Newberry Library

06/22/2021

Weathergrams courtesy of Chicago Calligraphy Collective are now available outside the Newb. Grab one while supplies last!

06/20/2021

🏖️ 🌞 😎

[Illinois: Lake Storey Park picnic grounds near Galesburg. Esther Bubley. 1948. Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company Archives. CB&Q.A-5] #summer #summersolstice #swimming #beaches #photography #photographs

🏖️ 🌞 😎

[Illinois: Lake Storey Park picnic grounds near Galesburg. Esther Bubley. 1948. Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company Archives. CB&Q.A-5] #summer #summersolstice #swimming #beaches #photography #photographs

06/19/2021

Happy #Juneteenth, now an official state holiday in Illinois!

Today in 1865, the advancing Union Army reached the westernmost Confederate state, Texas, where it declared an end to slavery and set about enforcing Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Already by the next year, communities in Texas were celebrating Juneteenth, as it became known, and over the next decades, commemorative celebrations spread across the South and the rest of the country.

By the early part of the 20th century, Juneteenth had become an established holiday, as indicated by this collage of headlines and articles from various issues of the Chicago Defender, the country's preeminent Black newspaper during much of the 20th century.

[Custom collage. Chicago Defender. 20th century] #juneteenth #emancipation #blackhistory #africanamericanhistory #ushistory #holidays #emancipationday

Happy #Juneteenth, now an official state holiday in Illinois!

Today in 1865, the advancing Union Army reached the westernmost Confederate state, Texas, where it declared an end to slavery and set about enforcing Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Already by the next year, communities in Texas were celebrating Juneteenth, as it became known, and over the next decades, commemorative celebrations spread across the South and the rest of the country.

By the early part of the 20th century, Juneteenth had become an established holiday, as indicated by this collage of headlines and articles from various issues of the Chicago Defender, the country's preeminent Black newspaper during much of the 20th century.

[Custom collage. Chicago Defender. 20th century] #juneteenth #emancipation #blackhistory #africanamericanhistory #ushistory #holidays #emancipationday

06/18/2021

Reclaiming Indigenous Material Culture

Reclaiming Indigenous Material Culture

06/16/2021

Were you the victim of an unpunctuated, 4,391-word-long sentence? Attorney Frank Sharp has got your back. #Bloomsday

James Joyce's modernist masterpiece "Ulysses" has stumped many a reader over the years. So it's no surprise that the novel has generated an epic amount of secondary scholarship since it was first published in 1922--including, apparently, a lecture by an attorney advertised in this 1929 poster from legendary Chicago performance space the Dill Pickle Club.

[Ad for lecture on James Joyce at the Dil-Pickle Club. Chicago, 1929]

Were you the victim of an unpunctuated, 4,391-word-long sentence? Attorney Frank Sharp has got your back. #Bloomsday

James Joyce's modernist masterpiece "Ulysses" has stumped many a reader over the years. So it's no surprise that the novel has generated an epic amount of secondary scholarship since it was first published in 1922--including, apparently, a lecture by an attorney advertised in this 1929 poster from legendary Chicago performance space the Dill Pickle Club.

[Ad for lecture on James Joyce at the Dil-Pickle Club. Chicago, 1929]

06/15/2021

Revolutions Across Borders

How did issues of borders, boundaries, and jurisdictions play out during the Age of Revolutions 200 years ago?

The history of borderlands—from Argentina to Brazil, and Mexico up to Canada—is riddled with questions about immigration, labor practices, Indigenous rights, the arms trade, resource extraction, and cartography.

In this program, a panel of experts explores this history, and how these issues continue to shape our world today.

06/15/2021

Don't forget those dippers.

This typed list of items to pack in preparation for a month-long camping trip to Canada in 1907 was created by Frances Shaw, a poet, playwright, and traveler born in Chicago in 1872. Alongside canoe "dippers" (paddles), Shaw brought items ranging from a hatchet, rubber sheets, and a "folding rubber pail" to "4 books" and "a large flour sack" for assorted personal belongings. The rest of the diary details the trip itself and includes receipts, newspaper clippings, and hand-drawn maps of the route.

The diary is part of our Frances Wells Shaw Papers, a collection consisting mostly of material related to Shaw's domestic and international travels during the first half of the twentieth century. bit.ly/2RXjhHn

[List of items for camping trip in Canada. Frances Shaw Diary. August, 1907. Frances Wells Shaw Papers. Midwest MS ShawF Box 2 Folder 24] #diaries, #camping #trips #campingtrips #traveling #canada

Don't forget those dippers.

