen of Commerce (1948).

This piece is the third episode of Backtrack, a summer mini-series from the WNYC Archives. The rest of the episodes can be found here.

We drew on several sources for this episode, but especially  Matthew Erlich’s article, “Radio Utopia: Promoting Public Interest in a 1940s Radio Documentary,” as well as Robert Musburger’s article “Setting the Stage for the Television Docudrama,” and several copies of “Education on the Air.” Thanks also to the Municipal Archives for giving us access to their shows.

The weather outside is borderline-frightful, but look how delightful these weather and storm books are!

We have books and manuscripts on meteorology, storm-related shipwrecks, the 1938 Rhode Island “tidal wave”, and urban flooding, as well as a book with a superb etching of “Lightning above a Volcano”.

Stop by Special Collections today, Tuesday, between 10:30 and 1:00 to hang out with these weather-related items!

The United States has always had a complicated relationship with its immigrants.  Americans All, Immigrants All, a CBS show produced in 1938, is no exception.

Times were tense. America was coming off the Great Depression, and the world was heading into a war. Americans All was an effort to inspire unity and patriotism in the face of all these issues.

The show tried to acknowledge the contributions that various immigrant groups had made to the United States. It wanted to make immigrants a part of the official narrative of U.S. history.

Which is all well and good, except that Americans All also struggled with stereotypes, with overly-positive messaging, and with questions about assimilation. Also, the various writers and researchers wanted to push different agendas, which led to contradictory messages.

The result is a complicated show about a difficult subject. In this episode of Backtrack, we’ve tried to highlight some of the main issues that come up in Americans All, and to give you a feel for what the 26 episode long series sounded like.

This piece is the second episode of Backtrack, a summer mini-series from the WNYC Archives.The rest of the episodes can be found here.

We drew on a number of sources for this episode, but especially Barbara Savage’s Broadcasting Freedom: Radio, War, and the Politics of Race, 1938-1948, and Dan Shiffman’s article Standard for the Wise and Honest: The Americans All Immigrants All Radio Broadcasts (Studies in Popular Culture, Vol. 19, No.1).

We’re going to devote this post to taking a peek at the rich visual materials in the Amherst College Dramatic Activities Collection. This is but a very small taste of the large collection of photographs, playbills, costume sketches, set designs, props and recordings of Amherst College theatrical productions to be found in the Dramatic Activities Collection.

H. M. S. Pinafore, produced in June of 1879 by the Glee Club in College Hall.

While students had been putting on dramatic productions since the very early days of the college, there is little photographic evidence until the 1870s. This is one of the few photographs of a nineteenth century production taken on set; most were cast portraits taken in a photographer’s studio. The lack of adequate lighting is evident in the blurriness of many cast members. This was the first full-length dramatic production put on at the college.

This studio portrait of cast members from The Rivals by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, produced in February of 1885, features the illustrious Clyde Fitch (reclining).

Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night was produced in March of 1907. Note the classic Art Nouveau program and the studio background in the cast portrait (click to view larger).

Green Grow the Lilacs by Lynn Riggs, published in 1930, was produced in December of 1936 by the Amherst College Masquers.

A January 1940 production of Peer Gynt by Henrik Ibsen staged in Kirby Theater, which opened in 1938

Set design for The Devil’s Disciple, November 1946

Shakespeare’s The Tempest, November 1951

A poster for the Masquers’ production of Oedipus Rex, November 1955

The Balcony by Jean Genet, September 1968

Costume sketch for Domina of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which was produced in October of 1974 by the Masquers

The premiere of C’mon Back to Heavenly House by African-American playwright Ed Bullins, produced by the Masquers in April of 1977

Set design for the October 1982 production of The Misanthrope

Moliere’s The Misanthrope, November 1982

We’re going to devote this post to taking a peek at the rich visual materials in the Amherst College Dramatic Activities Collection. This is but a very small taste of the large collection of photographs, playbills, costume sketches, set designs, props and recordings of Amherst College theatrical productions to be found in the Dramatic Activities Collection.

H. M. S. Pinafore, produced in June of 1879 by the Glee Club in College Hall.

While students had been putting on dramatic productions since the very early days of the college, there is little photographic evidence until the 1870s. This is one of the few photographs of a nineteenth century production taken on set; most were cast portraits taken in a photographer’s studio. The lack of adequate lighting is evident in the blurriness of many cast members. This was the first full-length dramatic production put on at the college.

This studio portrait of cast members from The Rivals by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, produced in February of 1885, features the illustrious Clyde Fitch (reclining).

Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night was produced in March of 1907. Note the classic Art Nouveau program and the studio background in the cast portrait (click to view larger).

Green Grow the Lilacs by Lynn Riggs, published in 1930, was produced in December of 1936 by the Amherst College Masquers.

A January 1940 production of Peer Gynt by Henrik Ibsen staged in Kirby Theater, which opened in 1938

Set design for The Devil’s Disciple, November 1946

Shakespeare’s The Tempest, November 1951

A poster for the Masquers’ production of Oedipus Rex, November 1955

The Balcony by Jean Genet, September 1968

Costume sketch for Domina of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which was produced in October of 1974 by the Masquers

The premiere of C’mon Back to Heavenly House by African-American playwright Ed Bullins, produced by the Masquers in April of 1977

Set design for the October 1982 production of The Misanthrope

Moliere’s The Misanthrope, November 1982

In 1975, the civil rights activist and musician Reverend Douglas Kirkpatrick came to the WNYC studios and performed “The Ballad of Frank Wills.” The song tells the story of the Watergate break in and the eventual resignation of Richard Nixon on August 9th, 1974. What makes the song so great is that it’s told from the perspective of Frank Willls, the security guard who discovered the five burglars in the DNC headquarters.

Listen to track above and Kirkpatrick’s entire in in-studio performance on Dave Sear’s Folk and Baroque below. Original airdate, January 1st, 1975.

Seventy years ago, on August 6th, 1945, the United States dropped the atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, they bombed Nagasaki.

At the time, that much was clear. Also clear was that tens of thousands of people had died from the flash, the fire, the radiation. Buildings had collapsed on civilians. People’s skin and eyes had burned.

There were other details that were less easily accessible, though. In the years since, we’ve been able to gather data about the effects of the bombs, but directly after the fact, it was hard to get reliable information. Scientists from the U.S. Government interviewed eyewitness survivors, trying to put together a more complete picture.

