Past is Present

What’s AAS Preserving this Week? An Early (1709) Bay Psalm Book

To continue the celebration of the American Library Association’s 2014 Preservation Week held back in April (and mentioned in an earlier post), we’re bringing you a behind-the-scenes peek into a conservation project that started just a couple weeks ago on a recent acquisition – a Bay Psalm Book from 1709. The revitalization process for this volume will start with a photo shoot, a cleansing bath, and some re-stitching, and will end with a new back, protective clothing, and secure housing.

BPB music — Closeup of musical supplement at the end of the 1709 Bay Psalm Book

AAS was thrilled to add this early eighteenth-century edition to our already strong collection of early Bay Psalm Books, including a copy of the first edition from 1640. You can learn more about the Bay Psalm Book editions and why this particular one is of interest to us by reading the full article in the AAS newsletter, the Almanac, embedded below. (Spoiler alert: it’s the only known complete copy of this edition, it contains the earliest example of music printed in North America at AAS, and it is in complete and unsophisticated — although certainly not perfect! — condition.)

Even before the funding was secured to acquire this 1709 Bay Psalm Book (given by the Fred Harris Daniels Foundation in memory of AAS member William O. Pettit, Jr.), donations had begun flowing from eager members, scholars, and staff. Thanks especially to early donors Margery Dearborn, Jock Herron, and Meredith Neuman! Those generous early donations are now being used to conserve, house, and digitize the book in order to preserve its physical structure.

BPB cover — Binding of the 1709 Bay Psalm Book, or more precisely, The psalms hymns, and spiritual songs, of the Old and New-Testament. 14th ed. Boston: John Allen for Eleazer Phillips, 1709.

Using our newest Bay Psalm Book as it was originally intended is challenging in its current condition. Yet it is actually in remarkably good shape compared to other early psalters. Given that hymnals or psalters were meant to be flipped through and handled at least once a week rather than read through once a lifetime, those that do survive the centuries have almost invariably lost a few things along the way: their original binding, at least part of the title page, and usually some of the pages of music at the end. Remarkably, this 1709 Bay Psalm Book managed to hold on to all of its parts. Still, even just leafing through the volume in its current state puts its over-300-year-old body under undue pressure.

The goal of AAS conservation staff is to stabilize the book’s condition without losing potential information binding historians might find useful. The conservation plan, as it stands now, begins with high-quality, detailed photographs documenting the current state of the volume. The text block will then have to be removed from its period binding. The paper will be washed to deacidify or neutralize it, then alkalized in a magnesium bicarbonate solution, as it has become discolored from age and improper storage. Remarkably, little paper repair is needed apart from mending the tattered edge of the title page with Japanese paper. The signatures will be resewn and new endbands fabricated in the same style as they were originally. The text block will then be fit back into the original binding, which will be retained, but will need to have a leather re-back as the original binding has broken over the years. End papers will be added to protect the title page. A custom box will be made to the exact dimension of the volume so it can sit on the shelf with no danger of friction. There it will safely sit in AAS’s doubly-locked and climate-controlled vault (home of our “holy of holies”) where it will remain available for scholarly examination for hopefully at least another 300 years.

Images from the conservation photoshoot are on AAS’s Instagram page. Now that you’ve seen our “before,” stay tuned for our “after”!

We think of these planned interventions as not so much a facelift as a hip replacement. Although the book will look more aesthetically pleasing in the end, the goal is to make it functional again. After all, if no one can open a book or turn its pages without breaking it or damaging it further, does it really exist as a book?

The Way to a Woman’s Heart—Or Not

It’s an age-old question: What is the way to a woman’s heart? (It’s also a timely question, with Mother’s Day this coming weekend.) We often hear the way to a man’s heart is food, beer, or sports. To a woman’s, it’s usually said that it’s chocolate, jewelry, clothing, or shoes. If we dig a little deeper, men may also value kindness and compassion, women sensitivity and strength. These are all stereotypes, of course, but one striking thing about working in an archive is reaffirming that there really is nothing new under the sun, including stereotypes—and the tiny bits of truth they sometimes hold.

Among the thousands of images depicting women in our collections, there is one that has continually sparked discussion whenever we share it with K-12 and Hands-On History Workshop participants: A Map of the Open Country of Woman’s Heart, Exhibiting its internal communication, and the facilities and dangers to Travellers therein. Printed between 1833 and 1842 with attribution stated as “By a Lady,” this image serves as a perfect place to begin exploring nineteenth-century ideas about and attitudes towards women. At first glance, its complex layout and soft, pretty colors lead the viewer to think they are looking at a positive and glowing depiction of women’s love and understanding. Closer viewing belies these initial signals, revealing that the Lands of Love of Admiration, Love of Display, Love of Dress, Coquetry, and Selfishness take up far more space in a woman’s heart than the Region of Sentiment, which consists of districts such as Love, Hope, Enthusiasm, Good Sense, and Patience.

While I certainly take issue with the creator’s proportions of positive versus negative traits, closer inspection of these so-called lands and regions does bring to mind some present-day assumptions about human woman's heart detail 1 (and woman) nature. For example, apparently jewelry and clothing have always been seen as one way to a woman’s heart. If you look closely at the Lands of Love of Dress and Display in the top right of the heart, they include the cities of Cashmere and Belles-maisons (“Beautiful-houses”); the Satin Plains; the Pyramids of Fashion; Bonnet Ridge; and the Rivers Drain the Purse and Wilful Waste, both of which flow into the Jewelry Inlet. The creator has left no doubt about their attitudes toward a love of fashion and style, even bordering these lands with the Bays of Establishment and Old Mans Darling. By these standards, some women today—including myself, who can never pass up a good pair of shoes—are certainly guilty of a love of dress and display.

This mid-nineteenth-century engraving depicts some of the dangers of novel reading for women.

Many of the other lands include similar negative topographical names. Even the Land of Sentimentality—a concept that was very popularly applied to women in the nineteenth century—features the Plain of Susceptibility and the town of Dandy’s Rest, the idea presumably being that if you are too sentimental you are susceptible to being taken in, making you perfect prey for those vain dandies. Let’s also not forget the damaging influence of the ultimate conveyor of sentimentality, the novel. A Land of Sentimentality would not be complete without a River of Novel Reading.

