Dilettante [i.e. Edward W. Clay] Lessons in Dancing, Exemplified by Sketches from Real Life in the City of Philadelphia. Philadelphia: Published by R.H. Hobson, 1828. Only the second known copy of this title with eight delicately hand-colored plates of dancing couples mounted on stubs and sewn into printed tan paper wrappers with the imprint information. … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Lessons in Dancing
Another year done means another Annual Report. For most, the phrase “annual report” doesn’t exactly elicit imaginings of stimulating reading material. But here at AAS we like to think of the Annual Report as more than just a business reckoning. It’s also a reflection of a thriving community—a learned society, if you will—made up of … Continue reading The Annual Report: Not All Business
Editor’s note: In the most recent issue of the Almanac, we asked members of the AAS community to give us their choice of recommended reading for “fiction published before 1900.” We are continuing those recommendation in this series on Past is Present. This first post is written by AAS member Philip F. Gura, who is … Continue reading Recommended Reading: Isa, A Pilgrimage (1852) by Caroline Chesebro’
You may notice that things look a little different around here. Last October, just in time for the bicentennial, we released the new AAS website. Its sleek look and improved navigation have been a success, so we decided to give our blog a similar treatment this fall. To go with the new look, we also … Continue reading The New Face of Past is Present
This fall, the American Antiquarian Society, with the generous support of the Terra Foundation, is sending an important exhibition of American lithographs to the Musée Goupil in Bordeaux, France. The exhibition, À la mode francaise: La lithographie aux États-Unis 1820 to 1860, will be opening on September 6 and closing on November 10, 2013. The … Continue reading With a French Accent goes to Bordeaux, France!
Group of 100 pieces of American ephemera, 1830-1900. In order to mark the Society’s 200th birthday, AAS member and collector Lisa Baskin took the unique approach of donating 100 pieces of American ephemera, including the examples shown here. The collection includes labels, trade cards, and tickets, and features a variety of printing styles, including letter … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: 100 Pieces of American Ephemera
Over the next several months we are very excited to offer a new series of workshops for K-12 teachers. First up is “The Emancipation Proclamation” on Saturday, April 20 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., led by prominent Lincoln historian Harold Holzer. During this one-day workshop we will examine carefully the text of the proclamation, … Continue reading New K-12 Workshop: The Emancipation Proclamation with Harold Holzer
Leonard Deming booksellers’ stamp. In Jonathan Edward’s The Salvation of All Men Strictly Examined.Boston: Published by C. Ewer, and T. Bedlington, 1824. Leonard Deming is best known to scholars today for being (along with Nathaniel Coverly) the other important purveyor of folk ballads and street literature in early nineteenth-century Boston and a prolific publisher of … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Leonard Deming Booksellers’ Stamp
Bargue, Charles after Alfred de Dreux, Atalanta, Paris, Berlin, New York: Goupil and Knoedler, 1860. Another beautiful example of transatlantic lithographic printing from France, this image of the horse Atalanta from a series of prints of driving and saddle horses was the bicentennial gift of AAS member George Fox. Named for a Greek goddess of … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Atalanta
Abbott, Jacob. Juno on a Journey.The Juno Stories.New York: Dodd & Mead, ca. 1870. Jacob Abbott’s Juno was among the first female African American protagonists of a children’s book series. In this book, Juno is enlisted to take a little white boy named Georgie on a train journey by the boy’s father. During this early … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Juno on a Journey
On March 30-31, 2012, as part of our bicentennial programming, AAS hosted a symposium titled “Research Libraries in the Digital Age: Needs and Opportunities.” This symposium was intended to provide the AAS Council and staff with a set of perspectives that would help inform its vision of how AAS can best position itself to remain … Continue reading Our Need, Now an Employment Opportunity
Whenever you create a movie you always shoot more footage than you can actually use. When we created our new orientation film describing the Society as part of our bicentennial celebrations last year, we decided to put the extra footage we had created to good use by creating five short video modules and embedding them … Continue reading Video Modules Enliven AAS Website
Each year at the Boston International Antiquarian Book Fair, AAS has a booth on Cultural Row (booths given to local libraries to promote themselves). When regular visitors to the fair walk by our booth, they usually think one thing. Chocolate! Early on we had a dish with small candy bars or other chocolate confectionery delights … Continue reading When I Say AAS You Think…Chocolate?
As a description of a professional trajectory in the research library world, it certainly makes for an impressive resume: Library Assistant, American Antiquarian Society Curator of Maps and Prints, American Antiquarian Society Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Graphic Arts, American Antiquarian Society Director, Center for Historic American Visual Culture, American Antiquarian Society At the same … Continue reading Tribute to a Legendary AAS Staff Member
The 200th annual meeting provided the opportunity to celebrate many accomplishments and transitions, but among the most poignant were the retirements of three long-time colleagues: Gigi Barnhill and Caroline Sloat (who retired this summer) and John Keenum (who will retire at the end of the year). A blog post about Gigi’s retirement will appear in … Continue reading Celebrating the Retirements of AAS Staff Members