One such survivor was Kaleria Palchikoff, a medical missionary born in the Soviet Union in 1922. She was living in Hiroshima at the time. Her family had moved into the outskirts of town just before the bomb fell, following evacuation warnings, but she was close enough to see the events unfold.

In this recording, we hear an excerpt of a U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey interview with Palchikoff, conducted after the fact.

Palchikoff describes the flash, and the sandy glass particles that stayed in her eyes for days.

She talks about the burial practices. People dug a hole in front of the regiment headquarters, threw bodies in, and covered them up. They did this, she says, about five times. There were thousands of bodies.

The unidentified men questioning her want more specific information, though. What color dress was she wearing at the time? Did the buildings with steel or reinforced concrete frames do better than others? Who did the Japanese hold responsible for the bombings?

Her answers are partly description, partly speculation and hearsay. None of the white people lost their hair after the attack, she says. She also claims that the Japanese looked up to white people “as Gods,” or at least as highly educated people that they strove to emulate or “live up” to.

As for the attitude of those who were burned, it was “pure jealousy,” Palchikoff says, with young women and men looking at their unburned friends and wondering, “Why me and not you?”

The interview is an interesting mix of fact and rumor, and an indication of just how hard it was to get specific, verifiable data from a disaster zone, even if it was man-made.

As my graduate assistantship in the Special Collections & Archives Division nears its end, I thought I’d say good-bye to Special Collections by sharing a few of my favorite items from our collection.

My previous MA focused on medieval religious and intellectual history, and unsurprisingly, my favorite items in FSU Special Collections & Archives relate to that field.

“The Nun’s Book:” Anulus Nuptialis , Vault BT769 .A56

From the catalog: Written in a humanistic hand by a single scribe on parchment. Initials in red with gold, blue with gold and green with gold ornament. Written by nuns in a convent.

Why I love it:  Anulus Nuptialis is notable for its binding (thought to be the original Renaissance binding).  But I also love its topic.  Written by Venetian nuns during the Renaissance, it describes the nun’s mystical union with God.  This was a popular theme among medieval religious women, and I love seeing its continuity through the Italian Renaissance.  For more information about this volume, see here.

“The Chained Book:” Sermones Discipuli, Vault BX1756 .H448 S4**

From the catalog: Written in one hand, in Gothic cursive script. Rubricated. Contemporary monastic binding, heavy wooden boards with remains of leather covering, brass cornerpieces and 10 brass bosses, clasps wanting; leaves from an earlier manuscript on vellum have been used for linings; hubbed spine exposed; heavy metal ring with three links of chain attached.

Why I love it:  The chained book is a show-stopper, and draws attention in every class we brought it out for.  More than that, it illustrates a very different idea on the value of books and knowledge than we consider in our age of open access, intellectual freedom, and circulating libraries.

17th century Breviary: Breviarium Romanum, Vault BX2000 .A2 1600z**

From the catalog: Latin text, without musical notation, beginning with last part of Psalm 29 and ending with hymn: Aurora iam spargit polum, and verse. Includes most of the psalms 30-108, 142.  Large breviary of the type used by a choir for readings for Church services. Large signatures of heavy paper, stitched together with heavy string, with leather headband sewn over stitching. Covers of wooden boards, covered outside with leather and glued to inside of covers, with parchment endpapers glued over them. Holes and impressions on covers indicate metal ornaments were formerly there. Repairs in folio made with strips of plain or Spanish printed paper and verso strips of musical notation (neumes) glued over center edges of pages near binding. Some pages show erasures with letters printed over them and dusted with a white powdery substance.  Rubricated ms., possibly hand-printed or stenciled in large black letters, with verses and sections each beginning with 1 or more red letters.

Why I love it:  This breviary is huge!  It’s large enough to have been seen and read by a monastic choir during their daily recitation of the Divine Office.  I love being able to interact with this centuries old breviary and actually experience how the monks would have recited their daily prayers.

Vellum Antiphonals: Roman Catholic Church Antiphonals, Vault M2147 .M36*

From the catalog: Twelve examples of manuscript music scores used by the Roman Catholic Church in Europe. The texts are in Latin. The music notes are a type of mensural notation. The media is ink on vellum.

Why I love it:  During the Middle Ages, vellum was the preferred substrate.  Though this antiphonals were made in the 16th century, it is illustrative of the difference between vellum and paper.

‘We Have Tomorrow’: Peter Mackay and the Liberation Movement in Southern Africa

University of Stirling Library

5.30pm, Tuesday 22^nd September 2015

Peter Mackay on the ‘Freedom Road’ from South Africa.

The University of Stirling Archives invites you to an event to celebrate the donation of the papers of Peter Mackay (1926-2013), a key figure in the independence movements of Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) and Nyasaland (Malawi). Born into a Scottish family with strong links to Doune, Mackay served in the Scots Guards, where he became the youngest captain in the Brigade, before emigrating to Southern Rhodesia in 1948. There he rejected the attitudes prevalent in the white community and served as a key organiser for the multiracial Capricorn Society founded by Colonel David Stirling, also from the Doune area. In 1956, however, he resigned from the Capricorn Society and over the next quarter of a century devoted himself to the cause of African liberation in Nyasaland and Southern Rhodesia, becoming actively involved with nationalist leaders such as Yatuta Chisiza in Nyasaland and James Chikerema and George Nyandoro in Rhodesia. Following the establishment of majority rule in Zimbabwe, he took up the cause of the impoverished people of Omay on the shores of Lake Kariba. His volume of memoirs, We Have Tomorrow: Stirrings in Africa, 1959-1967 provides remarkable insights into Southern African nationalism in its most principled phase.

The event will begin with a public lecture by Dr John McCracken (author of A History of Malawi) on ‘Peter Mackay and the role of White Activists in the Nationalist Struggle in Malawi and Zimbabwe.’ The lecture will be followed by an opportunity to view a selection of material from the Peter Mackay Archive in our archives reading room.

