Listen to a chilling account, created only days later, of President Kennedy’s assassination on November 22, 1963.

The excerpt above is from a disc created by Recording for the Blind recounting the major Sunday New York Times news for the week of November 24, 1963. These discs were created and distributed weekly to visually impaired people all over the world. You can listen below to the entire news and analysis for that week, including items about Jimmy Hoffa, the fluoridation of water in NYC, the second Vatican council, and the return of Soviet hostage Frederick Baghoorn.

The disc, from Archives Director Andy Lanset’s personal collection, has probably not been heard in fifty years. Despite being only seven inches in diameter, it packs a full 50 minutes of audio, thanks in part to its running at the rare rotational speed of 16 2/3 RPM, or half the normal LP speed.

The Director of National Intelligence (DNI) declassified and publicly released documents relating to intelligence collection under sections 501 and 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).  The DNI has now declassified nearly 2,000 pages of documents since June.  The declassified documents include Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court opinions and orders, reports to Congress on FISA activities, and internal documents from agencies on their FISA collection programs.

General Clapper began this effort at the direction of President Obama in June.  We congratulate the DNI for his leadership regarding this declassification activity.  Over the past year, we have heard from the public about its interest in documents related to the FISA.  Gen. Clapper’s decisions support our recommendations to transform the security classification system.   His declassification actions promote Government transparency and democratic discourse.  These documents allow our citizens to judge the actions taken by the Government on their behalf to protect our nation’s security.  The declassification actions also follow our recommendations to protect clearly defined intelligence sources and methods and to limit classification to only that information requiring protection for national security.

You may access more information about the declassification of these documents on the DNI website.

From the February, 1943 WQXR Program Guide:

You or we may not agree with everything [or anything] that Sir Thomas Beecham says about women in music, but we know his comments will interest you. This article is condensed from the original which appears in the recently published “Vogue’s First Reader.” We wish to express our thanks to the publishers for their permission to reprint it.

The number of women in the musical profession has been steadily increasing in the last thirty years or so. As the art of music is in a state of hopeless decadence, this phenomenon is inevitable.

I am, of course, speaking only of the executive side of music. (There are no women composers, never have been and possibly never will be). I look forward with cheerful pessimism to the day when it will be virtually monopolized by women; for man, the more dynamic animal, will not be content much longer to remain in the service of an art which for the moment seems incapable of giving birth to beautiful creations of the imagination.

The simple truth is that all human activity must pass through its periods of rise, ripeness, and decline, and music has been, to a certain extent, fortunate in that it is the last of the great arts in point of date to suffer this general experience.  For my part, I look forward to the next twenty years with a quite lively curiosity and anticipation. I want to see what women are going to do with their newest toy, and I believe the results will be full of interest.

There is a definite feminine approach to music which has a distinct pathological value. Women can actually make it sound different to what it is when handled by men. This physical fact I discovered many years ago. Then I heard, during an audition, a number of women play the viola, that most unsatisfactory and nondescript member of the orchestra. The tone produced by these ladies, almost without exception, was wholly unlike that of the masculine candidates, and to my taste more appealing and attractive.

There is a decided feminine element discernible in all the great masters. Much of this I have always felt has been unduly discounted by most male interpreters. Were it otherwise, the world would not have been so grossly affronted as it has been for generations by the ponderous, dull, and graceless performances given almost everywhere of such composers as Bach, Handel, and Haydn. It is high time that a little stress was laid upon the other side of the musical picture, even though we lose something temporarily in the process.

But far more inimical to the fuller development of their powers is marriage. All that can be said is that for artists it takes its rightful place alongside such other major disasters as earthquakes, sea wrecks, battle, and sudden death. And yet there is hardly one among them who, heedless of every other consideration in the world, does not rush into matrimony upon the slightest provocation or the flimsiest pretext.

Scores of times I have viewed the depressing spectacle of some bright young thing of talent, upon whom have been lavished the resources of family or friends and the last word in the expert training of her day, and yet who, upon the very threshold of success, turns up smilingly one day to announce her instant marriage to a man who has sturdily put his foot down against her appearing before the public.

And our soft-hearted, and still more soft-headed modern society, instead of devoting what it elects to call its mind to the discovery of a punishment worthy of such a crime, hails the catastrophe with enthusiasm. It rejoices over the wasted years of useless endeavour.

So far I have spoken only of instrumental or absolute music, in which, up to the present time, my sex has reigned supreme; but, when I come to the vocal branch of the art, the boot is very much on the other foot.  Here during the past two hundred years, women have acquired an undoubted ascendancy, mainly because of the invention and development of opera in every land. It was not so, of course, in those earlier days. Then women took no part in public representations of any sort, such a thing being unseemly, unsocial, and unchristian.