This typed list of items to pack in preparation for a month-long camping trip to Canada in 1907 was created by Frances Shaw, a poet, playwright, and traveler born in Chicago in 1872. Alongside canoe "dippers" (paddles), Shaw brought items ranging from a hatchet, rubber sheets, and a "folding rubber pail" to "4 books" and "a large flour sack" for assorted personal belongings. The rest of the diary details the trip itself and includes receipts, newspaper clippings, and hand-drawn maps of the route.

The diary is part of our Frances Wells Shaw Papers, a collection consisting mostly of material related to Shaw's domestic and international travels during the first half of the twentieth century. bit.ly/2RXjhHn

[List of items for camping trip in Canada. Frances Shaw Diary. August, 1907. Frances Wells Shaw Papers. Midwest MS ShawF Box 2 Folder 24] #diaries, #camping #trips #campingtrips #traveling #canada

06/14/2021

Mondays, amirite?

Part of a group of allegorical plates, this illustration satirizes Philippe, the French Duke of Anjou, whose accession to the throne of Spain in 1700 triggered the War of Spanish Succession, a conflict between the French Bourbon and Spanish Hapsburg dynasties that extended from 1701 to 1714. Though it involved a range of European powers, the ultimate effect of the war was to weaken both Spain and France, enabling the rise of Great Britain.

In the cartoon, Philippe is depicted as a sick donkey (a symbol of Spain) while the figure to the right, captioned "Doctor Financier," takes care of him.

["De zieltogende Anjouse Monarchie." From "A Collection of Dutch political pamphlets, broadsides, and cartoons." Netherlands. 1711. Case Wing folio ZC 1 .185.] #cartoons #engravings #illustrations #donkeys

Mondays, amirite?

Part of a group of allegorical plates, this illustration satirizes Philippe, the French Duke of Anjou, whose accession to the throne of Spain in 1700 triggered the War of Spanish Succession, a conflict between the French Bourbon and Spanish Hapsburg dynasties that extended from 1701 to 1714. Though it involved a range of European powers, the ultimate effect of the war was to weaken both Spain and France, enabling the rise of Great Britain.

In the cartoon, Philippe is depicted as a sick donkey (a symbol of Spain) while the figure to the right, captioned "Doctor Financier," takes care of him.

["De zieltogende Anjouse Monarchie." From "A Collection of Dutch political pamphlets, broadsides, and cartoons." Netherlands. 1711. Case Wing folio ZC 1 .185.] #cartoons #engravings #illustrations #donkeys

06/12/2021

Feeling pretty jazzed for #RecordStoreDay.

This record—a 1959 reissue by jazz singer Della Reese—is part of a recently acquired archive of materials from legendary Chicago nightclub Mister Kelly’s.

[A Date with Della Reese at Mister Kelly's in Chicago. Jubilee Records. 1959. Midwest MS Mister Kelly's] #dellareese #misterkellys #chicago #music #jazz #vinyl #records #recordstores

Feeling pretty jazzed for #RecordStoreDay.

This record—a 1959 reissue by jazz singer Della Reese—is part of a recently acquired archive of materials from legendary Chicago nightclub Mister Kelly’s.

[A Date with Della Reese at Mister Kelly's in Chicago. Jubilee Records. 1959. Midwest MS Mister Kelly's] #dellareese #misterkellys #chicago #music #jazz #vinyl #records #recordstores

06/10/2021

America's First Civil Rights Movement

Scholars Kate Masur and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor reconsider the country's earliest federal civil rights measures: the Fourteenth Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1866.

06/10/2021

Apply within.

[Photo by Esther Bubley. Sheridan, Wyoming, 1948. CB&Q A-5]

#womancook #photographs #employment #helpwanted #photography #history #archives #americana

Apply within.

[Photo by Esther Bubley. Sheridan, Wyoming, 1948. CB&Q A-5]

#womancook #photographs #employment #helpwanted #photography #history #archives #americana

06/09/2021

❤️ 🌈 ❤️

Largely self-taught in an era when marbling manuals were scarce, Norma Rubovits modified traditional marbling patterns and techniques to create what she first referred to as “doodles” and later named marbled monoprints or marbled vignettes.

We're lucky enough to house Rubovits's work, along with marbling samples she'd collected from other artists.