To reserve a place at the event, or to find out more about the collection, please email us at archives@stir.ac.uk

Essential Etymological Preface: The English language is an ever-shifting beast, with corresponding changes in the meanings of words. That said, through at least the 18th century, the word “slut” was used to refer to an ugly, slovenly, unkempt person, often a woman. (For examples of this usage, check the OED2.) The Online Etymology Dictionary describes the word’s likely origins from the colloquial German schlutt, meaning a slovenly woman, and claims that its contemporary usage wasn’t cemented until some time in the 1960s. Sam Bovill has a blog post describing the word’s semantic shift, and Malcolm Jones, in an article in The Daily Beast, notes that over the centuries, “slut” has been used to refer to “men, women, dogs, and light fixtures”.

Keeping that in mind, let’s take a look at today’s featured book, a very tiny volume entitled The Merry Andrew: or, the Humours of a Fair. Here it is, with my smaller-than-most hand included for scale:

The title page doesn’t have a publication date, but my best guess is some time between 1810 and 1820.

The author includes his own cautionary preface at the start of this tale, noting that the “humours of a fair” aren’t all levity and entertainment– for instance, the surging crowds there can easily trample a small boy.

For little boys are often trod upon, and even crushed to death by mixing with the mob. If you would be safe, by all means avoid a crowd. Look yonder, Dick Wilson there has done the very thing I cautioned you against.

It’s a little hard to see his head down there at surging-crowd-knee-level, but Dick Wilson is definitely there, full of his usual bad ideas. He’s not today’s primary bad child of history, but he is, according to the author, an “impertinent little monkey”, which is definitely one of my new favorite insults.

As long as you’re not like Dick Wilson, you can see all kinds of fascinating and entertaining things at the fair. You can visit the Wheel of Fortune, pre-Vanna White:

You can see these entertaining gentlemen:

You can ignore your mother’s good advice and ride these dangerous-looking carnival rides:

(Sidenote: the text around that second illustration mystifies me. “You know what I mean by the Up-and-down? It is a horse in a box, a horse that flies in the air, like that which the ancient poets rode on.” Is that a reference to Pegasus? Did ancient poets love carnival rides? Clarifying comments encouraged.)

Because The Merry Andrew is a historical children’s book, this catalog of delights is followed by brief discourses entitled “Descant on Time”, “On Learning”, “On Business”, and “On Idleness”, and the book closes with two short rhymes, “To a Good Girl” and “To a Naughty Girl”.

Below are said good and naughty girls, looking suspiciously like the exact same lass with a slightly different hat and bustle:

So, pretty Miss Prudence, you’re come to the Fair,
And a very good girl they tell me you are.
Here, take this fine orange, this watch, and this knot,
You’re welcome, my dear, to all we have got.

So, pert Mistress Prate-a-Pace, how came you here?
There is nobody wants to see you at the Fair.
Not an orange, an apple, a cake, or a nut,
Will any one give to so saucy a slut.

(Did you keep our etymological preface in mind this whole time? Good, good.) Lesson: don’t be brazen or dirty, or you won’t get any snacks. If you’re pretty, however, you’ll get lots of desirable things, including but not limited to a “fine orange”. Now, children, go forth to the fair, unless there are crowds. Just be careful on the Up-and-down!

The Liber de proprietatibus rerum Bartholomei angelici (On the Properties of Things) is a medieval encyclopedia that was written by the 13th century Franciscan scholar Bartholomeus Anglicus, who sought to gather the rapidly expanding corpus of knowledge of the Late Middle Ages into a single volume. As Bartholomeus himself says in the epilogue to De proprietatibus rerum, he wrote his book so that “the simple and the young, who on account of the infinite number of books cannot look into the properties of each single thing about which Scripture deals, can readily find their meaning herein – at least superficially.”¹ A single source for surface-level knowledge about everything? In other words, medieval Wikipedia. De proprietatibus rerum is arranged into nineteen books, moving in order of importance from spiritual beings, to human beings, to the natural world.

Over one hundred manuscript copies of De proprietatibus rerum survive, indicating its popularity and widespread use, and it continued to be printed into the seventeenth century, purportedly being used over the years by the likes of Shakespeare and Dante.² FSU Special Collections & Archives has two printed copies of De proprietatibus rerum – the first edition in English printed in London in 1582 (Vault oversize AE3.B313 1582) and a 1485 imprint from Strassburg (Vault oversize AE2.B27 1485), which is featured here.

The 1485 imprint is a stellar example of an incunabule, a book printed before 1501 in the first half-century after Gutenberg’s invention of movable type. FSU’s copy is in its original binding of alum-tawed pigskin decorated with blind fillets and stamps of popular Gothic imagery such as the griffin and the Agnus Dei (the sacrificial Lamb of God). The cover is also stamped with a small banner tool of Gothic lettering (unfortunately illegible) that could be the name of the bookbinder. The endpapers inside the front and back covers are made from re-purposed medieval manuscripts on vellum. In early printers’ shops, paper was always at a premium, and it is not uncommon to find fragments of older manuscripts used as endpapers, bindings, and sewing supports in newer books. Discoveries like these are one of the great joys of working with rare books in-person. In fact, fragments of yet another medieval manuscript have also been re-purposed on FSU’s copy of De proprietatibus rerum to make tabs, which aid the reader in turning directly to specific sections of the encyclopedia.

The study of incunabula provides a fascinating glimpse into a period of history when the book was adapting to the challenges and demands of new technologies. On the opening page of the 1485 De proprietatibus rerum, the capital letter “C” is sketched in, perhaps in preparation for illumination that was never completed; on early printed books, decoration and rubrication (red lettering) was still done by hand. Throughout the rest of the book, however, the space where a decorative capital would have been drawn is left blank and marked by a small, printed letter. As printing increased the output of new books, forms of decoration that were routine for scribes and illuminators fell to the wayside. This is not to suggest that a total break with the past occurred, however. To the contrary, the very act of printing De proprietatibus rerum is an example of new technology being used to spread old ways of thinking. The presence of manuscript waste and marginalia on FSU’s copy are physical manifestations of the links between the old and the new that can be discovered in early printed books.

Katherine Hoarn is a graduate assistant in Special Collections & Archives. She is working on her Master of Library and Information Science degree at Florida State University.

References

1. Quoted in R. J. Long, Bartholomaeus Anglicus On the Properties of Soul and Body, Toronto, 1979, p. 1.

2. R. J. Long, Bartholomaeus Anglicus On the Properties of Soul and Body, Toronto, 1979, p. 2.

..And young Sam Bowles’s son–

And young Sam Bowles is old Sam Bowles

When old Sam Bowles is done.”

