McGregor Grant Project Concludes

On November 5 high-resolution scans of John Lawson’s A New Voyage to Carolina (London, 1709) were added to the U.Va. Library’s digital repository and made publicly accessible through Virgo, the Library’s online catalog. This brought to a successful close our six-year effort to improve access to the world-renowned Tracy W. McGregor Library of American History.

Virgo record for John Lawson, A New Voyage to Carolina (London, 1709) with image viewer.

First, some background. On the day that Alderman Library was dedicated in June 1938, U.Va. received a truly transformational gift: the Tracy W. McGregor Library of American History. Initially formed by Detroit philanthropist Tracy W. McGregor, the McGregor Library was then, and remains, one of the nation’s foremost collections of rare books documenting the discovery and settlement of the New World, and the pre-1900 history of North America and the United States.

Some of the mid-16th century imprints in the McGregor Library (photo by Eze Amos)

Since 1938 the McGregor Fund of Detroit, Mich., has partnered with the U.Va. Library to provide for the superb library collected by its founder, Tracy W. McGregor. The McGregor Fund’s first benefaction was the magnificent McGregor Room in Alderman Library, built expressly to house the McGregor Library and to serve as a Special Collections reading room. Other major McGregor Fund gifts have included the recent McGregor Room renovation; a substantial acquisitions endowment for the McGregor Library, which has quintupled in size since 1938; a series of publications based on the collection; and the annual Tracy W. and Katherine W. McGregor Distinguished Lecture in American History.

In 2013 the McGregor Fund offered to finance a major initiative to expand public access to the McGregor Library. We proposed a two-pronged approach involving the rarest and most significant works in the 20,000-volume McGregor Library: 1) prepare and make freely accessible online high-resolution digital images of these works, and 2) improve their discoverability in Virgo and other bibliographical databases by upgrading their catalog records. The McGregor Fund generously provided an initial grant of $245,000, awarding an additional $70,000 in 2017 so that we could expand the project’s scope.

Key members of Team McGregor include: Sam Pierceall, Imaging Specialist and Project Coordinator; Adam Newman, student supervisor; and Christina Deane, Manager, Digital Production Group (photo by Eze Amos)

McGregor Grant Project work began on January 13, 2014, and ten days later the first scanned book was posted online: Amerigo Vespucci’s account of his third exploratory voyage along the Brazilian coast, published in Strasbourg in 1505. Since then the skilled student and professional staff of the U.Va. Library’s Digital Production Group have digitized a total of 136,067 pages from 547 rare McGregor Library works. Now researchers anywhere in the world may freely access these volumes by calling up their Virgo records, to which the images are linked. The books can be read using the Virgo image viewer or downloaded in PDF form. Concurrently project cataloger Yu Lee An substantially enhanced the Virgo records for 2,051 McGregor Library books—fully 10% of the entire collection.

Some of the 547 rare McGregor Library works that were digitized and recataloged during the project.

The volumes selected for scanning and recataloging are not only the McGregor Library’s most significant works, but also those most heavily used for research and instruction. Mindful of our obligation to preserve these books for future generations, we can minimize wear and tear on these priceless works by offering more viewing options to infinitely more readers. Moreover, the digital images have been archived permanently so that the volumes should never need rescanning.

Now Open: Reading between the Lines of Jacob Lawrence’s Struggle Series

From 1954 to 1956, at the height of the McCarthy Era and at the time the Supreme Court decision in Brown vs. the Board of Education launched the modern Civil Rights movement, Jacob Lawrence painted thirty history paintings encompassing the period from the American Revolution to early westward expansion. Thirteen of the resulting panels from the series, Struggle…from the History of the American People, are currently on display at UVA’s Fralin Museum of Art (September 3 –June 5, 2016).

Lawrence wanted to portray “not only the struggle and contribution of the Negro people, but also…the rich and exciting story of all the people who immigrated to the New World and contributed to the creation of the United States.” His colorful, dynamic, and highly symbolic imagery, paired with titles that are often quotations from historical documents, recasts familiar historical subjects and invites new understandings about the foundation of our country.