Aside from these topographical elements, however, one of the most interesting aspects of this image is the use of what was at the time either relatively or very new transportation technology to convey a sense of women’s patterns of emotion and behavior. Take, for example, the railroad, which begins in the top left corner in the Land of Love of Admiration and covers distance “with incredible speed.” It moves through this first land, past the Lake of Self Concern, the High Grounds of Matrimonial Speculations, and the Valley of Mothers Artifice, and into the Land of Coquetry. From there it speeds past the Tenting ground of Uncertainty, through Jilting Corner, briefly finds itself in the Land of Selfishness where it passes the Labarynth of Fair Hopes, and on through the Town of Lady’s Privilege in the Region of Fickleness, finally crossing the border into the Land of Oblivion. Following this path gives one the impression of a whirlwind tour of the plot of one of those nineteenth-century sentimental novels the creator finds so distasteful, or else reeks of the bitterness of someone who has fallen prey to a woman’s (and her mother’s) prospective matrimonial games one to many times. Perhaps someone had been reading a too few many of those novels themselves.

The employment of the transportation metaphor shows up again with the steamboat on the River of Indulgence, which provides communication between the City of Moi-meme (“Myself”) in the Land of Selfishness and the Lands of Love of Dress and Display on the opposite end of the country. The metaphor of a steamboat—a form of transportation that was relatively quick and could travel lengthy distances, but was not quite as efficient as a railroad—gives one the sense that it is not a far trip from selfishness to vanity. Indeed, rather than the windswept sense of love affairs the railroad gives, the connection between selfishness and vanity is more constant and steady.

Before we get too angry with the artist, there are a few good traits depicted—a very few. Right at the heart of the heart is the City and District of Love. As mentioned earlier, this Region of Sentiment includes qualities such as patience, prudence, and hope. Within this small region, protected (to keep people in or out?) by the Ego Mountains, reside the final, as well as the slowest and oldest, forms of transportation included on the map. The Canal and the Windin Path, which begin in the Country of Solid Worth, are the only two routes that lead into the City and District of Love. Both are short and slow methods of travel, suggesting that to enter that golden city, one needs patience, steadiness, and reliability. A woman’s love is worth taking the time and effort to acquire. (What the River of Lasciviousness, connecting the Country of Solid Worth and the Lake of Felicity, is doing in this region is less clear.)

With all this said, the question remains: Was this designed by a man or a woman? Sure, it states it’s “By a Lady,” but as with nineteenth-century authorship, that does not necessarily mean it’s so. Is the image reflecting nineteenth-century male stereotypes about women? Or was someone trying to send a message to her fellow women? In any case, I hope you’re planning a nice gift for your mother this weekend. Some jewelry or a novel would be much appreciated, I’m sure.

Today’s the Day: Support AAS in Greater Worcester GIVES!

Today is Worcester County’s first-ever online giving challenge, Greater Worcester GIVES, and the American Antiquarian Society is proud to be participating. Please show your support for AAS – and for the community we are part of – by donating to us in the challenge before midnight EST so that we can contribute a strong total for the region!

How it works:

Go to http://gwgives.org/#npo/american-antiquarian-society anytime today, May 6, and follow instructions to make an online donation of $25 or higher to the American Antiquarian Society. Your gift will be tax-deductible. All gifts are unrestricted unless you specify otherwise. You do not have to be a Worcester County resident to participate – all donations are welcome!

Organized and hosted by the Greater Worcester Community Foundation (GWCF), Greater Worcester GIVES seeks to inspire people to support local nonprofits within this 24-hour period, for a collective impact that will benefit the region as a whole. Visit http://www.gwgives.org/ for more information.

Come Adopt-a-Book tomorrow night!

Tomorrow night the Society is holding its seventh annual Adopt-a-Book event at Antiquarian Hall from 6:00 to 8:00pm. Come join us for libations and snacks (generously donated this year by Ed Hyder, Panera, and Crown Bakery). Each of the Society’s curators has selected material for adoption including paper dolls, ledger books, newspapers, lithographs, and bound volumes. There will be dozens of historic objects up for adoption, ranging in price from $25 to $400. There will also be a display of material already adopted through the very successful online adoption portion of the event, which has raised over $10,000 since April 15th.

During the course of the evening we will be holding a raffle for some quirky prizes (i.e.., two chairs from the original set ordered for the reading room in 1912), the five curators will speak about material they have purchased with funds raised during last year’s Adopt-a-Book event, and current NEH fellow Marina Moskowitz, from the University of Glasgow, will speak about her ongoing research under the dome.

But the real focus of the evening is raising funds for continued acquisitions at the Society. The money we raise through adoptions helps us further expand the collection.

Here are three items that will be up for adoption tomorrow evening:

1.) Currier & Ives, A Patriot of 1776 Defending his Homestead, New York, 1876. Adopt me for $100.

2.) Horace O. Conger and Caroline P. Crane. Obstetrics and Womanly Beauty. A treatise on the physical life of woman, embracing full information on all important matters for both mothers and maidens. Chicago:American Publishing House, after 1875. Adopt me for $50.

3.) Miller’s Harpoon, New Bedford, Massachusetts, 1847. Adopt me for $100.

If you have pre-adopted online, admission to this event is free, otherwise $10 at the door. We hope to see you tomorrow night!

Noah Webster’s American English

First edition of the two-volume American Dictionary. — 1828 first edition of the two-volume An American Dictionary of the English Language by Noah Webster

Do you remember – especially before the advent of the internet – being in need of a definition or a proper spelling of a word and turning to your home’s, school’s, or work’s copy of a Merriam-Webster dictionary? That dictionary you used was based on the life’s work of one ambitious American, Noah Webster. Webster’s legacy continues today, not only in his printed dictionaries and now the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, but in the Americanized version of English that he helped to standardize after the Revolution.