In the nineteenth century, who are the greatest singers whose names immediately occur to our memory? Are they men? Hardly ever. Those whom we think of without effort are Malibran, Jenny Lind, Christine Nilsson, Patti, Melba, Ternina, Eames, and Sembrich;  and, in more recent times, Bori, Farrar, Jeritza, Rethberg, and Flagstad. Occasional figures there are among the men, who stand out like solitary stars, much as Maurel, de Reszke, and Caruso. But it is the women who bear off the palm all the time.

Today there is a small chance of this one-sided state of things being varied. For women on the who do not appear to be less gifted and attractive than formerly and decidedly the men are less so. Indeed, the vocal condition of my sex has sunk to a level lower than has been heard for generations, and it might be worthwhile to institute an inquiry into the cause of it.

I do not like, and never will, the association of men and women in orchestras and other instrumental combinations. My beliefs nowadays may be looked upon as heretical or blasphemous. As a conductor, I always find myself cramped and embarrassed by the necessity of imposing upon my critical efforts during rehearsals a chilly politeness which accords ill with the exuberance of my impulses. My spirit is torn all the time between  a natural inclination to let myself go and the depressing thought that I must behave like a little gentleman. I have been unable to avoid noticing that the presences of half a dozen good-looking women in the orchestra is a distinctly distracting factor. As a member of the orchestra once said to me, “If she is attractive I can’t play with her, and if she is not then I won’t.”

With the opening of the “Discovery and Recovery” exhibit, I had a chance last week to thank many of the National Archives staff who made it possible.  And it truly took a village to make this happen!  Staff from just about every corner of the Agency contributed—preservation and conservation, security, legal, communications, exhibits, digital engagement, innovation, digital preservation, holdings protection, programs, and facilities.  Truly a team effort.

Photo of the “Discovery and Recovery” exhibit in the Lawrence O’Brien Gallery. Photograph from the National Archives’ Instagram account: instagram.com/usnatarchives

In my remarks to the assembled staff I tried to convey my pride in their work, but also my pride in the passion and commitment they bring to the job every day.  And I was reminded of the closing lines of Donna Tartt’s new novel, The Goldfinch, about the rescue of a painting:

“…if disaster and oblivion have followed this painting down through time—so too has love.  Insofar as it is immortal (and it is) I have a small, bright, immutable part in that immortality.  It exists; and it keeps on existing.  And I add my own love to the history of people who have loved beautiful things, and looked out for them, and pulled them from the fire, and sought them when they were lost, and tried to preserve them and save them while passing them along … [ Read all ]

The exceedingly well-dressed citizens of Amherst agree to found a college

Last week Peter Nelson wrote about Samuel Williston, who provided funds to Amherst College in 1840 when the institution was in danger of financial ruin, and who continued to donate to the College over the course of many years. Because of Williston’s timely donations, the College considered whether it should change its name to Williston College.

However, before Amherst had to make that decision, it had already confronted more than one identity crisis.

Amherst Academy

Those who have read a little about the College’s history know that it began in 1817 with the modest-sounding idea of securing funding for a professorship at Amherst Academy, the school that stood across from the Jones Library and functioned as a middle school and high school between 1814 and 1868. The idea behind the professorship was that the man holding the position would be able to train young men in the Greek and Latin that they would need to enter the ministry. The professorship was the idea of Colonel Rufus Graves (1758-1845), a native of Massachusetts and a graduate of Dartmouth in New Hampshire who had deep ties to both states. In 1817 he was living in Hampshire County – first in Leverett and later in Amherst – where he became involved with Amherst Academy. Graves attempted to raise funds for the professorship but found little enthusiasm and even fewer contributions. When he reported the failure to the trustees of Amherst Academy, they agreed that a larger enterprise – a college – was a better idea. The group reasoned that contributions for an institution would be a more inspirational and therefore more successful fundraising endeavor than was the professorship. It was a big idea for a big country. Colonel Graves again took up the challenge and labored for some two years, begging and beseeching citizens in at least three states for money for the institution. It was not an easy task, but by 1820 he managed to raise about 2/3 of it and the remainder needed was pledged by some of the Academy trustees.

As plans for the college progressed, people talked of joining forces with Williams College and having it move from what was a very hard to reach location to a more centrally located site in Hampshire County. The town of Amherst was considered for the purpose; so, too, Northampton. Williams preferred Northampton. If things had gone in one direction, we could be Noho College, or the College at Hamp. But after several years of great difficulties and much effort, Amherst was founded where it is now — the “College on the Hill,” “our city of Zion that overlooks the Promised Land.”

Amherst College in 1821. Oil painting by Orra White Hitchcock. Mead Art Museum.