In conjunction with this exhibition, the Albert & Shirley Small Special Collections Library is pleased to host a small exhibition featuring speeches, maps, drawings, and books that directly inspired or are historically related to Lawrence’s artworks. Original items from our collectionsare juxtaposed with reduced facsimiles of eight Struggle panels. Six of the panels shown in the Small Library exhibition are on view in their original form at the Fralin.

Like the larger Fralin project, this exhibition was organized by Professor Elizabeth Turner, whose graduate students have spent the last few months combing our collections to find the most salient historical counterparts to Lawrence’s paintings. Graduate students in Art History Chloe Downe and Elyse Justice made the final item selections and composed the layouts and label text.

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Shown here is a map of the Battle at Yorktown alongside Lawrence’s panel depicting a fallen British redcoat.

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Above Lawrence’s panel, which illustrates the death of Crispus Attucks during the Boston Massacre, is a rare period newspaper account of the event.

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This Lawrence panel shows the British troops and Shawnee warriors, including Tecumseh, at the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811. The hand-colored broadside above it illustrates the Battle of the Thames in 1813, the last battle between Tecumseh’s warriors and General William Henry Harrison’s trooops.

 

IMG_5338For a new perspective on American history and Lawrence’s works, come see Reading between the Lines of Jacob Lawrence’s Struggle  through May 2016 in the First Floor Gallery.

On View Now: Fred Hagstrom’s Passage, The Little Book of Slavery and their Origins

The blog has been on summer vacation! We are so pleased to be back with the news that we have a new mini-exhibition ready for visitors! We encourage you to stop by the First Floor Gallery to take a look at  “Fred Hagstrom’s Passage, The Little Book of Slavery and their Origins.”

hagstrom_caseThis exhibition features two recently acquired artists’ books that draw on artifacts deeply rooted in our collections of African-American history and slavery-related materials.Using iconic images and texts from the transatlantic slave trade and the anti-slavery movement, American artist Fred Hagstrom produces a compelling interpretation of this history. On display with Hagstrom’s books are artifacts the artist used as the conceptual foundations of his artistic statements about the immorality of slavery. In both books, he produces heavy layers of texture and color in his interpretations of the iconic diagram of the slave ship Brookes, photographs, engravings, and texts from the era of slavery.

Of particular note is Hagstrom’s use of our library’s famous daguerrotype of Isaac Granger Jefferson, who was enslaved by Thomas Jefferson. Visitors may compare the original image with Hagstrom’s interpretation of it.

This daguerrotype of Isaac Granger Jefferson is frequently reproduced as an historical artifact; Hagstrom's pixellated image of it, juxtaposed with high-resolution close-ups of the equally iconic image of the "Slave Ship Brookes," opens new interpretive possiblities.

This daguerrotype of Isaac Granger Jefferson is frequently reproduced as an historical artifact; Hagstrom’s exaggeratedly pixellated image of it, juxtaposed with high-resolution close-ups of the equally iconic image of the “Slave Ship Brookes,” opens new interpretive possiblities. (MSS 2041. Tracy W. McGregor Library of American History)

Detail of Hagstrom's Passage as it is exhibited.

The page featuring Isaac Granger Jefferson in  “Passage,” as it is exhibited. (N7433.4 .H34 P37 2013. Associates Endowment Fund)

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Also on display is one of our copies of the famous diagram of “The British Slave Ship Brookes,” as it appeared in “An Abstract of the Evidence Delivered Before a Select Committee of the House of Commons, in the Years 1790 and 1790.” Edinburgh, Printed for J. Robertson, 1791. (HT1162 .a5 1791 no.1 Plate)

This exhibition offers just a glimpse into Mr. Hagstrom’s work, which we hope will be a fertile ground for study by students and scholars alike. Our artists’ books collections cover a wide variety of genres, aesthetic approaches, and subject matter, and we are particularly interested in examples that relate to our varied collecting strengths. Perhaps this exhibit will tempt you to come take a closer look at Passage or The Little Book of Slavery in our reading room after the exhibition comes down. Until then,  here are some more of the striking justapositions to be found in Passage:

The front cover of Passage. Image courtesy of the artist.

The front cover of “Passage.” Image by Peter Lee, courtesy of Fred Hagstrom.