This jingle, which appeared in “Time Magazine” on Oct 15, 1934 but which was said by the reporter to have been sung for decades by “the beery compositors of the venerable Springfield (Mass.) Republican,” refers to the three generations of “Sam Bowleses” who ran the Springfield Republican newspaper between 1824 and 1915, when the last editor named Sam Bowles died.  The fifth Sam Bowles broke the pattern: he didn’t run the paper. Instead, his cousin Richard Hooker took over the paper as editor and publisher. Subsequently, Sam’s younger brother Sherman worked for the paper as business manager, and then in other capacities for what had become the Republican Company, comprised of several papers.*

The “Springfield Republican” building, ca. 1900

That the first Samuel Bowles (1762-1813), the father of the Republican’s founder, was determined to have a son named after him is proven by his naming four infant sons Samuel until one lived long enough to make it stick:

List of the children of Samuel Bowles I (1762-1813), from “Genealogical and historical notes of the Bowles family” (1851)

The verse about the Bowles men was running through my head when I resealed a daguerreotype that I believe to be the youngest image extant of Sam Bowles III (1826-1878).  The daguerreotype has excellent provenance: it came to us through direct descendants of Sam Bowles along with many other photographs and papers of the Bowles-Hoar family.  Because the daguerreotype’s dirty original glass obscured the image, and because the sitter lacks the facial hair we’ve seen in so many other photos of the most famous Sam Bowles, it took a while to realize who the sitter was.  But in resealing the image in July I was able to see that we had a view of a Sam Bowles taken around 1848, before he took over the paper from his father (1851), met the Dickinsons of Amherst (1858), or became a trustee of Amherst College (1866-1878).   Here it is, shared with you and shown for the first time:

Samuel Bowles III (1826-1878), “the Editor,” here ca. 1848.

Let’s look at that verse again, then, taking the opportunity to illustrate with some of the images at Amherst College of the Samuels involved with the paper.

There’s old Sam Bowles:

Samuel Bowles II (1797-1851), “the Founder,” ca. 1850.

And young Sam Bowles:

Samuel Bowles III, a little older in ca. 1852. Shown earlier at: https://www.amherst.edu/library/archives/holdings/BHFP/bowles

And young Sam Bowles’s son:

Samuel Bowles IV (1851-1915), whose son Sherman was the last Bowles to run the paper.

But young Sam Bowles:

A third cased image of Sam Bowles III, this time ca. 1856.

Is old Sam Bowles:

Cabinet card of Sam Bowles III, ca. 1875.

When old Sam Bowles is done. In keeping with the verse, we should have another photograph of the founder, Samuel Bowles II. So far, only one photograph of him is known — the one five photos above — so we’ll end with his grandson again, Sam Bowles IV, and then another photograph of his sons Sherman (below, at left) and Samuel V:

Cabinet card of Sam Bowles IV, ca.1877.

Sherman and Samuel Bowles V, ca. 1896-7.

It’s easy to confuse the Bowles men, especially given differences in counting the Sams (whether to start with the founder or, as the Bowles family did, with his father, who died a decade before the paper was founded), or in knowing which one was at the helm of one of the papers in a given year. We hope this post helps link names with faces and dates.

************************

*The history of Springfield newspapers — dailies, weeklies, Sunday editions — is detailed in “The story of an independent newspaper, by Richard Hooker; one hundred years of the Springfield Republican, 1824-1924” and “The Passing of the Springfield Republican,” by John J. Scanlon (1950).

..And young Sam Bowles’s son–

And young Sam Bowles is old Sam Bowles

When old Sam Bowles is done.”

This jingle, which appeared in “Time Magazine” on Oct 15, 1934 but which was said by the reporter to have been sung for decades by “the beery compositors of the venerable Springfield (Mass.) Republican,” refers to the three generations of “Sam Bowleses” who ran the Springfield Republican newspaper between 1824 and 1915, when the last editor named Sam Bowles died.  The fifth Sam Bowles broke the pattern: he didn’t run the paper. Instead, his cousin Richard Hooker took over the paper as editor and publisher. Subsequently, Sam’s younger brother Sherman worked for the paper as business manager, and then in other capacities for what had become the Republican Company, comprised of several papers.*

The “Springfield Republican” building, ca. 1900

That the first Samuel Bowles (1762-1813), the father of the Republican’s founder, was determined to have a son named after him is proven by his naming four infant sons Samuel until one lived long enough to make it stick:

List of the children of Samuel Bowles I (1762-1813), from “Genealogical and historical notes of the Bowles family” (1851)

The verse about the Bowles men was running through my head when I resealed a daguerreotype that I believe to be the youngest image extant of Sam Bowles III (1826-1878).  The daguerreotype has excellent provenance: it came to us through direct descendants of Sam Bowles along with many other photographs and papers of the Bowles-Hoar family.  Because the daguerreotype’s dirty original glass obscured the image, and because the sitter lacks the facial hair we’ve seen in so many other photos of the most famous Sam Bowles, it took a while to realize who the sitter was.  But in resealing the image in July I was able to see that we had a view of a Sam Bowles taken around 1848, before he took over the paper from his father (1851), met the Dickinsons of Amherst (1858), or became a trustee of Amherst College (1866-1878).   Here it is, shared with you and shown for the first time:

Samuel Bowles III (1826-1878), “the Editor,” here ca. 1848.

Let’s look at that verse again, then, taking the opportunity to illustrate with some of the images at Amherst College of the Samuels involved with the paper.

There’s old Sam Bowles:

Samuel Bowles II (1797-1851), “the Founder,” ca. 1850.

And young Sam Bowles:

Samuel Bowles III, a little older in ca. 1852. Shown earlier at: https://www.amherst.edu/library/archives/holdings/BHFP/bowles

And young Sam Bowles’s son:

Samuel Bowles IV (1851-1915), whose son Sherman was the last Bowles to run the paper.

But young Sam Bowles:

A third cased image of Sam Bowles III, this time ca. 1856.

Is old Sam Bowles:

Cabinet card of Sam Bowles III, ca. 1875.

When old Sam Bowles is done. In keeping with the verse, we should have another photograph of the founder, Samuel Bowles II. So far, only one photograph of him is known — the one five photos above — so we’ll end with his grandson again, Sam Bowles IV, and then another photograph of his sons Sherman (below, at left) and Samuel V:

Cabinet card of Sam Bowles IV, ca.1877.