[Wing MMS Rubovits: Series 4, Box 15] #marbledpaper #art #libraryloveisloveislove #pride #pridemonth

❤️ 🌈 ❤️

Largely self-taught in an era when marbling manuals were scarce, Norma Rubovits modified traditional marbling patterns and techniques to create what she first referred to as “doodles” and later named marbled monoprints or marbled vignettes.

We're lucky enough to house Rubovits's work, along with marbling samples she'd collected from other artists.

[Wing MMS Rubovits: Series 4, Box 15] #marbledpaper #art #libraryloveisloveislove #pride #pridemonth

06/08/2021

"Viva la Libertad" - Video Tour

Take a quick tour of "Viva la Libertad: Latin America and the Age of Revolutions," on display at the Newberry Library through July 24, 2021.

Narrated by Will Hansen, Curator of "Viva la Libertad." Filmed and edited by Truth & Documentary.

Learn more about the exhibition: https://digital.newberry.org/libertad/exhibition/

06/07/2021

Zipping around on microfilm is something everyone should experience at least once. At the Newb, you can access Chicago newspapers on microfilm, including past issues of the Chicago Defender from 1909-1950.

[Local History Ref Microfilm 1310] #archives #newspapers #microfilm #chicago #chicagodefender #research

06/05/2021

Our exhibition galleries are open today from 12-4pm. Plan your visit: https://www.newberry.org/visit

06/04/2021

Territory, Land, Identity

Artist Fernando Martí joins us for the latest episode of “NewbTube” to discuss how he addresses concepts like territory, land, borders, and identity in his work.

A print recently designed by Martí is currently on display in the Newberry exhibition "¡Viva la Libertad! Latin America and the Age of Revolutions."

Martí will be interviewed by Will Hansen, curator of "¡Viva la Libertad!"

"NewbTube" is a series of brisk but brainy conversations with Newberry staff and others.

06/04/2021

"The Scorcher" is not the hero we deserve but the hero we need right now. #ArchivesOnWheels #ArchivesHashtagParty

While the first bicycle was invented in 1817, it wasn't until the 1880s and ‘90s that bicycles became affordable, safe, and comfortable enough for widespread use. Sheet music of the era celebrated bicycles both as a fun way to get around and as a means of breaking gendered social constraints.

["The Scorcher" by George Rosey, 1897. Driscoll Collection of Historical American Sheet Music: Series 9, Box 206] #bikes #bicycles #music #sheetmusic #archives

"The Scorcher" is not the hero we deserve but the hero we need right now. #ArchivesOnWheels #ArchivesHashtagParty

While the first bicycle was invented in 1817, it wasn't until the 1880s and ‘90s that bicycles became affordable, safe, and comfortable enough for widespread use. Sheet music of the era celebrated bicycles both as a fun way to get around and as a means of breaking gendered social constraints.

["The Scorcher" by George Rosey, 1897. Driscoll Collection of Historical American Sheet Music: Series 9, Box 206] #bikes #bicycles #music #sheetmusic #archives

06/02/2021

Black Freedom on Native Land

No symbol in African American history may be as powerful as “40 acres and a mule”—the lost promise of reparations for slavery after the Civil War.

In this Meet the Author event, we’ll hear from scholar Alaina Roberts about the Black people who received the mythic 40 acres, the American settlers who coveted this land, and the Native Americans who originally inhabited the land.

Joined by the Newberry’s Rose Miron, Roberts discusses her new book, I’ve Been Here All the While: Black Freedom on Native Land, in which she uses archival research and family history to revise the traditional story of Reconstruction by focusing on the ways Indigenous peoples, freed African Americans, and white settlers negotiated claims to land during the period of westward expansion.

06/02/2021

Even our well-documented love of
👉manicules👈 has its limits. This example is certainly not the most carefully drawn manicule we’ve ever seen.

A reader found plenty to highlight in this copy of Castiglione's "Book of the Courtier." The book, which immediately gained a wide audience, provided an in-depth examination of the customs (like eating with forks) observed in a princely Italian court. Nobility across Europe consulted Castiglione as they set up or reformed their own courts.

[Il libro del cortegiano del conte Baldesar Castiglione. Venice: 1539. Case Y 712 .C2738] #manicules #reading #renaissance #marginalia #speccolls

Even our well-documented love of
👉manicules👈 has its limits. This example is certainly not the most carefully drawn manicule we’ve ever seen.

A reader found plenty to highlight in this copy of Castiglione's "Book of the Courtier." The book, which immediately gained a wide audience, provided an in-depth examination of the customs (like eating with forks) observed in a princely Italian court. Nobility across Europe consulted Castiglione as they set up or reformed their own courts.