But I digress. The complicated history mentioned above in what is in fact frightening brevity is readily obtained at even greater length in several published works. What I really want to touch on in this post is that before any of these events happened, there was a moment in time when Colonel Graves considered starting a charity fund to benefit a school in Amherst, New Hampshire — that is, an academy in that town, rather than “Amherst Academy” in New Hampshire (there being no such animal). The project was conceived with the same purpose as that which was tried later in Amherst, Massachusetts — again, a professorship to train young men to enter the ministry. Graves deliberated over the proposal but decided that it would be difficult to raise funds in Massachusetts for a professorship in a New Hampshire school. A short time later, he presented the idea to the trustees of our Amherst Academy. And the rest is as we know it to be, “more or less for sure” (it’s always advisable to keep an open mind where details are concerned).

This matter of New Hampshire is nowhere mentioned in our established documentation of the history of Amherst College. It is not in alumnus William S. Tyler’s magisterial work “The History of Amherst College,” nor in Frederick Tuckerman’s “Amherst Academy” or Stanley King’s “A Consecrated Eminence.” I first came across the story in a fourteen-page letter in Tyler’s biographical file from George Washington Graves, the son of Rufus Graves, writing to Tyler in 1871. At the time Tyler was assembling material for his “History,” and he wrote to anyone and everyone who had been involved with the College from its inception, or to their children, to early alumni, etc. His book contains many anecdotes from the responses he received. G.W. Graves’s letter was a long description of the work his father had done to bring about Amherst College. The letter is energetic and impressive – his memories flood onto the pages, with many details of his father’s labors that have made it into the historical record and many that have not. The letter’s contents clarify the extraordinary contribution in time, energy, and resources that Rufus Graves committed to the founding of Amherst College. I took the time to read the entire letter and had Colleen O’Connor ’11, our dedicated archives assistant at the time, type a rough transcription. And I continued to wonder about the New Hampshire story. Where would Amherst College be — would it “be” at all? — if Graves had been successful in this enterprise for New Hampshire?

First page of G.W. Graves letter. Transcription below!

Curiously, although in his “History” Tyler gives Rufus Graves his due, he does not quote from the son’s letter, and he certainly doesn’t mention New Hampshire. Since Tyler is generally scrupulous in his reporting, I wondered why he didn’t include the son’s anecdote. It isn’t because he automatically dismissed the memories of people who had been young at the time of the founding. On the contrary, Tyler mentions many other letters, and he singles out the recollections of another Amherst person, Sarah Strong, who was a teacher at Amherst Academy in its earliest days and who was about the same age as George W. Graves. In this case, however, Tyler must have entirely approved of her facts, for he writes, “ To this lady…I am indebted for the many facts in the early history of Amherst Academy, which but for her extraordinary memory must have perished with the fire that consumed the Records in 1838” (“History,” n., p. 35). So, why the omission of any direct quote from or even mention of the letter from George Washington Graves? Was it just happenstance, just the way Tyler happened to write it, or was the omission intentional?

After putting myself and Colleen to the trouble of transcribing the letter, I almost immediately found that it had already been transcribed and published in the Amherst Graduates Quarterly in 1921 (link provided below). The transcription is faithful – it includes the New Hampshire story – but what fascinated me about the published account was the editor’s note.

The editor, George Frisbee Whicher, Class of 1910 and about 32 years old at the time of the AGQ article, does not credit the New Hampshire story. In fact, he goes to a little trouble to discredit it and its author. He says, in essence, this writer is an old dude and he doesn’t remember things accurately, so don’t believe everything he says.  Whicher also begins his editorial comment with this line: “No one man founded Amherst College.” This statement may be true, but there is emphasis in its placement here that strikes me as a clue to why Tyler did not mention the letter in his book and went to great lengths to avoid giving too much credit for Amherst College’s founding to one man. Instead, Tyler sought to make the founding of Amherst College a religious act where citizens worked together to build what was viewed as a very special institution with a divine charge to aid “indigent young men of promising talents and hopeful piety, who shall manifest a desire to obtain a liberal education with a sole view to the Christian ministry.” It is perhaps for this reason – the importance of the group effort — that the College would later avoid renaming itself after one man, such as Williston, or Graves, or Hitchcock, or Dickinson, all men who gave much to the College, and would stick with the name of the town. In this determination one may also see why the College has repeatedly said that it is named after the town rather than the general: if the trustees would not name the College after someone who had given so much in time and effort, or in money, then it would certainly not name it after someone who had been born and died before the College was even an idea. The general would have seemed irrelevant to what these citizens were about.

So, Whicher provides a disclaimer about the reliability of the Graves letter and then proceeds to provide a transcription of the document in its entirety. He inserts one more little note about the New Hampshire story, this time saying specifically that Graves had confused Amherst, New Hampshire, with Amherst, Massachusetts, in HAMPSHIRE county. You know how the old folks forget stuff.