Noah Webster was born on October 16, 1758 to a well-respected West Hartford, Connecticut family. He and his siblings received a great deal of attention from his parents in the form of instruction on religion, morality, and academic subjects. In The Forgotten Founding Father (2010), Joshua Kendall argues that Webster gleaned from his upbringing an admiration for his authoritarian parents as well as a view of himself dependent on his accomplishments (15). He engaged in private studies with a local pastor before entering Yale College in the 1770s, where he developed revolutionary sympathies as he lived through events like the Battles of Lexington and Concord, after which he showed his patriotism by joining his classmates in a student-directed military drill. After graduating from college in 1778, Webster turned to the law profession. He soon redirected his career to teaching for a more stable income, and founded a successful school in Sharon, Connecticut in 1781. Webster went back and forth between teaching assignments for a number of years. He then turned his attention to what would be a best-selling project, uniting his ambitions for nationalism, “fame and silver dollars” (Kendall, 71).

This edition of The American Spelling Book was printed by Ebenezer Andrews and AAS's founder, Isaiah Thomas — This edition of The American Spelling Book was printed by Ebenezer Andrews and AAS’s founder, Isaiah Thomas

In these post-Revolutionary years, Webster voiced strong convictions that a national language would unify the independent and distinct states. He published his American Spelling Book in 1783 as the first of a three-part series on the English language. Webster wrote in his preface that he wished to “diffuse uniformity and purity of language in America [and] destroy provincial prejudices” which he believed had arisen as a result of unstandardized spellings and varied pronunciations of words. Webster borrowed heavily from Thomas Dilworth’s A New Guide to the English Tongue, printed in England in the mid-eighteenth century. Webster added key modifications, however, including the fact that the language of his speller was more readable (Kendall, 72). Furthermore, he employed standardized syllables that reflected pronunciation, as opposed to Dilworth’s syllables based on Latin grammatical rules (Kendall, 74). Webster also included moral lessons instead of heavy Christian concepts. His Spelling Book took off, selling a million and a half copies between 1783 and 1801. This number is significant considering that the U.S. population was only about 2.8 million people in 1780 (Lemon, 122). AAS holds multiple editions of the Spelling Book, including a 1789 edition and a corresponding digital copy.

Webster kept busy after his successful Spelling Book, retaining an interest in the development of his new nation and its education. In the 1780s, he published his own version of the New-England Primer, a text originally published by an Englishman in the seventeenth century that had been reprinted throughout the colonies for decades due to a lack of copyright laws. AAS holds multiple editions of Webster’s adapted Primer. Furthermore, Webster composed a work called Sketches of American Policy (1785), which articulated proposals for a structure of a strong, balanced federal government as an alternative to the Articles of Confederation. Never idle, Webster travelled the country giving lectures on the English language. He also penned works advocating the ratification of the new Constitution.

Pages from the New England Primer — Reading selections from The New-England Primer, 1789

Despite the success of his Spelling Book, Webster was publicly scorned by many leading Americans when he first proposed in 1800 to compile An American Dictionary of the English Language. Webster stuck to his linguistic efforts, however, beginning work on the Dictionary in 1807. He put in full work days engaging such books as Samuel Johnson’s popular English dictionary and Robert Ainsworth’s Latin one, while himself contributing “meanings and distinctions” (Kendall, 260).

Frontispiece portrait of Noah Webster in An American Dictionary

Overcoming early criticism, Webster’s Dictionary was well received upon its publication in 1828; it was a major feat that brought significant increases and changes to a more standardized and Americanized English language. Webster included 70,000 words, greatly exceeding Johnson’s dictionary of the same period. He helped standardize changes from British English that were previously used only erratically in America, such as eliminating superfluous letters in certain words. His dictionary included even quotidian words and scientific expressions; it was also influential for his clear and thorough definitions (Kendall, 304). AAS holds many editions of Webster’s Dictionary, including the 1828 two-volume publication.

An American Dictionary of the English Language was far from unbiased; Webster inserted his rigid moral values and personal views in the definitions. For example, as an American Patriot who had supported the rebellion against King George III just a few decades earlier, Webster’s negative opinion of kings shone through in his definitions of the words “monarchy” and “monarchal.” For the former, he offers as an example the quote “‘A free government has a great advantage over a simple monarchy’ J. Adams;” for the latter: “‘Satan, whom now transcendent glory raised / Above his fellows, with monarchal pride’ – Milton.” Despite his anti-monarchal views, Webster did not advocate a very inclusive republican system of government. Richard Rollins, in “Words as Social Control” (1976), describes Webster’s growing desire for authoritative order around the turn of the nineteenth century. Webster, who in 1808 had undergone a Calvinist conversion, fervently pushed the ideal of God-fearing Christians submitting to the authority of male leaders with a very high age minimum. Webster thought that such men, unlike younger politicians, would be less self-interested in serving the public good (Rollins, 418). As Rollins points out, this distrust of politicians is hinted at in his Dictionary in his two-part definition of a politician, the second part being men “of artifice and contrivance.” The dictionary itself was not democratic in that it cost twenty dollars and was thus not available for the majority of private citizens. When the Merriam brothers bought the rights and revised the dictionary, however, they were able to create a six dollar version that allowed for a much wider audience.

An exhibit of several of Webster’s works is currently on display in the AAS Reading Room. You can see the enormous volume that comprises only half of Webster’s 1828 Dictionary, as well as his Spelling Book and his New England Primer. Webster was a crucial leader in adapting the English language to the new American nation, from teaching it with more logical syllabication to implementing key spelling reforms. His Dictionary, the product of decades of labor, was a groundbreaking model in content and style.

Works Cited:

Kendall, Joshua. The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster’s Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2010.
Lemon, James T. “Colonial America in the Eighteenth Century.” In North America: The Historical Geography of a Changing Continent. Ed. Robert Mitchell and Paul Groves. 1987.
Rollins, Richard M. “Words as Social Control: Noah Webster and the Creation of the American Dictionary.” In American Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 4, p. 415-430. JSTOR.
Webster, Noah. An American Dictionary of the English Language. New York: 1828.
Webster, Noah. The American Spelling Book: containing an easy standard of pronunciation. Boston: 1789.
Webster, Noah. The New-England Primer, Amended and Improved. New York: 1789.

