This past winter, while hunting in the stacks for a trade card for a reader, I spotted this intriguing advertisement for chewing gum. As editor of the Society’s Instagram account, I had been participating in an event called #bugginout, which featured posts by libraries around the world focused on illustrations of anthropomorphic insects. These posts … Continue reading Gen. Benjamin Butler and Shoo Fly Chewing Gum
Richard and Claudia Bushman are the AAS Distinguished Scholars in Residence for the 2014-2015 academic year. Richard is Gouverneur Morris professor emeritus of history at Columbia University and the recipient of many honors, including the Bancroft Prize. His new book, which he plans to finish while at AAS, is on American farming in the eighteenth century. Claudia … Continue reading Richard and Claudia Bushman, AAS Distinguished Scholars in Residence
This year the American Antiquarian Society will be holding its 8th annual Adopt-a-Book event on Tuesday, May 5, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. This fundraising event supports the library’s continued acquisitions of historic material and has been very successful in the past, with over $100,000 raised to date. The funds help curators buy more books, pamphlets, … Continue reading Now launched: Adopt-a-Book 2015!
Past is Present: I guess we’ll start out with your new projects. Could you both describe the projects you’re working on here? Claudia Bushman: What I’m doing is an extension of a project I began my scholarly work with, which is a study of Harriet Hanson Robinson, second echelon reformer who spent a lot of … Continue reading Richard and Claudia Bushman, AAS Distinguished Scholars in Residence
This week, AAS was fortunate to receive a hand-made, circa 1830, valentine as a donation. Society member George K. Fox of California presented the valentine to AAS President Ellen Dunlap at an event at the San Francisco Book Club celebrating the Society’s receipt of the National Humanities Medal. The Society has a large and representative … Continue reading A Saucy Valentine
Since our founder Isaiah Thomas’s research for his ambitious The History of Printing in America (1810), AAS has held the largest collection of data on the early American book trades in North America and the Caribbean. The bulk of this information exists on 25 drawers of cards in our reading room and is known as … Continue reading “Black Printers” on White Cards: Information Architecture in the Database of the Early American Book Trades
The nineteenth-century gold rushes continue to have a strong hold on the imagination of the American public. Perhaps it’s the promise of wealth or adventure or simply starting a new life. In any case, the gold rushes opened not only new physical and political frontiers for the United States, but also very personal ones for … Continue reading The Life and Times of a Miner’s Wife: Part I
We’ve had an interesting lineup of public programs so far this spring, exploring everything from nineteenth-century theater and attitudes towards alcohol to what life was like for free and enslaved African Americans in Massachusetts during the prelude to the Revolutionary War. Tomorrow, Thursday, May 29, at 7:00 p.m., we’ll continue our series with a talk … Continue reading Public Program: Poet Tess Taylor on Researching at AAS
Now that the spring weather seems to have (finally) reached us here in Worcester, everyone is beginning to get out and partake in all of those activities they put off during the winter, including cultural events. We hope that our spring lineup of public programs at Antiquarian Hall—including the one tonight—will be among those that … Continue reading 2014 Spring Public Programs Now in Full Swing
A lot of the Society’s staff travels for work. We are a national organization and we collect material from all across the fifty states and Canada. Curators travel to conferences and to visit collectors, catalogers move about for training and to stay up to date with the latest methods, managers visit members, foundations, granting agencies, … Continue reading On the Road for AAS
Fitch’s Geography for Beginners, [1850-1858]. This handwritten textbook of geography is something of a mystery. Heavily illustrated with original drawings and images clipped from publications, the text is divided into lessons with topics such as “About Travelling,” “About the Surface of the Earth,” “About Animals,” and “About Trees and Plants.” The title, Fitch’s Geography… suggests … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Fitch’s Geography for Beginners
On Saturday, June 22, AAS will hold an interactive workshop for educators entitled Mining for Minerals: The Pull of the West that explores the search for gold and silver in the west and the impact that it had on immigration, economic development, the environment, Native Americans and social interactions. Led by Middlebury College professor Kathyrn … Continue reading Thou Shalt Not Miss “Mining for Minerals: The Pull of the West”
We’re starting to gear up for our summer series of K-12 professional development workshops! If you’re an educator and haven’t yet had the chance to attend one of our workshops, now is the time to do it. We have some great topics and interesting scholars joining us, not to mention the library materials. For those … Continue reading Summer Series of Workshops for K-12 Educators
Aspinwall Courier. Aspinwall, Panama. In the 1850s, Aspinwall (today known as Cólon) was founded as one of the end points of the Panama Railroad, which spanned the isthmus for and provided part of the route to and from the California gold rush regions. This paper was edited by Frederic E. Foster and printed in English … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: Aspinwall Courier
Hall, William. The Encyclopaedia of English Grammar: Designed for the Use of Schools. Wheeling, Va.: John B. Wolff, 1849. Like newspapers, textbooks were frequently among the earliest imprints issued in regional outposts like Wheeling, Virginia (later West Virginia). Such is the case with William Hall’s Encyclopaedia of English Grammar, which was first copyrighted in nearby … Continue reading The Acquisitions Table: The Encyclopedia of English Grammar