Sherman and Samuel Bowles V, ca. 1896-7.

It’s easy to confuse the Bowles men, especially given differences in counting the Sams (whether to start with the founder or, as the Bowles family did, with his father, who died a decade before the paper was founded), or in knowing which one was at the helm of one of the papers in a given year. We hope this post helps link names with faces and dates.

************************

*The history of Springfield newspapers — dailies, weeklies, Sunday editions — is detailed in “The story of an independent newspaper, by Richard Hooker; one hundred years of the Springfield Republican, 1824-1924” and “The Passing of the Springfield Republican,” by John J. Scanlon (1950).

Have you ever wondered how a book is cataloged or who constructs the records that allow you to find a resource within the library? If so, then today is your lucky day. Special Collections’ Complex Cataloging Unit created a Film Noir short on the cataloging process. Directed, filmed, and edited by Dominique Bortmas, Complex Cataloging Specialist, and written by Cataloger Elizabeth Richey, the film provides a comical yet insightful view into the world of cataloging.

Today’s story comes from Dolly and I, an 1872 volume penned by the improbably-named Oliver Optic.

The star of our tale is a ten-year-old girl named Katy, daughter of a factory agent, and a “pretty good girl”, although we’re told from the get-go that she was a demanding baby and, as she grew older, “she did not like to see others have any thing which she could not have.”

The text of Dolly and I is full of the detailed goings-on of dolls (I imagine this is appealing to the book’s intended audience), but to make a long story short: Katy is gifted a beautiful wax doll, and she doesn’t want to share it with her sweet-tempered sister Nellie, who must make do with numerous broken-ish dolls.

Despite Katy’s meanness, Nellie is still kind to her. As a reward for her kindness and good nature, Nellie herself is gifted a wax doll– and this one has eyes that open and close!!

Wow.

As I’m sure one can imagine, Katy is 100% furious. How dare Nellie have a blinking doll, when Katy only has a beautiful non-blinking doll? (Mind you, Nellie is so empathetic, she feels guilty about her doll’s niceness and her sister’s anger.)

What does Katy, blinded by her envious rage, do? She stumbles up the dark stairs after dinner one evening, makes her way into her poorly-lit play room, and then:

Golly. The accompanying narrative makes it even creepier:

‘Your dolly shall not be better than mine any longer,’ she said to herself. As she said this, she took the scissors from the work basket on the bureau, and finding one of the eyes with her fingers, she struck one of the points right into it. Then she turned the scissors, so as entirely to destroy the eye. Not content with this, she spoiled the other eye in the same manner.

Sneaking the defiled doll back into her drawer, Katy slinks downstairs and tries to act cool. When dear, sweet Nellie suggests some pre-bedtime doll-playing, Katy demurs, feeling “just as though she should sink through the floor”. Nellie, completely unaware of her sister’s inner turmoil, runs upstairs, grabs her blinking doll, brings it down to the table, and…

…wait for it…

Nellie’s doll IS TOTALLY FINE and HER EYES HAVEN’T BEEN POKED OUT BY A SEWING IMPLEMENT.

Is it magic?

No, it’s the retributive tendency of the otherwise marvelous universe, for in her jealous frenzy, Katy accidentally poked out the eyes of her very own wax doll.

Our story ends with Katy’s mother scolding her, Katy crying herself to sleep, and the non-blinking wax doll being “utterly ruined”. Tell us, Oliver Optic, what’s the moral of this sad, sad tale?

When you envy others, although you may not punch out the eyes of your own doll, you hurt yourself more than any one else.

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

A few weeks ago I wrote about our facial goniometer, an instrument that measures the precise angles of the human face, and wondered whether it had been acquired by Amherst’s college physician and professor of physical education and hygiene Edward “Doc” Hitchcock (AC 1849). This led me to further pondering about the interesting 19th century origins of anthropometry, the science of measurements and proportions of the human body.

Edward “Doc” Hitchcock, Class of 1849

In the fall of 1861, “Doc” Hitchcock, as Professor of Physical Education and Hygiene at Amherst, introduced his system of anthropometric measurements documenting the physical size and strength of every freshman for more than twenty years. These measurements became an American standard for comparative purposes and earned Hitchcock the reputation as a pioneer in this field.

The anthropometric protocol for students as instituted by Dr. Hitchcock involved over fifty different measurements in six different categories: heights, weights, lengths, breadths, girths and strengths. It required many kinds of specialized devices and an elaborate system of record-keeping to register them. The practice of measuring students was in fact so accepted and indeed so entrenched in the culture of Amherst in the 19th century (as well as at many other American colleges that adopted Hitchcock’s methods) that it was customary to include physical data even in an annual list of graduates:

The table below lists not only the average measurements of the college population, but also the record highs in each category — as well as the name of the student holding that record:

Table from An Anthropometric Manual Giving Physical Measurements and Tests of Amherst College Students Between 17 and 26 Years of Age, and the Method of Securing Them. 4th ed., 1900).  Edward and Mary Judson Hitchcock Papers, box 18, folder 9.

What was the purpose of all these measurements?

The Need of Anthropometry: A Paper Read by E. Hitchcock. Brooklyn: Rome Brothers, 1887.

Hitchcock, in a paper entitled “The Need of Anthropometry” (1887), explained the rationale this way:

To learn what is the condition of all the young men as they come to us and how, and in what way can we help them to grow while connected with us, is the ultimate aim of the Anthropometric work of Amherst College. And the carrying out of this object involves the accurate observation of the physical characteristics of the students, and by a patient and long time process of comparing data, finally enabling the Department to declare to them a standard by which they may be judged.

“Doc” Hitchcock is widely credited as “the father of college physical education.” He took quite seriously Amherst president William A. Stearns’ emphasis on the goal of mens sana in corpore sano, a healthy mind in a healthy body, as the answer to the observable increase in morbidity among a sedentary class of college-educated Americans at that time in the country’s history. Many colleges and universities began to adopt European regimens of exercise for their students and built the first gymnasiums on their campuses. Amherst, under Stearns’ leadership, went one step farther in establishing the first department of Physical Education and Hygiene (and an endowed professorship to secure it).

This advertisement on the back cover of “The Need of Anthropometry” shows Hitchcock’s influence as a exponent of anthropometry and the range of colleges and schools where it was practiced.