Further Reading:

Lepore, Jill. A is for American: Letters and Other Characters in the Newly United States. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002.
Nietz, John A. “Old Textbooks.” University of Pittsburgh Press, 1961. In 19th Century Schoolbooks. Digital Research Library, University of Pittsburgh.
Verma, Henrietta. “BackTalk: 20 Years, One Assistant, 70,000 Words.” Library Journal. May 1, 2013. Reviews.libraryjournal.com.
Warfel, Harry R. Noah Webster: Schoolmaster to America. New York: The MacMillan Company, 1936.

Preservation Matters

Riding the wave of our recent James Russell Wiggins lecture’s Franklin-iana and the American Library Association’s 2014 Preservation Week: Pass it On (which takes place April 27-May 4, 2014), we found ourselves struck by the Benjamin Franklin quotation, “An ounce of preservation is worth a pound of cure.” Although Franklin was speaking about fire safety (and the quote has been used in the context of health), we used it as a charge to reflect on general collection health and maintenance.

preservation_bookcradle — DIY book cradle

One of the goals of ALA’s Preservation Week is how we can preserve personal and shared collections. Several weeks ago, curator of graphic arts Lauren Hewes had an eye-opening experience in the flooded basement of a descendent of a photographer (photographs of the subsequent conservation work were posted on the AAS Instagram account). In this case, minimal preservation steps would have gone a long way. Similarly, two years ago while in a Preservation Management in Libraries and Archives class with Rachel Onuf at Simmons College, I was assigned a final project to create a preservation education program for the public. The forum I selected was to produce a blog to showcase selected preservation needs – a blog created for those interested in preservation of library materials on a shoe-string budget. The project was called “Simple Preservation Matters” because it gathered together the most straightforward preservation strategies and suggested that carrying them out would have value for a collection.

A book snake, to hold open pages — DIY book snake

The project started out with a budget – of eighteen dollars and eighteen days. The goal was to create eighteen resourceful ways of dealing with the issues of preservation, including housing, education, proper display, use and handling, acquisition of suitable housing, minor book treatments, and disaster preparedness. The purpose of the project was two-fold: first to create a resource for those interested in the preservation of library materials which could lead them in the right direction, but also to display how achievable the ideas are.

A few points about what this project was not. This blog did not attempt, or suggest, that professionals shouldn’t be called in when needed. It did not encourage conservation, but rather attempts to filter some of the larger preservation goals (environmental monitoring, security, minor building surveying/fixing, housing) into manageable pieces. This site was not intended to be a resource for collections conservators – nor was it to encourage librarians or well-meaning individuals to think they are collections conservators or technicians. Instead it was a forum for creativity, for ideas, for humor, and to show doable best practices in action.

Some of the activities were for the DIY crowd (making your own book cradle and making your own book snake), while others were for a younger audience and advocated proper book handling and, if creativity allowed, making preservation paper dolls with Tyvek suits. Still others were on the lighter/informational side and advocated for proper collection transport (à la “my other car is a book truck” bumper sticker).

The blog was created to lead those interested in preservation to the authoritative resources on preservation management (see footnote). Usually the most inexpensive strategies make a difference in the protection of a collection. This included recommendations from the NEDCC on how books should never be stored directly against walls (but be three inches from them) and all collections should be at least four inches off the ground. Instead of an “app” for that, we created a printable-ruler. There is also a post to the Council of State Archivists’s “Pocket Response Plan (PReP)™,” which is available for download (and to be filled out) by those interested in having a truly mobile response plan but who may not already have one. We also showed the best way to remove a volume from the shelf (and showed cap damage to a volume pulled incorrectly). Also included was how to make a paper enclosure and tintype storage.

In my experience as a librarian I have done minimal housing and handwork, which I think underscores why some of these posts can work. Education is important, but so is feeling empowered to tackle the daily preservation issues of any archive in relatively simple ways. Culling together best practices from authoritative resources and sharing how they are achievable with a low (to sometimes “no”) budget was the objective. At AAS, we believe that collection safety, housing, and use are to be taken seriously. And I do not mean to suggest that the blog is comprehensive or will lighten a librarian/archivist/collector’s already laborious workload. The work never ends; instead it gradually becomes less absorbing. But my hope through this brief project was to allow users to start seeing preservation issues in a new way.

Some useful resources consulted:

Banks, Paul N. and Roberta Pilette, eds, Preservation: Issues and Planning. Chicago: American Library Association, 2000.

Library of Congress: Collections Care Web Resource. < http://www.loc.gov/preservation/care/>

Long, Jane S, Richard W. Long, Inge-Lise Eckmann, and Clare B. Hansen. Caring for Your Family Treasures: Heritage Preservation. New York: H.N. Abrams, 2000.

Northeast Document Conservation Center Resources: Preservation Leaflets. Andover, MA: Northeast Document Conservation Center, [consulted July 2012]. Web resource < http://www.nedcc.org/resources/leaflets.list.php>

Patkus, Beth. Assessing Preservation Needs: A Self-Survey Guide. Andover, Mass: Northeast Document Conservation Center, 2003.

Recent Arrivals Shelf – Modern Scholarship

Living in the stacks amongst the vast collections of historical primary source material at AAS, one will find books of a much younger age. AAS does not only seek to collect one copy of every thing printed in the United States up until about 1876; we also strive to add recent scholarship written about topics that reflect the time period of the collections. Having scholarship alongside these historic gems allows for some context to be provided for the materials, as well as encouragement for the fulfillment of possible missing areas of research and other untold stories. After all, there will always be an item inside of an archive that is waiting for an eager reader to stumble upon it and place it in context of the larger historical picture.

Here are some highlights from our Recent Arrivals Shelf, which can be found under the dome in the Reading Room for a short while before they make their way to their new home in the stacks.