But when I read Graves’s letter in the original, it didn’t seem to me that he was muddled in his facts, or if he was, it would take someone well versed in the history of Amherst College to pick out his errors. On the contrary, I thought the letter showed a steady stream of memories from someone who was documenting events he witnessed as a young man. He was 12 when his father was approached about the idea of a professorship for New Hampshire and about 20 when South College went up on the hill in Amherst, Massachusetts.  In fact, he’s so specific in his memories, so deliberate in his writing, that we can say that the Trustees agreed on Thursday, July 27, 1820, to lay the cornerstone on Wednesday, August 9, and George went with his father directly after the July 27 meeting to “engage the brick” and on the following morning (Friday) to Pelham for the stone and the next morning (Saturday) to survey the land.  A week later, he helped start digging the trench for the foundation. If he is mistaken on this or that point, as he very reasonably could be, he is probably accurate on most details – including, very possibly, the New Hampshire detail.

His account of the New Hampshire story comes first. And if he was mistaken about it, then it was no slip of the tongue and he was very determined in his mistake, for he mentioned New Hampshire specifically three times, and the third time he noted that it “was the last of New Hamp.” Remember that George Graves grew up in Massachusetts, not in New Hampshire – he knew Amherst, Massachusetts well. He lived through all of the College’s history. It seems very unlikely to me that he would make a mistake of this nature.

I have no evidence for the story outside the son’s letter. Still, the letter is so extraordinary that it seems worthwhile to put it here and to let readers decide for themselves whether George Graves sounds muddled in his facts. If he is not – if the anecdote about New Hampshire is true – then it’s an interesting detail to add to the history of Amherst College.

Link to full article HERE.

Whether the New Hampshire enterprise would ever have gotten to the college stage is another question. Given Graves’s zeal, one can’t rule it out – in which case our College on the Hill might be a College on the Green at 42°51′41″N 71°37′31″W

By now it may have occurred to the reader that there are no known images of Rufus Graves or they would have been displayed earlier to break up this text… However, in 1946 Curtis Canfield (AC 1925 and later Professor of Dramatics) produced a play, “The Seed and the Sowers,” about the early years of the College. Many of the scenes included Rufus Graves, a major character. Since there are no images of the real Graves, here are several photographs from the play, which is well documented in our Dramatic Activities Collection. Graves was played by Herbert Miller Magram, Class of 1947. The captions with the photographs include lines from Canfield’s play and do not necessarily match the scenes below exactly.  In 1955 Canfield published the play and a series of Chapel talks about Amherst’s early history under the same title.

Click on the first image to view the photographs as a slideshow.

The Public Interest Declassification Board is very pleased to announce that Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) will participate as keynote speaker at the next public meeting of the PIDB.  Senator Shaheen introduced the “Preserving American Access to Information Act” on August 1, 2013, which directly addresses many of the Board’s recommendations found in its 2012 Report to the President on Transforming the Security Classification System. The Bill promotes transparency and efficiency by reducing unnecessary classification and addressing the growing backlog of records awaiting declassification.

The PIDB will host this open meeting on Thursday, November 21, 2013 to discuss its recommendations and focus more specifically on declassification prioritization.  To register and attend, please visit Eventbrite.

Be sure to stay connected to the Board’s activities and look for more information about the Board on our blog, Transforming Classification, and on the PIDB website.

Meg Travers
Friday, November 15, 2013 – 14:22

For many years we’ve been receiving feedback from SRO users through our surveys and feedback forms about AEON – about how it works and what sort of functions and features it should have. We’ve been listening and, while not everything you have requested is possible, we have begun looking at a replacement collection management system which will accommodate many of the functions requested over the years. Over the next few months we will be running sessions setting out what the new system will be capable of providing and seeking additional feedback and comment from our users about what we have planned.  As with all changes, the look and feel of the finished product will be different from what currently exists, but the underlying principles of archival description will remain the same and we hope the new system will provide greater benefits not just for ourselves but to all our users.

One of the more frequent questions that we get asked about our catalogue, AEON, is why don’t we have subjects, or other elements that are familiar from library catalogues?  The answer lies in the difference between archives and library standards, and the types of materials we hold. 

Library materials are generally publications, with multiple copies in multiple locations. Other than author or publisher there is often no obvious link or connection between one book or journal and another.  Librarians create these links through the use of classification schemes, such as the Dewey Decimal System, and subject headings, so that we, as users, can make those connections.  To assist us in making and using those connections, library catalogues are designed in accordance with a set of specific rules.  English language catalogues have been created under the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd edition (known familiarly as AACR2) for many years.  In addition, the way in which the elements of computer catalogues are set out is also prescribed – usually in line with the MAchine Readable Cataloguing (MARC) standards developed by the Library of Congress.

While libraries may also hold archives, this is usually only a small proportion of the collection, except for the State and National Libraries. In a 2004 national survey run by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the State and National libraries held over 11 million publications and 33 km of archives (around 5 million items). Local libraries held around 41 million items, both as lending and non-lending stock. (At the same time, State and National archives held over 629 km of archives or 98 million items). It makes sense to use the library standards for all the material in a library.