[Il libro del cortegiano del conte Baldesar Castiglione. Venice: 1539. Case Y 712 .C2738] #manicules #reading #renaissance #marginalia #speccolls

06/01/2021

Happy Pride Month! 🌈

We're getting the month started with a recent acquisition: a collection of photos by Eunice Hundseth Militanté, a le***an activist, feminist, and photographer who documented early Pride parades in Chicago.

[Scene from Chicago Gay Pride Parade, 1976. Eunice Hundseth Militanté. Chicago. 1976. Eunice Hundseth Militanté Photograph Collection. New acquisition] #pride #gaypride #prideparade #pridemonth #photographs #chicago #newacq

Happy Pride Month! 🌈

We're getting the month started with a recent acquisition: a collection of photos by Eunice Hundseth Militanté, a le***an activist, feminist, and photographer who documented early Pride parades in Chicago.

[Scene from Chicago Gay Pride Parade, 1976. Eunice Hundseth Militanté. Chicago. 1976. Eunice Hundseth Militanté Photograph Collection. New acquisition] #pride #gaypride #prideparade #pridemonth #photographs #chicago #newacq

05/31/2021

One hundred years ago today, white mobs in Tulsa, Oklahoma, attacked the city's Greenwood District--a thriving Black neighborhood known nationally as "Black Wall Street"--murdering residents, burning businesses, churches, and schools, and bombing buildings with private aircraft in what has come to be known as the Tulsa Race Massacre.

Triggered by events surrounding the arrest of a Black shoeshiner on a bogus r**e charge, the massacre began with an altercation outside the jail where the accused man, 19-year-old Dick Rowland, was being held. Following rumors that Rowland would be lynched by a group of whites who had congregated outside the jail, a group of Black residents gathered around the jail to protect him. When a white man tried to disarm one of the Black men, fighting broke out.

That night, and into the next morning, white rioters--some of them deputized by city officials and police--stormed Greenwood in an organized assault. According to some reports, the rioters were occasionally joined by police officers who burned houses and robbed Black citizens. By noon on June 1--when the National Guard imposed martial law--the mob had killed between 75 and 300 Black residents, destroyed dozens of Black businesses, and razed 35 city blocks.

The massacre was covered by newspapers around the country, including the nation's preeminent African American newspaper, the Chicago Defender, which published this headline on June 11, 1921.

The Tulsa Race Massacre is considered by many to be one of the worst instances of concentrated racial violence in US history.

["Police Aided Tulsa Rioters." The Chicago Defender (National edition). Chicago, Ill. June 11, 1921. Page 1. ProQuest Historical Newspaper: Chicago Defender] #tulsa100 #tulsaracemassacre #blackhistory #africanamericanhistory #onthisday #history #ushistory

One hundred years ago today, white mobs in Tulsa, Oklahoma, attacked the city's Greenwood District--a thriving Black neighborhood known nationally as "Black Wall Street"--murdering residents, burning businesses, churches, and schools, and bombing buildings with private aircraft in what has come to be known as the Tulsa Race Massacre.

Triggered by events surrounding the arrest of a Black shoeshiner on a bogus r**e charge, the massacre began with an altercation outside the jail where the accused man, 19-year-old Dick Rowland, was being held. Following rumors that Rowland would be lynched by a group of whites who had congregated outside the jail, a group of Black residents gathered around the jail to protect him. When a white man tried to disarm one of the Black men, fighting broke out.

That night, and into the next morning, white rioters--some of them deputized by city officials and police--stormed Greenwood in an organized assault. According to some reports, the rioters were occasionally joined by police officers who burned houses and robbed Black citizens. By noon on June 1--when the National Guard imposed martial law--the mob had killed between 75 and 300 Black residents, destroyed dozens of Black businesses, and razed 35 city blocks.

The massacre was covered by newspapers around the country, including the nation's preeminent African American newspaper, the Chicago Defender, which published this headline on June 11, 1921.

The Tulsa Race Massacre is considered by many to be one of the worst instances of concentrated racial violence in US history.

["Police Aided Tulsa Rioters." The Chicago Defender (National edition). Chicago, Ill. June 11, 1921. Page 1. ProQuest Historical Newspaper: Chicago Defender] #tulsa100 #tulsaracemassacre #blackhistory #africanamericanhistory #onthisday #history #ushistory