On Paper: The Everything of Its Two-thousand-year History
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013)
By Nicholas A. Basbanes
AAS Member (elected 1995)

Courtesty of www.nicholasbasbanes.com — Courtesy of www.nicholasbasbanes.com

Published in 2013, this book was also the topic of a talk given at AAS by the author on November 12^th of this past year. In the first part of the book, Basbanes traces the history of the invention and spread of paper beginning in China and then traveling to North America. Aside from the timeline of the life of paper, Basbanes’ particular interest in regards to this book has to do more with the idea of paper, “one that certainly takes in the twin notions of medium and message, but that also examines its indispensability as a tool of flexibility and function” (Basbanes, xii). Basbanes also explores how paper has been a force in shaping historical events across time and place. On Paper was recently placed on the ALA’s shortlist for the Andrew Carnegie Medal of Excellence in Nonfiction. Read more about this honor here.

Also by Nicholas Basbanes:

About the Author: Inside the Creative Process (2010)
A World of Letters: Yale University Press, 1908-200 (2008)
Editions & Impressions: Twenty Years on the Book Beat (2007)
Every Book its Reader: The Power of the Printed Word to Stir the World (2005)
A Splendor of Letters: The Permanence of Books in an Impermanent World (2003)
Among the Gently Mad: Perspectives and Strategies for the Book-Hunter in the 21st Century (2002)
Patience & Fortitude: A Roving Chronicle of Book People, Book Places, and Book Culture (2001)
A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books (1995)

The Heathen School: A Story of Hope and Betrayal in the Age of the Early Republic
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013)
By John Demos
AAS Member (elected 1979)

Courtesy of: http://www.npr.org/2014/03/18/291130318/what-u-s-learned-from-heathen-school-wasnt-part-of-the-lesson-plan

Just published last month, this book will be the topic of an upcoming public lecture to be given by the author on June 10th, 2014, at 7:00 p.m. in Antiquarian Hall. The Heathen School tells the history of the Foreign Mission School of Cornwall, Connecticut, which was founded in the early nineteenth century. “Heathen youth” from all over the world would be brought to the school to be educated on Christianity and “civilization.” The story of this school encompasses the legacy of “American exceptionalism” as a nation that promotes, “a feeling of obligation…to make the world as a whole a better place” (Demos, 4). After a seemingly perfect start, the school was soon enveloped in controversy when some of the students began courting local white women. Ultimately, the reasons behind the failure of this school demonstrate that there are many points in American history that we need to encounter, learn from, and reflect on more often.

The Heathen School was also featured in a recent NPR article and Fresh Air story.

Also by John Demos:

The Enemy Within: 2,000 Years of Witch-hunting in the Western World (2008)
Circles and Lines: The Shape of Experience in Early America (2004)
A Little Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth Colony (1999)
The Tried and the True: Native American Women Confronting Colonization (1995)
The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story from Early America (1994)
Past, Present, and Personal: The Family and the Life Course in American History (1988)
Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England (1982)

Selling the Dwelling: The Books that Built America’s Houses, 1775-2000
(New York: The Grolier Club, 2013)
By Richard Cheek
AAS Member (elected 2004)

This book was published as an accompaniment to an exhibition by the same name at the Grolier Club in New York which ran from December 11, 2013-February 7, 2014. The author of this book, who also curated the exhibit, is an architectural photographer who specializes in recording the visual history of American architecture. Both the exhibit and the publication explore how advertising ephemera, such as builder’s guides, pattern books, and catalogues, helped to portray a particular ideal home and market that home in order to make a sale.

“Cheek highlights the more visually arresting and socially compelling examples, focusing on books that reveal the character of our country as much as they do the style of our houses. With over 600 examples illustrated in the text, plus an appendix listing several hundred additional items, Selling the Dwelling is a significant contribution to the bibliography of American domestic architecture.” – Oak Knoll Press

Read more about the publication and the exhibition at the Grolier Club website.

Also by Richard Cheek:

Land of the Commonwealth: A Portrait of the Conserved Landscapes of Massachusetts (2000)
Gardens and Landscapes of Virginia (1993)
Newport Mansions: The Gilded Age (1982)

AAS to Participate in Greater Worcester GIVES, May 6th

On Tuesday, May 6, 2014, the American Antiquarian Society will be part of Worcester County’s first-ever online giving challenge, Greater Worcester GIVES. Organized and hosted by the Greater Worcester Community Foundation, Greater Worcester GIVES seeks to inspire people to support local nonprofits within that 24-hour period, for a collective impact that will benefit the region as a whole. Please help AAS contribute to a strong total for the community by donating to us in the challenge!

How it works:

On May 6^th, go to http://www.gwgives.org/ and follow instructions to make an online donation of $25 or higher to the American Antiquarian Society. Your gift will be tax-deductible. All gifts are unrestricted unless you specify otherwise in the notes field on the giving form.

Stay tuned for more details closer to May 6^th!

2014 Spring Public Programs Now in Full Swing

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 make it on to your springtime calendar!

“Dreaming up a Nation Forever on the Move: The Strange Quest for the ‘Great American Novel’”
By Lawrence Buell
Tuesday, April 22, at 7:00 p.m.
Co-sponsored by the Franklin M. Loew Lecture Series at Becker College

There have been hundreds of candidates for the Great American Novel in the nearly 150 years since John William DeForest first introduced the idea, but why have these books been contenders for this title? What do claims of being the GAN really mean? In this lecture based upon his recently published book The Dream of the Great American Novel, lecturer Lawrence Buell charts the history of the quest to write the Great American Novel and then uses this history as a platform for exploring some of the characteristic ways that GAN candidates have acted as explorations and reference points for imagining a national identity.

Buell is Powell M. Cabot research professor of American literature at Harvard. He has written and lectured worldwide on American fiction, on the Transcendentalists and their legacies, and on the environmental humanities. His books include Literary Transcendentalism (1973), New England Literary Culture (1986), The Environmental Imagination (1995), Writing for an Endangered World (2001), and Emerson (2003).

“‘Slavery in the Bowels of a free & Christian Country:’ People of Color and the Struggle for Freedom in Revolutionary Massachusetts”
By Thomas Doughton
Tuesday, May 13, at 7:00 p.m.
Co-Sponsored by Africana Studies at the College of the Holy Cross

Regional people of color submitted three important petitions to the provincial legislature: one calling for an end of slavery in the colony, another asking that former slaves be transported back to Africa, and a third that the legislature set aside lands in the western part of Massachusetts for former slaves. This presentation will explore the relationships of people of color in central New England as “A great number of Negroes …detained in a state of Slavery” to an emerging political discourse of revolutionary freedom and racial equity in rural Massachusetts.