The elaborate system of body measurements that Hitchcock introduced, then, was intended not (as one might queasily suspect) as a reference (veiled or not) to relative judgments on racial “purity” (eugenics being a hideous malformation of science that was to have its full bloom in the early decades of the following century). Rather, it indicated an attempt to educate the whole man — mind, body, soul — and encourage each one individually to be mindful of his body as a temple. I have little doubt that it was influenced by the Victorian ideal of “muscular Christianity,” a piety built on a foundation of fresh air, wholesome diet, sport and exercise.

Below, preserved in the college scrapbook of Shattuck Hartwell (AC 1888) is his personal booklet of anthropometric measurements, entered in pencil next to the printed average values for men in his height range. As can be seen from the numbers, Hartwell was probably told he should work harder in Amherst’s calisthenics classes to make up for many deficiencies!

Physical education class in Pratt Gymnasium, winter 1899.

Our Archives holds a wealth of material on anthropometry. The Edward (AC 1849) and Mary Judson Hitchcock Family Papers hold most of Doc Hitchcock’s writings on the subject and on physical education generally, and show too what a leading figure he was not only on the Amherst campus but nationwide in his field. The records of the Department of Physical Education and Hygiene contain annual reports, manuals, correspondence, articles by Hitchcock and other educators, and many tables of anthropometric data. Our Photographs Collection holds a few rare images showing anthropometry apparatus in use, as here:

The mustached man in the third photo above, by the way, can be identified as Leverett Bradley (AC 1873), a member of Amherst’s famed crew team that took the championship at the Springfield Regatta, July 1872. A formidable athlete, Bradley went on to become an Episcopal priest in Boston and Philadelphia. Muscular Christianity, indeed.

A few weeks ago I wrote about our facial goniometer, an instrument that measures the precise angles of the human face, and wondered whether it had been acquired by Amherst’s college physician and professor of physical education and hygiene Edward “Doc” Hitchcock (AC 1849). This led me to further pondering about the interesting 19th century origins of anthropometry, the science of measurements and proportions of the human body.

Edward “Doc” Hitchcock, Class of 1849

In the fall of 1861, “Doc” Hitchcock, as Professor of Physical Education and Hygiene at Amherst, introduced his system of anthropometric measurements documenting the physical size and strength of every freshman for more than twenty years. These measurements became an American standard for comparative purposes and earned Hitchcock the reputation as a pioneer in this field.

The anthropometric protocol for students as instituted by Dr. Hitchcock involved over fifty different measurements in six different categories: heights, weights, lengths, breadths, girths and strengths. It required many kinds of specialized devices and an elaborate system of record-keeping to register them. The practice of measuring students was in fact so accepted and indeed so entrenched in the culture of Amherst in the 19th century (as well as at many other American colleges that adopted Hitchcock’s methods) that it was customary to include physical data even in an annual list of graduates:

The table below lists not only the average measurements of the college population, but also the record highs in each category — as well as the name of the student holding that record:

Table from An Anthropometric Manual Giving Physical Measurements and Tests of Amherst College Students Between 17 and 26 Years of Age, and the Method of Securing Them. 4th ed., 1900).  Edward and Mary Judson Hitchcock Papers, box 18, folder 9.

What was the purpose of all these measurements?

The Need of Anthropometry: A Paper Read by E. Hitchcock. Brooklyn: Rome Brothers, 1887.

Hitchcock, in a paper entitled “The Need of Anthropometry” (1887), explained the rationale this way:

To learn what is the condition of all the young men as they come to us and how, and in what way can we help them to grow while connected with us, is the ultimate aim of the Anthropometric work of Amherst College. And the carrying out of this object involves the accurate observation of the physical characteristics of the students, and by a patient and long time process of comparing data, finally enabling the Department to declare to them a standard by which they may be judged.

“Doc” Hitchcock is widely credited as “the father of college physical education.” He took quite seriously Amherst president William A. Stearns’ emphasis on the goal of mens sana in corpore sano, a healthy mind in a healthy body, as the answer to the observable increase in morbidity among a sedentary class of college-educated Americans at that time in the country’s history. Many colleges and universities began to adopt European regimens of exercise for their students and built the first gymnasiums on their campuses. Amherst, under Stearns’ leadership, went one step farther in establishing the first department of Physical Education and Hygiene (and an endowed professorship to secure it).

This advertisement on the back cover of “The Need of Anthropometry” shows Hitchcock’s influence as a exponent of anthropometry and the range of colleges and schools where it was practiced.

The elaborate system of body measurements that Hitchcock introduced, then, was intended not (as one might queasily suspect) as a reference (veiled or not) to relative judgments on racial “purity” (eugenics being a hideous malformation of science that was to have its full bloom in the early decades of the following century). Rather, it indicated an attempt to educate the whole man — mind, body, soul — and encourage each one individually to be mindful of his body as a temple. I have little doubt that it was influenced by the Victorian ideal of “muscular Christianity,” a piety built on a foundation of fresh air, wholesome diet, sport and exercise.

Below, preserved in the college scrapbook of Shattuck Hartwell (AC 1888) is his personal booklet of anthropometric measurements, entered in pencil next to the printed average values for men in his height range. As can be seen from the numbers, Hartwell was probably told he should work harder in Amherst’s calisthenics classes to make up for many deficiencies!

Physical education class in Pratt Gymnasium, winter 1899.

Our Archives holds a wealth of material on anthropometry. The Edward (AC 1849) and Mary Judson Hitchcock Family Papers hold most of Doc Hitchcock’s writings on the subject and on physical education generally, and show too what a leading figure he was not only on the Amherst campus but nationwide in his field. The records of the Department of Physical Education and Hygiene contain annual reports, manuals, correspondence, articles by Hitchcock and other educators, and many tables of anthropometric data. Our Photographs Collection holds a few rare images showing anthropometry apparatus in use, as here:

The mustached man in the third photo above, by the way, can be identified as Leverett Bradley (AC 1873), a member of Amherst’s famed crew team that took the championship at the Springfield Regatta, July 1872. A formidable athlete, Bradley went on to become an Episcopal priest in Boston and Philadelphia. Muscular Christianity, indeed.

In June, I attended the Association of Canadian Archivists (ACA) annual conference in Regina, Saskatchewan.