A page spread in Passage. Image courtesy of the artist.

A page spread from “Passage.” (Click twice to zoom in to read the text.) Image by Peter Lee, courtesy of Fred Hagstrom.

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A page spread from “Passage.” (Click twice to zoom in to read the text.) Image by Peter Lee, courtesy of Fred Hagstrom.

You can learn more about Hagstrom’s work on his Carleton College website.

Patron’s Choice: The United States Camel Cavalry…yes, you read that right!

This week, we are pleased to feature a guest post from researcher Maria A. Windell, Assistant Professor of English at Ball State University. Dr. Windell visited Special Collections a few months ago to work on an article entitled  “Military, Diplomatic, and Novel Imperial Imaginaries: Literary History and the Writings of David Dixon Porter,” about Civil War hero Admiral David Dixon Porter.  It is drawn from a larger project on the Porter family and nineteenth-century literary history. While she was here, Maria found one particularly intriguing artifact that she generously agreed to share with us.

In March of 1855, Congress appropriated $30,000 for the purchase of…camels. The Army was hoping to find a more reliable and cost-effective way of navigating the American Southwest, as the broad swaths of territory gained just seven years before in the U.S.-Mexican War had proven difficult for horses to travel. Looking for a creative solution to these issues, the Army and Congress began to consider how camels might be adapted for transportation and perhaps even combat purposes in the United States.

A camel as illustrated in the 1857 "Report of the Secretary of War..."(UC 350 . U5 1857. Bequest of Paul Mellon. Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

A camel as illustrated in the “Report of the Secretary of War…respecting the Purchase of Camels for the Purposes of Military Transportation” (Washington: A.O.P.Nelson, 1857). (UC 350 . U5 1857. Bequest of Paul Mellon. Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

Secretary of War Jefferson Davis (yes, future president of the Confederacy) tapped Major Henry Wayne of the Army to head an expedition to purchase camels for use in the U.S.; Wayne had long been interested in incorporating camels into the Army’s supply chain. Davis and Wayne then chose Lieutenant David Dixon Porter of the Navy to captain the Supply, the ship that would sail the camels from the Middle East to Indianola, Texas. Porter’s brother-in-law, Gwinn Harris Heap, who had lived in Tunis for many years, accompanied the expedition as, among other things, its resident illustrator.

The expedition set out in 1855, and returned to Texas with thirty-four camels (including two calves born at sea) eleven months later. While the expedition was thus successful, the camel experiment ultimately failed. While the camels adapted quite nicely to the southwestern climate and landscape, Americans—and their horses—were unable to accept the aroma and mannerisms of their new four-legged companions. More importantly, the Civil War arrived, drawing interest and funding from the experiment. Some of the camels were sold to circuses and zoos, some were sold to private individuals, and some escaped into the desert (Texans reported encountering feral camels even into the twentieth century).

Camels being loaded for transport, as illustrated in the report. (Image by University of Virginia Digitization Services)

Camels being loaded for transport, as illustrated in the report. (Image by University of Virginia Digitization Services)

While the expedition failed to yield a permanent “Camel Corps,” it did yield a fairly comprehensive governmental report. At the request of Congress, Davis published a volume on the experiment with the rather utilitarian title Report of the Secretary of War, Communicating, In Compliance with a Resolution of the Senate of February 2, 1857, Information Respecting the Purchase of Camels for the Purposes of Military Transportation. The report is mostly a series of dispatches from Major Wayne and Lieutenant Porter; a number of Heap’s illustrations are included, as are the entries into the Supply’s log for the trip back to the U.S. Wayne also submitted lengthy excerpts and translations from various tomes on the camel, and Davis incorporated these into the report as well. There are certainly some entertaining events and illustrations to be found in the approximately 240-page report, but much of the volume is filled with mundane dispatches and camel arcana.

Title page of the report. (UC 350 .U5 1857. Bequest of Paul Mellon. Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

Title page of the report. (UC 350 .U5 1857. Bequest of Paul Mellon. Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

In some ways, the publication of this 1857 report might be seen as the end of the expedition (the experiment took several years to peter out). Yet the report is in some ways also the beginning of the story of the camel event—it demonstrates how the experiment became a narrative of national interest before becoming a forgotten element of the national past. And the particular copy of the report held in the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia demonstrates this in a particularly vivid way: it bears an inscription showing the volume to have been gifted. While it was quite common for novels, poetry, and story collections to be gifted during the nineteenth century, the gifting of a War Department report published for congressional use was certainly not the norm.