Thomas Doughton is the senior lecturer at the Center for Interdisciplinary and Special Studies at the College of the Holy Cross. Doughton specializes in the history of people of color and their relationships with whites in Central New England.

worcrevolution (This program is being presented as part of the Worcester Revolution of 1774, a celebration of Worcester County’s overthrow of British Authority seven months before the fighting at Lexington and Concord. For further information about this project see http://www.revolution1774.org/)

“Sifting the Uneven Archive: Researching The Forage House”
By Tess Taylor
Thursday, May 29, at 7:00 p.m.

In this program, poet Tess Taylor will recount how a residency here at the AAS helped her as she researched and wrote her latest book of poems, The Forage House. Her poems layer oral TessTaylor-tn histories, documents, and folksongs to craft an exploration of her ancestors—a mix of New England missionaries and Southern slave owners, including Thomas Jefferson. Taylor’s poems are as much about the imperfect material of family stories as they are about the politically charged material of history.

Taylor’s poetry and nonfiction have appeared in The Atlantic, Boston Review, Harvard Review, Literary Imagination, The Times Literary Supplement, and The New Yorker. She currently reviews poetry for NPR’s “All Things Considered” and teaches writing at the University of California, Berkeley.

“On the Trail of the ‘Heathen School’: Local History, American History, and World History”
By John Demos
Tuesday, June 10, at 7:00 P.M.

This lecture will be based on Demos’s newly published book unraveling the forgotten story of a special school for “heathen youth” brought to New England in the early nineteenth century from all corners of the earth. Located in the little town of Cornwall, Connecticut, this uniquely fashioned institution embodied an early version of what we now call American exceptionalism: convert them, educate them, civilize them, then send them back to found similar projects in their respective homelands, and the world will be saved in the shortest time imaginable. After a seemingly brilliant beginning, however, the plans ran afoul of racism—when some of the heathen students courted local women. The result was scandal, widespread controversy, and permanent closure of the school. Demos will also reflect on the process of his research, including his time as a distinguished scholar at the Antiquarian Society and his visits to places central to the story.

John Demos is the Samuel Knight professor of history emeritus at Yale University. Demos’s award-winning books cover topics ranging from family life in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, to witch-hunting in the Western world, in such works as A Little Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth Colony (1970), the Bancroft Prize-winning Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England (1982). Demos is a member of the American Antiquarian Society and was the AAS-Mellon Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence during the 2012 calendar year.

The Acquisitions Table: The Bookbinders Shop

The Bookbinders Shop. Philadelphia: P.S. Duval for the American Sunday School Union, ca. 1850.

This image of the interior of the British bookbinding establishment of Westleys & Clark was issued by the Philadelphia lithographer P.S. Duval sometime between 1842 and 1850. A second, related print showing a ship and its furniture was printed by Duval using the same bordered vignette format, also for the American Sunday School Union. Possibly the images (along with others not yet located) were used to educate children about trades — each features workers and modern equipment along with relevant vocabulary. Duval had a steady relationship with the American Sunday School Union, publishing several small-format, paper-covered books for children during this period. The bookbinding shop shown in this print includes both male and female workers surrounded by reams of paper and the tools used to create books for the booming markets of Europe and America.

Adopt-a-Book 2014

This year the American Antiquarian Society will be holding its 7^th annual Adopt-a-Book event on Tuesday, May 6^th, from 6:00 to 8:00pm. This event has been an entertaining and successful fundraiser for the library’s continued acquisitions of historic material. The money raised helps curators buy more books, pamphlets, prints, newspapers, and manuscripts. On May 6^th, participants will have the opportunity to view all kinds of material recently acquired by AAS, including a book on fortunetelling, a Confederate newspaper, and a copy book made by a New England schoolchild. You can adopt in your name or in memory/in honor of a special person (or both, with multiple adoptions!). The event has become so popular with our members, fellows, local supporters, and staff, that many previous participants ask the curators in advance for hints about the type of material that will be made available for adoption! Everyone has been waiting for the catalog.

And here it is! Today, we launch the 2014 Adopt-a-Book event with the online catalog, which will remain active through May (or until everything is adopted). Participants who wish to pre-adopt can do so now, direct from the digital catalog (and as an added incentive, entrance to the May 6^th event is FREE if you pre-adopt from the online catalog, otherwise $10). So click on over and have a look at the 110 objects the curators have selected for the online portion of this event. Don’t worry if it seems like everything is getting snapped up quickly – we are always gratified by the enthusiasm our supporters show. And, the curators have already selected additional, exclusive, material that will only be up for adoption in person at the event on May 6^th.

To further tempt you, here are selections in the online catalog from each of the five curatorial departments:

The Valley Farmer (St. Louis, MO). May 1864
Adopt me for $25

This is a nice western agricultural periodical in its original wrappers. This issue was edited by Norman J. Colman who was later the first U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. He purchased the failing periodical in 1855 and made it very successful promoting modern agricultural techniques.

Three Little Kittens. St. Louis: Scruggs, Vanderwoort & Barney, ca. 1880.
Adopt me for $50

Mamma Cat puts her three kittens to work washing their mittens in this delightful chromolithographed Three Little Kittens, a picture book issued by the St. Louis department store Scruggs, Vanderwoort & Barney. The back cover has a full-page advertisement for the store touting its reputation as “a vast storehouse of everything that the feminine mind can think of for immediate wear.”

Thaddeus Davids, The History of Ink: Including its Etymology, Chemistry, and Bibliography. New-York, 1856.
Adopt me for $100

Designed in large part to promote Thaddeus Davids’ company, self-proclaimed maker of “the best ink known,” later editions of the book were plastered with advertisements and press notices. It took its subject matter seriously, though, from its first sentence declaring, “Ink is history.” Egypt and the Aztecs, writing ink and printing ink, paper mills and poetry about ink are all discussed.

