From the Stacks: Preserving a Dried Strawberry
We recently received a Twitter query related to the strangest items in archival collections. Meg Hixon, who did extraordinary work at the Clements Library as a Project Archivist, recalled that we have a dried strawberry in our James Caswell Knox Papers. This small berry was enclosed in a letter written by Catharine Knox on June 18, 1865, to her husband who was serving in Virginia with the 147th Indiana Infantry during the Civil War. While carefully wrapped in a scrap of newspaper, she...
Recent Acquisition: Rare Early Work by Native American Author
Post by Emiko Hastings, Curator of BooksThe Book Division is pleased to announce a significant new acquisition, Diego de Valadés' Rhetorica Christiana (1579). This purchase, courtesy of Liber Antiquus, Early Books & Manuscripts, fills an important gap in our holdings of early printed Americana. It is "almost certainly the first book written by a native of Mexico to be printed in Europe." The book itself is in excellent condition, bound in contemporary limp vellum and with all...
Palm Trees, Sugar, Slavery, and More
Post by Brian L. Dunnigan, Associate Director and Curator of MapsThe Clements Library is known to historians and scholars of other disciplines as a primary source repository of “Americana” dating between 1492 and 1900. For all too many members of the history and the University of Michigan communities, however, that word suggests collections documenting mainland, English-speaking North America, particularly the territory that became the United States. Admittedly, that is the part of the...
Graduate Student Workers and New Finding Aids
Post by Cheney Schopieray, Curator of ManuscriptsGraduate students are a vital part of the William L. Clements Library. As work-study employees, interns, grant-funded workers, and volunteers, graduate students help the Library with many different sorts of jobs and projects. They create inventories and indices, conduct research, arrange and describe collections, copy materials for patrons, perform office tasks, and work on special projects. Students benefit from mentorship by the Library's...
The Carte de Visite Phenomenon
Post by Clayton Lewis, Curator of GraphicsA preoccupation with self-image swept across society when a new technology enabled a flood of inexpensive portrait photographs. The enthusiastic gathering of photographs of friends and public figures and the sharing of them in albums became a social norm. This widespread fixation on portraits was commented upon in the print media and blamed for the rise of a superficial, vain populace that lacked appreciation for substantive culture.A selection of...
Mapping the American Revolution
Guest post by Allison K. Lange, assistant professor of history at the Wentworth Institute of Technology. She helped curate the Leventhal Map Center’s “We Are One” exhibition. Cantonment of the Forces in North America 1766. 1766. Manuscript, pen and ink and watercolor, 20.5 x 24.5 inches. The nearly decade-long French and Indian War ended with a British victory and the acquisition of new land in North America. The aftermath of the war, however, actually paved the way for the uprisings that led...
From the Stacks: Student Maps
Post by Jayne Ptolemy, Manuscripts Curatorial AssistantAs a new semester begins at the University of Michigan, here at the Clements Library we're highlighting some student maps to celebrate the academic year. The educational benefit of studying geography and copying maps has made them classroom staples, and the pride students feel upon successfully completing a map spans the centuries, too. In 1815, Sarah Butler wrote to her sister about her schoolwork, including "two large Charts… one of...
Clements Library Summer Reading: Part II
Last week we ran the first half of our Clements Library summer reading list, pairing staff's recently read and recommended books with items from the Clements's collections. We continue now with other good reads and interesting connections to the Library's rich historical sources.Terese Austin, Curatorial Assistant and Reading Room Supervisor, recently read Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (New York: Crown Publishers, 2010). Skloot's book recounts the story of how in 1951...
Clements Library Summer Reading: Part I
The William L. Clements Library is not only home to a world-class collection of manuscripts, books, maps, and graphics, it's also home to a staff of voracious readers. Our passion for all things Clements-related carries over even when we happily have our noses buried in modern books. We've compiled a list of books recently read and recommended by the staff, and have paired them with items from our collections that were brought to mind while enjoying them. Hopefully you'll find something worth...
From the Stacks: Decorative Papers in the Book Division
Post by Jayne Ptolemy, Manuscripts Curatorial Assistant The reasons to appreciate and enjoy the Clements Library's collections are as varied and numerous as the holdings themselves. Whether they are exceptionally rare, provide detailed information, or are particularly evocative, the research materials at the Clements are valuable on multiple levels. And sometimes, it's the sheer beauty of an item that draws our attention. The Book Division holds some striking examples of decorative papers....