Clements Library SAA Archives Blitz
Image credit: Claire MilldrumPost by Noa Kasman, Joyce Bonk Library AssistantOn the mornings of November 14th and November 18th, the University of Michigan’s Society of American Archivists (SAA) Student Chapter and the William L. Clements Library organized a two-part Archives Blitz. These events are held by the Student Chapter once or twice a semester. Since the fall of 2014, Student Chapter Archives Blitzes have ranged from several hours to week-long engagements with organizations....
Norton Strange Townshend Fellowship Now Offered for 2017
In keeping with the Clements Library’s commitment to the University of Michigan’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiative, we are pleased to announce a new post-doctoral fellowship. The Norton Strange Townshend Fellowship is named for the nineteenth-century physician and educator (1815-1895) and funded by the Library’s Townshend Fund.The Norton Strange Townshend Fellowship offers $10,000 in support of scholarly research on diversity, equity and inclusion in American history during...
Join us online and on campus – Our exciting events on Giving Blueday
We are excited to announce our mission and the festivities that we will be holding for Giving Blueday, November 29, 2016. Please join us in supporting the Clements Library's long lasting mission to collect and preserve primary source materials, to make them available for research, and to support and encourage scholarly investigation of our nation’s past.What is Giving Blueday? Giving Blueday (GBD) is the University of Michigan's Day of Giving, and it is a day for everyone who loves...
From the Stacks: Accusation of Witchcraft, 1665/66
Perhaps no image is more synonymous with Halloween than that of the witch, a woman dressed in black with a pointy hat and a broomstick. But this seemingly innocent costume has roots stretching back to the colonial period when being called a witch was a serious, often deadly, accusation. While some historians like Paul S. Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum focused on geographic and economic factors in such accusations, the important connection between gender and witchcraft in America has since been...
Politics Past: Political Prints and Social Satires in the Graphics Division
As our nation cycles through a particularly contentious political year, the collections of the Clements Library remind us that this is not the first time. Evidence of political pyrotechnics from past elections can be found across all divisions of the Clements Library. Smoldering in the print collection are examples of the political broadsides that were popular in the 19th century. These entertaining lithographs and engravings were sold mostly in urban areas at booksellers, stationery stores,...
Clements Library Acquires Previously Unknown Plan of 1790 Detroit
It seems as if the Director and curators of the Clements Library are always searching—searching for new documentation to make accessible to scholars; searching for collections or parts of collections that they know or hope are still “out there” in the hands of descendants, local and national Americana dealers, or private collectors. To this end the curators carefully examine dozens of catalogs each month and make recommendations to the Director, who then decides what we can afford....
Ann Arbor Art Fair, July 21-24, 2016
The annual Ann Arbor Art Fair returns this week, and the city's downtown will be transformed as over 1,000 artists set up booths alongside food vendors, performers, and artist demonstrators. The Fair runs from Thursday, July 21st to Sunday, July 24th, and the Clements Library finds itself right at the heart of it all with artists literally at our doorstep.Hopefully the Ann Arbor Art Fair won't be quite as chaotic as the scene depicted in our hand-colored 1734 copy of William Hogarth's print,...
From the Stacks: Mosquitoes
Balmy summer weather has finally arrived in Ann Arbor, and the staff at the Clements Library are enjoying the season's warmth and sunshine. The joys of sipping lemonade in the shade and lounging in hammocks are tempered by the less popular harbingers of summer-- mosquitoes. Mosquito-borne illnesses continue to plague the modern world, with West Nile, Zika virus, malaria, and dengue fever still making news headlines. While the resources at our disposal to try to mitigate and prevent the spread...
New Additions to Exhibit on Clements Library Collecting
Tobias Lear, A Minute Account of the Last Sickness and Death of George Washington, Mount Vernon, Virginia: December 14, 1799. Tobias Lear Papers.Just inside the great bronze doors of the Clements Library, visitors will find an exhibit about the collecting history of the institution. "Clements Library: A Century of Collecting, 1903-2016" uses original examples of Americana from the collection to show how Clements and the four directors who have guided the place since 1923 built up the Library's...
From the Stacks: Flag Day
By Emiko Hastings, Curator of BooksIn honor of Flag Day, we share a variety of U.S. flag-related imagery from across the Clements Library collections. Flag Day, established by President Woodrow Wilson, in 1916, commemorates the adoption of the flag of the United States on June 14th, 1777.Addie Guthrie Weaver, The Story of Our Flag, Colonial and National: With Historical Sketch of the Quakeress, Betsy Ross (Chicago, 1898). The Book Division includes a variety of printed materials...