The Children’s Pic-nic. New York: Currier & Ives, 1872-1874.
Adopt me for $75

This charming scene of well-dressed children playing outdoors was issued by Currier & Ives towards the end of their long run as print sellers and publishers in New York. The firm listed numerous genre prints of happy and adorable (and adoptable!) children under the heading “Juvenile” in their catalogs.

The Yankee Pedlar, vol. 1, no. 3, 1842.
Adopt me for $100

According to the masthead, this handwritten newspaper was “published every Saturday Morning at 31 Broad St.” The cover features a piece titled “The contents of the little Tin Box with a hole on the top” as well as a woodcut portrait of Shakespeare.

We are grateful to the following vendors for their generous donations for your enjoyment on May 6^th:

Ed Hyder’s Mediterranean Marketplace
Sahara Restaurant
Crown Bakery

This event is being held in conjunction with Greater Worcester Gives.

The Acquisitions Table: Samuel Dickinson Barton Lecture Notes

Barton, Samuel Dickinson. Lecture Notes (Amherst College), 1827 and undated.

Samuel Dickinson Barton was a student in the class of 1831 at Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts. These two volumes contain notes written by Barton while attending lectures at Amherst. One is dated 1827, the other is undated. The lectures he attended cover a variety of topics including theology, geology, mineralogy, natural philosophy, English, French, and chemistry. These volumes are particularly interesting because they include lectures delivered by Edward Hitchcock (1793-1864). Hitchcock is considered one of the founders of American geology and geology as a science. He founded the Association of American Geologists, was head of the first geological survey of Massachusetts, and was appointed State Geologist of Massachusetts in 1830. He began teaching at Amherst College in 1825, and served as president of the college from 1845-1854. These volumes show that Hitchcock not only made his mark on the science of geology, but remained devoted to teaching and education as well. He continued teaching at Amherst College until his death in 1864.

Adventures in Cataloging: Some Sleuthing Required (Part III)

This week, the series ends by correcting a case of mistaken identity. And if you missed the first two parts, be sure to check them out: Part I, Part II.

3. The Doctors Jackson

We like to trace provenance information in our records when we can. This allows one to find former owners, virtually reconstruct an individual’s book collection, and think on questions about audience and readership in relation to the titles at hand.

An Eulogium upon Benjamin Rush, M.D. by David Ramsay (Philadelphia, 1813) was given to “S. Jackson from E. Lewis” at an unknown time in the early nineteenth century. Later, it was owned by Dr. Asa M. Stackhouse of Morristown, N.J., who inscribed the title page, and William R. Stackhouse, who affixed his bookplate to the front flyleaf.

Dr. Asa M. Stackhouse’s notes about Dr. Samuel Jackson, which proved to be the key to disentangling the identities of the doctors Jackson.

Unfortunately, “S. Jackson from E. Lewis” is a rather uninformative inscription and gives little information that would help identify the individuals involved. However, Dr. Stackhouse obligingly added a note concerning provenance. He tells us that Dr. Samuel Jackson of Northumberland was the former owner and annotator of the volume, and that Dr. Jackson was the father of Francis Aristides Jackson, a professor of Latin in the University of Pennsylvania.

Searching for biographical information about the father of Francis Aristides Jackson proved productive, and we discovered that Dr. Samuel Jackson was born in 1788, earned his M.D. at the University of Pennsylvania in 1812, lived in Northumberland, Pa., and died in 1869.

However, the process of discovery did not stop there! Dr. Samuel Jackson (1788-1869) was actually one of two individuals by that name who lived in Pennsylvania and obtained an M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania during the early nineteenth century. The other Dr. Samuel Jackson was born in 1787, earned his M.D. at the University of Pennsylvania in 1808, and died in 1872.

Unsurprisingly, the good doctors had been confused and bibliographically conflated. All the titles ascribed to a Dr. Samuel Jackson of Pennsylvania had been attributed to Dr. Samuel Jackson (1787-1872), and Dr. Samuel Jackson (1788-1869) had disappeared from the bibliographic record. Knowing that there were two Dr. Samuel Jacksons allowed us to disambiguate them and correct errors in attribution.

Dr. Samuel Jackson (1788-1869) is now correctly listed as the author of two pamphlets, The Annual Discourse before the Philadelphia County Medical Society, delivered February 10, 1852 (Philadelphia, 1852) and The Organizing of the American Medical Association (Philadelphia, 1852). Additionally, he has been identified as the former owner of two titles held by the American Antiquarian Society, Elements of Surgery for the Use of Students by John Syng Dorsey (Philadelphia, 1813) and The Philosophy of Human Knowledge, or A Treatise on Language by A.B. Johnson (New York, 1828). These corrections will not, perhaps, set the academic and bibliographic worlds afire, but they help make the bibliographic record a little more correct than it was before.

A Young Reader’s Appreciation for Johnny Tremain

Editor’s note: In a twist that follows up on Jackie Penny’s account of reading pre-1900 fiction to her children, retired AAS director of book publication Caroline F. Sloat turned to her ten-year-old grandson for an enthusiastic recommendation of Esther Forbes’s Johnny Tremain.

Our bags were packed and we were ready to leave for the airport when Henry chose to ask about Johnny Tremain. He had read it before school closed for the summer and was captivated. My grandson usually stops reading a book when “something bad” happens to the hero, but the injury to Johnny’s hand was an exception. In fact, Henry even thinks the book needs a sequel.

Tremain 1998 — Cover of and illustration from the 1998 edition of Johnny Tremain. The illustration depicts the injury to Johnny’s hand.

His comments begged further discussion, but then, alas, was not the time. I knew it would be a few months before I would see him again and, and as full as his days are, I wondered how much he would remember. A lot it turned out, and he was eager to talk. He began by saying that he liked the way the author “blended an invented story into a real story.” The result “made sense” to him because it was a way to learn a lot about the time in which it took place, one that he considered important. He particularly liked the way the plot revolved around more than Johnny’s accident. In his experience with fiction he thought that many writers would have ended the story there. “Instead,” the author wrote “the extra section” that was “really long and you learn a lot more than you expected.”