Archives, on the other hand, are unique items which gain much of their value as resources through the context in which they were created and used.  Rather than creating connections, archival systems seek to tease out the connections that already exist. There are a number of different ways in which archives can be arranged and described, from the analysis of ‘fonds’ in Europe, to an emphasis on ‘record groups’ in the US and Canada, and the Series Registration System developed by the National Archives of Australia, which is the Australian preferred system. Although they seem very different, there are a number of unifying principles and concepts that have been brought together in the International Standard on Archival Description (ISAD). The SRO’s current system, AEON, is based on the Series Registration System and ISAD.  However, because of the differences in approach there has not been a consistent way of presenting items in an archives, in the way that the MARC format works for libraries.

The SRO is currently looking at a replacement collection management system for the data that underpins AEON.  Our preferred option is a system known as ICA-AtoM, developed for the International Council on Archives.  This system is wholly compliant with ISAD and with other international archival standards.  By using AtoM, we will also be looking at a catalogue format that will be familiar to users of archival collections internationally.

We will be running information sessions about the system and the benefits we think it can provide over the coming weeks, which will be advertised on our website and in our search room – if you are interested in attending and participating in this consultation process, please email sro@sro.wa.gov.au or phone us on 9427 3600.

Back by popular demand, the City of Vancouver Archives presents its fourth annual screening at the Vancity Theatre: Reflecting the City.

Together with local historian Michael Kluckner, we’ve dug out old gems and have discovered new ones too, and we can’t wait to show them on the big screen. Join us on Sunday, November 24^th at 2:00 PM as we showcase these latest finds from our moving image collection.

Train tracks and a reflection of the Marine Building in the water (c. 1939). Reference code: AM640-S1-: CVA 260-999.

Michael Kluckner will provide historical insight and context for each movie. This screening will also premiere newly digitized holdings and recent acquisitions not yet available in our online database.

We will be showing silent movies and ones with soundtracks. For the silent portions, we are honoured to have again this year pianist Wayne Stewart to provide live musical accompaniment.

The projection booth at Pacific Mills (1944). Reference code: AM1545-S3-: CVA 586-3284.

Some of the movies were originally recorded on now-obsolete and currently at-risk video formats. It is hard to find functioning or serviceable machines to play these formats, let alone find the parts to fix them. Our digital conservator Sue Bigelow will speak about the archival procedure behind saving the content on these formats.

Come to the screening early! We will be projecting scans of glass plate snipes from the 1920s. Snipes are similar to the advertisements and messages projected at movie theatres today.

Snipe on glass plate. Reference code: AM54-S4-: CVA371-2794.

As curator, Michael Kluckner will be presenting the screening in five themes:

“Family Abroad” exhibits 1930s home movies of a family based in British Columbia and Hong Kong. “Wartime Summer” features city parks, beaches and recreational pastimes in the 1940s. “Not Quite Haight-Ashbury” reveals a different social landscape during the 1960s and 1970s. “Getting Around” discusses the possibility of rapid transit during the 1970s, and bicycle advocacy in the 1990s. “Almost Yesterday” brings back TV shows and advertisements from a simpler time.

As in previous years, we are expecting the theatre to be sold out. Purchase your ticket early and online by visiting the Vancity Theatre website.

Grand opening night at Lonsdale Theatre (1911). Reference code: AM54-S4-: LP 362.

Below is a preview of Reflecting the City: Movies from the City of Vancouver Archives. We hope to see you there!

_{^{Lou Buttino. Photo by UNCW/Office of University Relations.}}

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Caveat: given my lacklustre tech saviness, our archivists or volunteers are probably the best ones to be discussing this topic, but here’s an attempt to share what we’ve been up to…

As part of our HLF funded project, New Perspectives, we are digitising the first six volumes of the NUWT’s journal publication, The Woman Teacher.  Each volume contains 44-45 issues.  The fact that these women were able to publish a journal on a weekly basis… in addition to teaching… and campaigning… is making us all seriously re-evaluate how we spend our free time.

We have been beyond fortunate to have a wonderful group of volunteers who have recently become a part of our Archive Team.  Since joining us six weeks ago, they have been hard at work making The Woman Teacher accessible and available for research online.  Because of our highly efficient volunteers, we are just half a volume away from having all six volumes scanned!

In addition to the basic scan, each copy has Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software applied to it.  OCR involves electronically converting scanned images of handwritten, typewritten or printed text into encoded, searchable text.  Essentially, with OCR, the text sits behind the image and makes any scanned document searchable.

Once all six volumes are ready to go, the volunteers will apply the meta-data, which embeds information directly into the PDF.  With the meta-data, important information about the document and the PDF are never separated, ensuring the document is more (for lack of a better word) ‘findable’.

Archives for the 21st century audience (though, it’s hard to beat actually holding the documents in your hands…)

After the meta-data and ongoing quality control checks are all complete, we can put everything online so it’s available to anyone with an internet connection, further widening access to archive collections.