The venerable Hotel Saskatchewan, site of the 2015 ACA conference

The Association of Canadian Archivists is the national professional organization for archivists in Canada outside of Quebec. Here are some highlights of this year’s event.

TAATU – the technology unconference

If you’re into tech, one of the best parts of any ACA conference is The Archives and Technology Unconference (TAATU). Hosted by the Technology and Archives Special Interest Section (TaASIS), TAATU is laid-back and designed to be non-intimidating for non-techies, but it also has its serious side, perhaps this year more so than others. As more and more Canadian archives adopt AtoM as their holdings management database and experiment with its sister product, digital preservation system Archivematica, TAATU has become a valuable venue for sharing information, including success stories and lessons learned, for both open source products.

This year’s highlights included lightning talks on:

• a new Archivematica feature to accommodate the hierarchical arrangement of digital records;
• Artefactual Systems’ work with the Museum of Modern Art to develop a repository management system, Binder
• The development of a Canadian accession standard and opportunities for community feedback
• Updates to donation agreements to take into account digital preservation considerations, including issues around ownership and fair market value, the ethics of forensic disk imaging, and options for Creative Commons licensing
• Physical storage management functionality improvements in AtoM.

There was also useful speculation and debate regarding the role and nature of the national and provincial/territorial network databases (MemoryBC in British Columbia, for example, and Archives Canada at the national level) and the issues surrounding their maintenance and synchronization. It is likely that this will be a key issue to be dealt with by the archival community over the next year or two.

The lightning talks were followed by a meeting of the Canadian AtoM development working group, for now a loose affiliation of AtoM users who are looking for ways to pool resources to develop requirements and fund development of the software.

News from Library and Archives Canada

The biggest buzz of the conference came during Friday’s plenary session by Librarian and Archivist of Canada, Guy Berthiaume. Part status report on Library and Archives Canada’s activity since his appointment in June 2014, part articulation of his vision for the future, Berthiaume took the opportunity to announce the restoration of some federal funding to the archives sector. The new Documentary Heritage Communities Program will provide $1.5 million in project funding to archival organizations that do not receive regular funding from any level of government. Unlike its predecessor, the National Archival Development Program which was cut in 2012, this new program excludes government and university archives. Nevertheless, it represents a step forward for LAC and its leadership role and hopefully bodes well for the future direction of the Canadian archival system.

Guy Berthiaume addresses ACA delegates during a plenary session

Almost lost in the clamour of the funding announcement were references to two key reports published within the last year. The first, The Future Now: Canada’s Libraries, Archives and Public Memory by the Royal Society of Canada, examines the state of library and archival services and the expectations of 21^st century users, and outlines recommendations for LAC, professional associations and councils, and provincial and territorial governments to strengthen both communities. The second, Leading in the Digital World: Opportunities for Canada’s Memory Institutions by the Council of Canadian Academies examines how archives, libraries, museums and galleries may embrace the opportunities and challenges posed by changes in digital technology, especially regarding their traditional roles and relevance to society. Both are well worth reading by those interested in the future directions of these institutions.

For more on M. Berthiaume’s address, the Government of Canada has made his speaking notes available.

Sessions of note

Other sessions of interest included a thought-provoking presentation on digital preservation challenges. Allana Mayer presented her independent survey results on the current state of born-digital preservation in Canada, while Adam Jansen looked at preservation requirements for records in cloud storage. Paul Wagner talked of Library and Archives Canada’s efforts to build a trusted digital repository.

Heather MacNeil and Elizabeth Shaffer gave two papers that explored the idea of archives’ role in social justice and the social consequences of poor recordkeeping. MacNeil focussed on the investigations of abuse in Scottish residential schools while Shaffer examined the design of information systems in the context of the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. Both papers reminded delegates of the fundamental role of archivists as keepers of evidence and of archives in citizens’ quests to prove rights and obligations.

On a lighter note, as part of a session on transformations within the profession and our holdings, Greg Bak of the University of Manitoba gave a whirlwind tour of the history of electronic recordkeeping from punch cards to cloud storage. Young archivists in the audience laughed at images of early Apple computers, considering them museum pieces; those of us in mid-career were horrified to realize we used them as undergraduates.

One of Greg Bak’s slides illustrating obsolete technology

It was also refreshing to hear Red Deer and District Archivist Lindsay Ballagray report on her institution’s new approach to copyright. Rooted in a desire to remove barriers on access and use, they now take a more simplified view with the elimination of commercial use and permission fees, greatly reducing paperwork and eliminating the need for enforcement. Delegates almost cheered Lindsay’s presentation, which was gratifying to witness. Our own decision to eliminate these in 2008 was certainly not as popular among our colleagues.

I had the pleasure of chairing the session ‘Building and Sustaining Archives’ and delivering commentary on the to papers. One reported the results of a recent Society of American Archivists survey of municipal archives and the other the tale of starting a municipal archives from the ground up, near to home at the City of Coquitlam.

Saturday’s plenary was also worthy of note. Anthea Seles, currently with the National Archives of the UK, told a cautionary tale of a future where archivists are not part of the conversation on managing and preserving big data, arguing that our continued convergence with other memory organizations emphasises our cultural function and ignores our more important role as facilitators of accountability and transparency. Encouraging alignment with auditors, lawyers and scientists, she challenged delegates to change the way we talk about archives, to build relationships and reach out and take in new knowledge.

In his commentary, Seamus Ross of University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information Science agreed that the profession is at a crossroads, but that we cannot lose sight of the fact that ours is an ancient profession and one with a robust intellectual body of knowledge. Arguing that there are many areas where we used to control the field, including knowledge of authenticity and provenance, he noted we need to engage in research across disciplines and demonstrate how our theoretical framework can inform those disciplines, including those of law, finance, and data science. He noted that we also need graduate students who understand data, suggesting that most archival studies students still come from the humanities and social sciences, which enables them to write a narrative, but does not give them the necessary scientific and technical background they need to truly succeed. And he suggested our professional associations are failing to meet the need as well, and must be more creative to remain relevant and effective.

Association business – state of the union

Probably the most critical topic at both the members input session and annual general meeting was the report of the Canadian Archival System Working Group. Formed after the Canadian Archives Summit in 2014, the working group has produced a renewed vision and focus for the Canadian Archival System and has published that draft strategy document for broader public consultation over the summer. As with the Royal Society and Council of Canadian Academies reports above, the re-envisioning is prompted by today’s digital challenges and the changing public expectations the digital age brings with it.