The inscription in UVa's copy of the report. (Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

The inscription in UVa’s copy of the report. (Image by University of Virginia Library Digitization Services.)

The inscription in UVa’s copy of Davis’s Report reveals that such was the unusual fate of this particular volume. At the time of the report’s publication, John P. Hale was a United States Senator from New Hampshire. Sarah J. Christie was the daughter of an attorney Hale had practiced law with in Dover, NH, years before. At the time he gifted the volume to Christie in 1857, Hale had likely long been married to Lucy Lambert (the Hales’ daughter, Lucy Lambert Hale, was engaged to John Wilkes Booth at the time of Lincoln’s assassination in 1865). While the inscription does not then necessarily imply a romantic gift, it does reveal that Hale believed Christie would be intrigued by the report.

Hale’s gifting of the report on the camel expedition to Christie demonstrates the appeal of the expedition for Americans further removed from political and military duties. As the volume is clean of Christie’s—or any other—marginalia, there is no way to judge of her reaction to the report. Nevertheless, Hale clearly assumed it had enough interesting content to offset its overall tedium: accounts of Tuscany, Tunis, and the Crimea; of slight diplomatic rows with Turkey and Egypt over substandard gifted camels (the insult!); and of the birthing of calves while at sea. The possibility of baby camels certainly captured the imagination of the staff at Harper’s Weekly, which (prematurely) declared the camel experiment a success before noting, “The Secretary of War, Mr. Jefferson Davis, has not yet had the pleasure of presenting to the people a native camel.[. . .] It is, perhaps, indiscreet to attempt to be precise in promising the advent of little humpbacked strangers; but we can assure the public that the hopes of the Department are very high and confident.”

Baby camels, as illustrated in the report. (Image by University of Virginia Digitization Services.)

Baby camels, as illustrated in the report. (Image by University of Virginia Digitization Services.)

While the camel expedition and experiment may have captivated nineteenth-century Americans, it faded into a largely forgotten event—overshadowed in national memory, as it was at the time, by the enormity of the Civil War. The volume held in Special Collections, however, attests not only to the strange and interesting event’s occurrence, but also to the remarkable interest it generated—even inspiring the gifting of a governmental report initially published for congressional use.

 

The ABCs of Special Collections: A is for…

There are so many items in the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library that it would be impossible to tell you about each and every one.  However, in our new series, the ABCs of Special Collections, which will run every two weeks for the next year, the library’s staff will share with you some of the unsung as well as better-known items of Special Collections.  So today, we bring you the letter…

A is for Atkinson Tuscan Roman (light), which is one of 75 alphabets represented in Frank H. Atkinson’s Atkinson Sign Painting up to Now: A Complete Manual of Sign Painting. Chicago: Frederick J. Drake & Co., 1915 (not yet catalogued. Gift of Nicholas Curtis. Photograph by Petrina Jackson).

A is for abecedarium

An abecedarium is an alphabetical wordbook used as a primer for teaching reading and spelling.  Among the many examples in Special Collections are those published by Henkel Press, a German language press in New Market, Virginia, that supplied newspapers, religious materials, and children’s books to communities throughout the Shenandoah Valley. Also shown here are examples of fine press and mechanical books as well as modern primers using various subjects to present the alphabet.

Contributed by Edward Gaynor, Head of Technical Services and Specialist for Virginiana and University Archives

Both of these alphabet books, written in German, were authored by Ambrose Henkel. The opened book is entitled Das grosse A B C Buch and was published in 1820. The closed book is entitled Das kleine A B C Buch, oder erste Anfangs Buchlein and was published in 1816. (Das grosse A B C, PF3114 .H35 1820, Gift of Chevalier E. Reynolds and Das kleine A B C, PF3114 .H38 1816, from the Henkel-Miller Family Papers, MSS 14434. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

Jolly Jump-Ups ABC Book was illustrated by Geraldine Clyne and published in 1948. (PZ92 .F6 J66 1948b, Brenda Forman Collection of Pop-Up and Moveable Books. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

A is for Amos Bronson Alcott

Amos Bronson Alcott, father of Louisa May, friend of Emerson and Thoreau, was a leading figure of the Transcendentalist Movement in the middle of the 19th-century. His efforts at educational reform and utopian living were considered radical at the time, and though ultimately unsuccessful, his writings remain influential today. A search of VIRGO, our online catalog, features 27 hits related to Alcott, including letters to his famous daughter, and books he authored.