To view a (searchable!) PDF of the very first issue of The Woman Teacher, click here… The Woman Teacher Vol. 1 No. 1

The next paragraph may be a bit of a bore if you’re not interested in the logistics of OCR software…

Since this is a new process for everyone, there has been plenty of trial and error as we and the volunteers experiment with the OCR software to find the best approach.  While we have been using specialist OCR software, it turns out our fancy scanner actually does a more accurate OCR on its own, in terms of creating an accurate, text-searchable PDF.  However, as anyone involved in digitising archives will likely agree, it seems to be a case by case – or archive by archive – basis as to what works best.

Tagged: archives, digitising, NUWT, OCR software, volunteers, woman teacher

From the September, 1943 WQXR Program Guide:

Alec Templeton is one of the few great artists who is equally at home in the realm of the popular as he is among the classics. His thorough musicianship has won for him an outstanding place on the air and in the concert hall, and we know that his thoughts on the music of today will be stimulating. When we asked Mr. Templeton the other day what we should say about him in this introduction, he said, “Say I am a devoted listener to WQXR.” We say so proudly.

It goes without saying that to the serious musician Johann Sebastian Bach is the veritable God of music. In fact, the reverence with which musicians approach him may account in some measure for their seeming forgetfulness that he was first and foremost a human being– and not a stodgy one, either!

True, much of Bach’s writing was for the church–a fact which applies not only to his original works, but also to innumerable old chorales and hymns which he rearranged. However, it must not be forgotten that he also wrote in the dance form. From his pen poured the popular dances of his time–the Minuet, the Sarabande, the Bourrée, the Gigue; and he embellished them in exactly the same manner as a Goodman or Dorsey does today. I believe the modern swing pianist is just beginning to realize this. Hence the complete disappearance of the old-style “jazz,” which is now considered “corny,” and the development in its place of the highly individual styles of a Teddy Wilson or an Art Tatum. I actually attribute the very excellent modern style of swing piano playing to a certain Johann Sebastian Bach! If you question this statement, analyze the flowing rhythmic movement of a Bach prelude, or a little cadenza in the form of an improvisation of the modern swing pianist. Any doubt about the similarity will immediately be dispelled.

Yes, Bach is a modern. A present-day band-arranger gives free rein to the performer–and so did Bach. He never bothered to write down each note in a composition. He wrote the figuration with harmonizing chord–but the embellishment he left to the discretion of the artist. That–in passing–is undoubtedly the reason for the many and varied Bach editions.

Bach’s exciting musicianship is a constant source of wonder and also provides another reason for classifying him as a modern. Sometimes I think he must have peered into the future, and had a peep at the mechanics of our present day piano! How else account for the sustained right hand melodies in his music–certainly quite impossible effects to obtain on the instruments in use during his life-time.

Bach was a genius who heard not one melody at a time, but several. Thus, when he scored for orchestra, each and every part was vitally important. Change one note, and you ruin the entire form of the music, for each part is a melody unto itself. And here again we can see the close relationship to the present. The small orchestra used by Bach in writing accompaniments for arias from his Cantate, can be compared with the small piece “outfit” in a swing band. The voice, of course, has the melody. But the orchestra is not merely an accompaniment. It may be scored for violin, oboe, flute, and harpsichord, and it is well-nigh impossible not to be fully aware of what each is doing.

In the same way, when you listen to Bing Crosby accompanied, say, by a trumpet, a trombone, a clarinet and a piano, you know that each of those fellows is improvising his own melody (“lick” in the vernacular) around the harmonization of the tune. Fortunately for us, Bach put his melodies down on paper. The fellows who play with Crosby are not likely to do that, but–fortunately again–we do have the recording machine.

Finally, there is the matter of tempo to link Johann Sebastian directly to the modern. All popular music, as you know, must be played in strictest tempo. And so it is with Bach. In playing his Suites, all the Brandenburg and piano concerti, in fact, everything he wrote–the tempi must be followed faithfully. Dull, you say? Not at all. It is my contention that Bach in strict tempo can be very expressive. One of the best examples of that is the exquisite chorale prelude, “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” which can sound, with retard and too much rubato, really cheap and maudlin. There is always a hidden metronome in Bach’s music, and keeping to it assures the listener greater enjoyment.

When I started my series of “Modernized Masters,” beginning with “Bach Goes to Town,” I did it with more in mind than the idea of humor in music. I felt that the gay Bach would not accuse me of desecration, but would be interested in the element of swing. Moreover, with the swing eliminated, the improvisation could actually have been one of his own.

Bach in German means brook–and what an appropriate name for this musical giant! I have endeavored to point out that to this day, with its ultra-modern music, he is still fathomless, and that his advanced ideas in all music are something to be marveled at. I am certain that he is an unending source of inspiration to the performer, writer, and arranger of popular music. Sometimes, indeed, he seems to be more than a mere inspiration. One very blatant example of how a current song hit sounds like him: –the song “This Can’t be Love,” from the show, “Boys from Syracuse.” This ditty is identical to the first bars of one of Bach’s smaller organ preludes.