East vs. West Ball Game

And finally, no ACA conference is complete without the traditional East vs. West softball game. The West was set to defend its title and secure the coveted Doughty Cup for another year, but sadly, a prairie thunderstorm conspired and the game was called on account of rain.

Ahead of the thunderstorm, Melanie Delva of the Anglican Diocese of New Westminster Archives keeps her eye on the ball

Ever on the hunt for a silver lining, however, this archivist took solace in a leisurely evening walk to and from the field. It made for some pleasant if distant reminders of my own youth on the prairie, albeit a bit further west of Regina. Still, the architecture was familiar, as were other reminders of prairie life, like this one:

Spotted on the way to the ball game…. What’s out of place in this parking lot? At least as far as a Lower Mainlander is concerned

The outlets for plugging in your block heater!

We were there, fortunately, during a gloriously warm and dry June. Thank you to the organizers for a great conference and a chance to connect with old friends and new colleagues.

The PIDB encourages you to participate in the planning of the Third Open Government National Action Plan (NAP 3.0).  

The Second Open Government National Action Plan included recommendations the PIDB made in its 2012 Report to the President on Transforming the Security Classification System.  These recommendations established the Security Classification Reform Committee, called for the implementation of a process to systematically review and declassify no-longer-sensitive information on nuclear activities, and encouraged the piloting of technological tools to assist declassification and decision-making.  

Still, more work is needed and public participation in drafting the NAP 3.0 is critical to our collective goal of transformation.  There is still time to consider including other recommendations made by the PIDB, including those in its latest Report, Setting Priorities: An Essential Step in Transforming Declassification.  The PIDB, therefore, urges you to participate in this drafting process by learning more about the Open Government Partnership and how you can contribute your ideas and recommendations.

The following post was written by Corinna Zarek, Senior Advisor for Open Government to the U.S. Chief Technology Officer in the Office of Science and Technology Policy.  Ms. Zarek outlines how you can be a contributor to US Open Government initiatives:

Since the United States joined the Open Government Partnership in 2011, U.S. agencies have been working alongside civil society to develop and implement commitments to increase transparency, improve participation, and curb corruption. From opening up Federal spending data to make it easier to see how taxpayer dollars are spent, to the We the People online petition site where the public can propose U.S. policy changes, to strengthening efforts to deny safe haven in the U.S. to corrupt individuals, our efforts to advance open government are making an impact.

Consistent with the commitment to the Open Government Partnership, later this year the United States plans to publish a third Open Government National Action Plan (NAP) including new and expanded open government initiatives to pursue in the next two years. The first U.S. NAP was published in 2011 and the second NAP — which is still being implemented through the end of 2015 — was published in 2013.

These plans are a true team effort — governments work alongside civil society in all 65 OGP countries to develop and implement the efforts within the plans. Over the next several months, we encourage you to contribute your ideas and work with us to build an ambitious third NAP!

How can you contribute?

Please share any NAP suggestions with us via email at opengov@ostp.gov or tweet us at@OpenGov. You can also contribute ideas to a publicly available Hackpad — an open, collaborative platform — that the General Services Administration is helping coordinate. (You will need to create an account on that site before viewing and contributing to content on that platform.)

You may wish to suggest expanded commitments on topic areas from the first two plans such as public participation, open data, records management, natural resource revenue transparency, the Freedom of Information Act, open innovation, or open educational resources, among others. You may also wish to suggest entirely new initiatives — and we hope you do!

The OGP provides guidance on creating NAPs and directs that commitments should be:

• Ambitious: pushing government beyond current practice by strengthening transparency, accountability, and public participation;
• Relevant: advancing one of the four open government principles of (1) transparency, (2) accountability, (3) participation, and/or (4) technology and innovation;
• Specific: describing the problem to be solved and expected outcomes; and
• Measurable: allowing independent observers to gauge whether the commitment has been completed.

As you suggest possible initiatives for the next NAP to help ensure the United States pursues bold, ambitious efforts, please tell us how those suggestions would achieve these criteria.

We look forward to working together as we update our roadmap for open government in the United States. Join us!

Corinna Zarek is the Senior Advisor for Open Government to the U.S. Chief Technology Officer in the Office of Science and Technology Policy

With all the grumbling about “kids these days”, one has to wonder: are kids worse now? Was there a golden age when children were well-behaved and sweet? How long ago was that? Maybe 500 years? What were children like in the 16th century?

I know who can tell us: Shakespeare. Take a look at this monologue from As You Like It:

Old Will, describing the “seven ages” of man, begins with the infant, “mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms”, followed by “the whining school-boy, with his satchel, and shining morning face, creeping like snail unwillingly to school”. (If you keep reading, you can see that Shakespeare is a firm believer not just in bad children of history, but also in bad young men, hotheaded soldiers, annoying middle-aged guys, and helpless senior citizens.)

Shakespeare’s seven ages of man have inspired countless artworks, including a series of paintings by Robert Smirke, a totem-pole-like sculpture in London, a chaotic painting by William Mulready, and a woodcut by Rockwell Kent. They also inspired a series of colored lithographs by Henry Thomas Alken, printed in 1824 and released in book form.

The first print in Alken’s book is a beautiful representation of the innocence of early childhood:

Look at that smart little child methodically disassembling a doll! Look at the welcoming chaos of enriching reading material strewn about on the floor! Look at that energetic baby developing his motor skills, and that little boy getting his hair styled while his mother gives him some serious side-eye! Delightful, I tell you.

Alken shows an equally appealing scene of the next stage of childhood, when children begin to gain some independence and roam about the countryside unsupervised.

Here you can see a very young Uncle Sam carrying a sack and a chalkboard across a bridge. He’s maintained the inquisitive nature of early childhood, gazing thoughtfully at the water below him where a young scallywag and a shepherd without pants are rushing toward an unidentifiable swimming animal. (Is that a nutria? Is it about to get raked with some twigs? Why is the shepherd rushing from the river’s right bank while his pants are heaped on the opposite shore? What is that weird-looking tree to the left of the picture?)

I can’t actually confirm the badness of the children pictured above, aside from the fact that two of them are carrying big sticks and definitely don’t seem to be headed to school, “creeping like snail” or otherwise. But, hey, at least they’ve moved on from “mewling and puking”, am I right?