Contributed by George Riser, Collections and Instruction Assistant

Amos Bronson Alcott, n.d. (MSS 7052-c, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

Louisa May Alcott and actor James Murdoch, n.d. (MSS 7052-c, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

Letter from A. Bronson Alcott to his daughter Louisa May on the occasion of their shared birthday, 29 Nov. 1848. (MSS 7052-c, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

The verso of Alcott’s November 1848 letter to his daughter Louisa May. (MSS 7052-c, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

A is for Ambrotype

Ambrotypes are sharply detailed, one-of-a-kind photographs on glass, packaged in protective cases similar to those used for daguerreotypes.  An ambrotype is essentially a collodion on glass negative that is intentionally underexposed so that the negative image appears as a positive image when viewed against a dark background.  The process of making ambrotypes was patented in the United States in 1854 by James Ambrose Cutting.  The popularity of ambrotypes was short-lived, however, and the process was soon displaced by the growing popularity of albumen prints.

Contributed by Eliza Gilligan, Book and Paper Conservator, University of Virginia Library; text from the George Eastman House Photography Collections Online Glossary http://www.geh.org/taschen/htmlsrc/glossary.html

Featured is the ambrotype of “Mammy Kitty” from the Ellis Family Daguerreotypes. Accompanying the image is a note that reads, “The faithful servant of Charles and Mrs. K. Ellis.” Died in Richmond in 1864. Our mother’s mammy.” (MSS 2516-c. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

A is for American History

One of the cornerstones of the University of Virginia Special Collections is the American history library of Tracy W. McGregor (1869-1936).  A unique call number classification scheme for the McGregor Library begins with “A” and is followed by the date of publication.  A further delineation identifies the specific volume.  The earliest volume in the collection is “A 1475 .P76” for the first edition of Ptolemy’s Cosmographia, printed in 1475.  It represents pre-discovery science and geography of the world before Columbus.

Contributed by Margaret Hrabe, Reference Coordinator

Tracy W. McGregor in an undated photograph. (Prints File, Gift of Mildred White. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

 

Ptolemy’s Cosmographia. (A 1475 .P76, Tracy W. McGregor Library of American History. Photograph by Petrina Jackson)

A is for Assiduous

It might also, in this case, stand for “artist” as they both define the life and personality of Maxfield Parrish (1870-1966). His paintings are a legacy of devotion to divine detail.  Creativity flowed from him like oil from a tube of artist’s paints, to the extent that the color cobalt blue came to be known as “Parrish Blue” by generations of artists who followed in his footsteps. Even his autographs reflect the care, detail, and flair of a born artist; why give in to mundane repetition when an upstroke here, a hook there, and a swash everywhere would embellish the letter more beautifully?

Contributed by Donna Stapley, Assistant to the Director

Maxfield Parrish’s signature, ca. 1901-1910 (MSS 6953, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature).

 

Maxfield Parrish’s signature, ca. 1901-1910 (MSS 6953, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson).

Maxfield Parrish’s signature, ca. 1901-1910 (MSS 6953, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson).

Maxfield Parrish’s signature, ca. 1901-1910 (MSS 6953, Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature. Photograph by Petrina Jackson).

Maxfield Parrish created detailed, stunning paintings. This one is from “The History of the Young King of the Black Isles.” The Arabian Nights: Their Best Known Tales edited by Kate Douglas Wiggin and Nora A. Smith, and illustrated by Maxfield Parrish. The caption, which accompanies this illustration, reads, “When he came to this part of his narrative the young king could not restrain his tears.”

We hope you enjoyed today’s selections from the letter A, from the A is for Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library!