For me, other composers may come and go, but Bach–like his name–goes on forever.

The First World War left few Canadians untouched. About 8% of the country’s population served during the war. Of those, about 10% died and almost a quarter were wounded. Citizens at home worked to support those fighting overseas.

1929 Armistice Day ceremonies. The Cenotaph was erected in 1924. Stuart Thomson, photographer. Reference code AM1535-: CVA 99-2010

Home

Many organizations, societies and companies raised money to help the troops.

Women selling goods at the Seaforth Market stall to raise money for soldiers’ comforts overseas, 1917. Stuart Thomson, photographer. Reference code AM54-S4-: Mil P57.

This refreshment tent is selling sandwiches and coffee.

South Vancouver Soldiers and Sailors Mothers and Wives Association refreshment tent, 1917. Stuart Thomson, photographer. Reference code
AM54-S4-: Mil P36.

A lot of home-made clothing was contributed to the war effort. Often, people would knit in groups, encouraged by (or possibly singing) World War I knitting songs. Here’s a sewing group from this era:

The St. Andrews’ and Caledonian Society sewing group, 1913. Stuart Thomson, photographer. Reference code AM54-S4-: Ch P94

The garments, along with other “comforts” such as underwear, tobacco, books and magazines, were boxed and shipped by the Canadian Field Comforts Commission.

Soldier in front of boxes of Canadian Field Comforts at Mrs. J.Z. Hall’s residence, 2890 Point Grey Road], 1918. Commercial Photo Co., photographer. Reference code AM54-S4-: Bu P329.

Abroad

Major Matthews, the first City Archivist, served in the First World War and acquired images of troops overseas.

Soldiers rest on their way to the trenches on the Western Front. ~1916. Official Photograph Issued for Press Bureau by “Topical” . Reference code AM54-S4-: Mil P281.17.

Royal Engineers return from the trenches on the Western Front, 1916. Official Photograph issued on behalf of the Press Bureau. Reference code AM54-S4-: Mil P281.47.

Canadian soldiers on parade at the Western Front, 1916. Official Photograph issued on behalf of the Press Bureau. Reference code AM54-S4-: Mil P281.50.

The arrival of papers & letters from home, some time 1914-1918. E.T. Sampson, Raines and Company, photographer. Reference code AM54-S4-: Gr War P33.

Let us honour all their efforts this Remembrance Day.

Lise Summers
Friday, November 8, 2013 – 16:25

During electrical work at the Institute, we came across this box in an attic cupboard. It contained something left behind at the Institute by its founder, Professor Christopher Hawkes (1905-1992) (http://www.arch.ox.ac.uk/history-of-the-institute.html):

We were expecting old notes, photographs, scraps of paper… but no!

Matchboxes!

It is a collection of matchboxes. On closer investigation, some of them have labels – Professor Hawkes used the boxes to store small finds from his excavations. We checked them – they are all empty.  But they make a pretty display…

How many cigarettes do you have to smoke to collect this many boxes?

There are a variety of matchbox types here – Hawkes seems to have been a phillumenist! These include Solo, Morelands, Bryant and May, The Scissors, Northland, Double Diamond, Victor, Mace, Criterion, Blue Cross, Meteor, Fire Queen, Old Castle, Camp, Wavy Line, The Ship and the Kentish Map Company.

Archival photobomb

Dateline San Francisco, March 31, 2013

The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society is pleased to announce that at the end of March, we completed a project funded by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) (http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/). The basic processing project, “Hidden from History: Accessing the GLBT Past” resulted in a survey of over 500 manuscript collections and the processing of over 500 linear feet of materials related to more than 75 years of GLBT history. We updated nearly 600 catalog records and added 81 new finding aids to the Historical Society website and/or the Online Archive of California. Finding aids from the project can be viewed here:

http://www.oac.cdlib.org/institutions/Gay,+Lesbian,+Bisexual,+Transgender+Historical+Society

Researchers can also search for collections here:

http://glbthistory.org/research/index.html

We also wrote – and have implemented – a formal deaccessioning policy.

Collections that were processed or partially processed with NHPRC funds include the papers of community historians Allan Bérubé and Eric Garber, artist and curator Adrienne Fuzee, World War II veteran Helen Harder, community activist John E. Teamer and bisexual activist/sexologist Maggi Rubenstein. Newly processed organizational records include materials from Community United Against Violence, various chapters of Black and White Men/Men of All Colors Together, the Wide Open Town History Project, the Filipino Task Force on AIDS, and women-owned businesses like the Bay Brick Inn and the Oracle Feminist Bookstore.

These collections document personal relationships, professional lives and cultural phenomena. Topics covered include the homophile movement and gay liberation; transgender rights; sports; religion and spirituality; racial politics; art, music and literature; the leather community; military history; and the history of AIDS and AIDS activism. These collections contain photographs, audiovisual materials and artifacts as well as manuscript materials.

