It has been a big year for some of the country’s most important documents. January saw the sesquicentennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, and just last week was the 150th anniversary of the reading of the Gettysburg Address. This Thursday in the United States we celebrate our national day of Thanksgiving, and so are looking back, ...
The collection of election ballots at the American Antiquarian Society is an impressive group of 952 items spanning the nineteenth through the early twentieth centuries. Several of these are individual ballots for specific elections, others are completely uncut; some are annotated, others are marked-up canvassing sheets (with sample tickets) or are comprised of paste downs. ...
Nothing is hair-raising quite like a chilling photograph. This month, when the occult is most heavily sought after in popular culture, we made a small collection accessible which examines death, the afterlife, photography, technology, and (naturally) print culture. AAS’s impressive collection of stereocard views includes a subset categorized as “Ghost” images. This includes approximately 31 images ...
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," a series we are continuing here on Past is Present. Last week we heard from AAS member Philip Gura. This week, Jackie Penny, AAS's image ...
With all eyes in the media directed towards the new addition to the royal family, we’ve taken a look back to seek out evidence in the historical record of this subject’s proportional popularity. Unsurprisingly, American buzz on the most recent princes and princesses is anything but new. Indeed, everything about Queen Victoria’s life was reported in ...
The March 2013 issue of AJN: The American Journal of Nursing featured on its cover a well-known AAS collection item – A Map of the Open country of a Woman’s Heart by “A Lady” published by Kellogg c. 1833–1842. Throughout the month of April, we received queries about this image from nurses around the country. We ...
Did you receive your copy of the Almanac yet? If not, a PDF version is currently available on the AAS website. But that’s not what this post is about. This is not a post about digital surrogacy. It’s a post about good, old-fashioned printing presses (okay, okay, a 1995 press). While we undoubtedly advocate for the ...
This piece of sheet music in the Society’s collection represents a handful of Confederate imprints published by George Dunn and Company (printer) and written or edited by F.W. (Fitz William) Rosier. Even before official secession, and certainly after, the Confederate States produced their own government documents and publications; there were also religious pieces and education ...
We are going to brave the waters of wartime Christmas. In the next few days, there will be three posts examining Confederate-printed items in the Society’s collection. This season of festivities is also one of commemoration and reflection as we are squarely in the War’s sesquicentennial. A glance over the pages of the nation’s most popular ...
Some children would do just about anything to catch a glimpse of the gift-giving St. Nick on Christmas Eve – others have parents who would set up a camera and create a stereographic photograph to capture the whole visit. This image, titled “Santa Claus loaded for business” illustrates just such a scene. A bearded and ...
The American Antiquarian Society is somewhat of a rare bird in the way we exhibit our holdings. On the one hand, the fact that we have virtually no display space means that materials are lent for other institutions to display; on the other hand, we’re just itching to show off our collections. So when the ...
This is the type of post which started out as an “In Memoriam.” Something lighthearted which included lines about the deceased card catalog’s birth in the 1970s, it being a ‘descendent of generations of particleboard furniture’ and that it ‘leaves behind grieving relations such as the filing cabinet, map drawer, etc.’ But the more I ...
Back in the 1950s, the AAS used to exhibit its items in places with traffic – (skeptical? Check out this 1952 photograph taken by Ted Woolner showing the front window of the Industrial City Bank and Banking Co. in Worcester with our Graphic Arts items) – but then the Internet was born and we learned ...
Without a doubt, many amazing people arrive daily on the doorstep of Antiquarian Hall. They bring research early in its infancy, artistic projects, personal histories, obligations of library pilgrimage – all in need of the AAS touch. In 1813, Isaiah Thomas made clear the intent for the doors and collection be open to all who ...
On this day 150 years ago, Martha LeBaron Goddard (1829-1888) wrote the letter transcribed below to her friend Mary Ware Allen Johnson. Her letters, composed over the years of the Civil War (of which the AAS has about 30), describe one woman’s response and ways of intersecting with the world (and war) around her. This letter ...