112176_0001 — Cover of the original 1943 edition

Nuances were not lost on him either: “most people would think that Americans only wanted independence and the British only wanted to keep the colonies. But that’s not true because a few Americans really wanted the British to keep ruling and some of the British wanted America to be separate. Sometimes people think that the United States already had a big military, but they didn’t and so they had to train their own soldiers.”

Esther Forbes might be pleased to know that reading the book was a “fun way” for Henry to explore Boston from his Seattle classroom. Boston came alive as Johnny “carried mail for money and delivered letters as a spy.” He also enjoyed reading about working in the ships and how to get around Johnny’s Boston and felt it was important to learn about such topics as the Boston Tea Party and Paul Revere’s Ride, but—and here comes the critique that Forbes might not find as gratifying: “I also noticed that the book didn’t have a really good ending. You need a second book. Johnny wanted to go into the army and you need to teach about life in the army and learn more about the whole revolution.”

Map from the inside cover of the 1943 edition - a helpful tool for understanding the text — Map from the inside cover of the 1943 edition – a helpful tool for understanding the text.

That said, Henry reported that the book started a “Revolutionary War craze” in Mr. A.’s classroom. The kids watched the 1957 Disney Johnny Tremain movie and found other books. Over the summer Henry himself was able to visit Mystic Seaport to see old ships and Old Sturbridge Village, which seemed to him a “lot like the outskirts of Boston.” The “blacksmith and the tin shop also give you the idea of silversmithing and the printing office and houses also help you learn about what life was like for Johnny. “

Henry summed up our conversation by observing that the book has a lot of facts for kids who don’t like to read nonfiction on their own and was a “good way to sneak them in.” As Henry’s grandmother, I would say it was a good way of sneaking fiction into his usual diet of nonfiction by creating a character and situation that he found completely credible and engaging.

Seventy years after Forbes won the Newbery Medal for this book—a product of her creative imagination and skillful transformation of archival research at the American Antiquarian Society—it still resonates with young people. Johnny Tremain will be the subject of a Hands-On History Workshop to be offered by the Society on Saturday, May 10, 2014, and a portion of the day will feature discussion about the use of the novel in the classroom. If you are a teacher, take it from Henry: “it adds to your knowledge and it’s nice to read.” And if you’re an adult who hasn’t read it recently, it’s still in print (or available for download) and a wonderful glimpse of some of the best research and writing to emerge from “under the generous dome.”

Adventures in Cataloging: Some Sleuthing Required (Part II)

Last week, in Part I, Amy discovered the title and date of a pamphlet missing a title page by scouring the newspapers. Now, she puts a name to a remarkable but unidentified woman.

2. The life of Ms. Sally (or Sarah) Rogers

Sometimes, I catalog a book or pamphlet and a person appears whom we know nothing about and who isn’t in the Name Authority File, the international database catalogers use to identify people.[1] When this happens, I once again dive into research to sort out the identity of the such people so that I can identify them with a unique heading in our records and they can be found as an author or subject.

Title page of A Real Object of Charity (Walpole, N.H., 1806).

Sally Rogers was such an individual. I first encountered her when I cataloged A Real Object of Charity, a small pamphlet published about April 1806 in New Hampshire. She is the subject of the pamphlet, although it gives only her father’s name, not hers; however, she did sign the original artwork accompanying it. Isaiah Thomas, the founder of the American Antiquarian Society, placed a value of $1.00 on the pamphlet, and it has resided in our collections for the past two centuries.

I couldn’t find Sally Rogers in vital records, and I was skeptical about my chances at discovering more about her due to the common nature of her name. Happily I was proved wrong, and now she can be found in our catalog as “Sally Rogers, approximately 1788-1813.” Unfortunately, her history survives primarily in ephemeral newspaper advertisements and reviews, which makes it difficult to trace her story in full and know what she thought about her life and choices.

In the pamphlet, Sally’s age is given as “about 18,” and she lived with her parents in Lempster, New Hampshire. It states that “nature seems to have denied her … the use of her limbs” – other reports described her as lacking hands and feet – but made “amends… in the exercise of other faculties as surpassing all human belief,” namely, the ability to create art by holding her instruments in her mouth and the ability to excel at such tasks as threading needles and moving with grace and decorum.

Watercolor illustration from A Real Object of Charity (Walpole, N.H., 1806). The painting, an image of a bird on a flowering tree, was created by Sally Rogers; it, along with three other illustrations, was inserted into the pamphlet after it was printed.

A Real Object of Charity marks the beginning of Sally Rogers’ public career as a working artist and performer. On June 17, 1806, the Repertory, a Boston paper, announced the commencement of her stay at the Columbian Museum. There she had “consented to perform in publick” and would “paint, mix colours, thread a needle, cut paper or cloth with scissars [sic] held in her mouth, &c.” Sally Rogers is unnamed in this advertisement, but the positive reviews which followed recognized the talents of “Miss Rogers.” She worked steadily for the next seven years, both under the name Sally Rogers and, after 1807, under the name Sarah Rogers. She toured from New Hampshire to South Carolina, experimenting with admission prices, taking commissions, exhibiting her work, and, in the South, sometimes working alongside Martha Ann Honeywell, another woman who lacked hands and adeptly performed artistic and feminine tasks. Sally/Sarah’s performances ended only with her death in Philadelphia on October 30, 1813. According to her obituary in the Democratic Press (Philadelphia, Pa.), she was twenty-four years of age, and her funeral would be held at the house of General James Barker.[2]

Next week, in the third and final part, Amy will clear up a case of mistaken identity!

[1] For example, the Name Authority File links different forms of an author’s name, so that you’ll find the Harry Potter books if you look for J.K. Rowling, Joanne K. Rowling, or Jo Rowling. It also differentiates between people, so that the works of Cotton Mather, the New England Puritan (entered under Mather, Cotton, 1663-1728) aren’t confused with the works of Cotton Mather, the professor of geography (entered under Mather, Cotton, 1918- ).

[2] Lanning, A. “Sally Rogers: The Celebrated Paintress.” In Historic Deerfield (Summer 2012).