We are very excited that these collections are now more accessible for research, and we are grateful to NHPRC for their support. If you have any questions about these collections or the project, please feel free to contact the managing archivist at reference@glbthistory.org

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I learned something new as I was poring over some 19th-century college records last week: that in 1847, and again in 1869, Amherst College briefly but seriously considered the idea of changing its name to Williston, in honor of its generous trustee and benefactor, Samuel Williston.

The Trustee minutes of July 7, 1847 record that the idea was to be formally proposed and voted on at that meeting.  However, as it came up at the end of a long, arduous agenda (actually extending over two days), such a momentous decision was deferred to the next meeting. But inexplicably, the idea wasn’t reconsidered until more than a year later.  Jump ahead to the Trustee minutes of August 8, 1848:

Voted: That in the opinion of this Board it is expedient to change the name of Amherst College & to affix to it the name of its liberal Benefactor; Samuel Williston.

Voted: That President Hitchcock, Dr. Packard & Mr. Vaill be a committee to apply to the Legislature for leave to make the alteration.

Voted: That the foregoing votes be submitted to Mr. Williston previous to their taking effect.

Samuel Williston (1795-1874), Easthampton (Mass.) button manufacturer, philanthropist, Amherst College trustee, and founder of Williston Academy.

Amherst’s debt to Samuel Williston is clearly not to be underestimated; in fact, it is no exaggeration to say that its very survival rested on his support.  When it faced serious financial difficulties in 1840, Williston pledged $1,000.  Over the next thirty years, his financial gifts to Amherst amounted to more than $220,000. (In all, his donations to various charities amounted to more than $1.5 million.)

1847 was a particularly precarious time for the College. It was deep in debt and faced the likely prospect of financial ruin. But Williston, seemingly finding faith in the financial realism and ingenuity of the new president Edward Hitchcock, came forward repeatedly with large gifts to establish several endowed professorships.

Of this critical juncture in Amherst’s history, Stanley King, in The History of the Endowment of Amherst College (1950), wrote:

Never again was the College in such desperate straits; financial problems it was to continue to have; other presidents would operate for years with mounting deficits; other treasurers would borrow money; vigorous pruning of expenses would often be necessary; but never again would there be grave doubt as to whether the College could go on. In 1847 the future of Amherst College was assured. Hitchcock saved the College from certain extinction. A new era opened. [41]

We can now see the Trustees’ reasons for wishing to offer Mr. Williston the greatest honor it could bestow: the very name of the college.  Their July 1847 meeting, when all were giddy with relief realizing such a dramatic turn-around in their finances, was described by W.S. Tyler as “the most delightful Trustee meeting I had ever attended” (History of Amherst College During Its First Half Century, 321).

And yet – to change the name? Not all were in agreement that this was a wise decision. Ebenezer S. Snell, professor of mathematics and natural philosphy and one of the first graduates of Amherst College (1822), felt dismay and was not shy about expressing it to Williston himself, as seen in this letter:

E.S. Snell (AC 1822) to Samuel Williston, August 13, 1847. [transcript] In: Early Trustee Records, box 1.

It is unknown whether Snell’s letter influenced Williston to decline the honor, but decline it he did. By the time the proposal came around again the following summer, it took no time at all for him to reject it, as seen in this news report from the Hampshire and Franklin Express, dated Aug 17, 1848:

Amherst College. We understand that the Trustees of Amherst College at their late meeting voted to apply to the Legislature for leave to change the official name of the Institution to Williston College as an expression of gratitude to its most liberal benefactor; one who has given it $50,000, who has expended more than $100,000 on Literary Institutions in New England; and who in proportion to his means, still remains the prince of benefactors to American schools and colleges. It is well known that the names of Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, and Williams College were given for sums scarcely a tenth part as large. We learn, however, that Mr. Williston has put the matter at rest for the present, at least, by requesting that the application may not be made, chiefly, it is said, lest the public should be led to misconstrue the motive of his benefactions.

Jump ahead twenty years, and add a new character in the form of Alpheus Hardy, who became an Amherst trustee in 1855 (so some time after Amherst’s initial offer to change its name to Williston). Hardy, a wealthy Boston businessman, wrote the following letter to President W.A. Stearns on May 11, 1869, urging the very same idea, which he intended to bring before the board at its next meeting:

We’ll never know whether Alpheus Hardy actually got to the point of presenting his (unbeknownst to him) not so original proposal to the Board: a great fire in Walker Hall in March 1882 destroyed almost all of the minutes for meetings held between 1868 and 1881. But it’s a fair bet that President Stearns nipped it in the bud. In any case, we do know how the story ended – Amherst retained its name. Aside from an endowed professorship and a prize, all that bears the name of Amherst’s greatest benefactor is a dormitory on the freshman quad, Williston Hall, built in 1858.