It's public program time again, beginning tomorrow! This season we have a wonderful variety of programs, including a book launch, a panel presentation of former Creative Artists and Writers Fellows to celebrate the program's 20th anniversary, and reflections on the Revolutionary War era. As always, public programs are open to the public and free of charge. ...
On September 6, 1774, 4,622 militiamen from 37 towns marched into Worcester, shiretown for the county, closed the Royal courts, and forced each court official to resign. Forming two lines, they forced each court official, hat in hand, to disavow the recent Massachusetts Government Act, which revoked the Province’s charter and disenfranchised its citizens. With ...
Those of you who follow the Society's blog are aware that the last week in April was Preservation Week, a period set aside by the American Libraries Association to focus on the care and conservation of collections material. We take preservation seriously at AAS. The word is part of our core mission, in fact. We have ...
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 ...
I recently scanned a few boxes of glass negatives from the collection, all made by one Benjamin T. Hill, an amateur photographer and local historian elected to the Antiquarian Society in 1901 who also served as an auditor for the Society for twenty-three years. These negatives were all made at a fair in Worcester in ...
Take some history buffs, students, teachers, museum professionals, an enthusiastic and well-known scholar, and some wonderful materials from our collections and what do you get? A great inaugural Hands-on History Workshop! Last Saturday we presented “Worcester and the American Revolution,” led by Ray Raphael, to a diverse group of interested, informed, and eager participants. We thought ...
To study closely a nineteenth-century lithograph or actually touch the impressions of type in the sheets of an eighteenth-century newspaper can be a magical, even transformative, experience. For years I have seen K-12 educators become engrossed and inspired by such activities. However it was only after we conducted a one-day workshop for K-12 educators on ...
Attribution is something libraries and museums struggle with every day. Who is the sitter in this portrait? Who is the author of this pamphlet? Often the objects give us clues, but not always. Sometimes they even lead us astray. This is the story of a pair of daguerreotypes at the American Antiquarian Society and how ...
If you navigate your way to the AAS online content webpage, you’ll find a link to the Society’s digital image archive, GIGI. In GIGI you’ll discover a searchable database of over 50,000 images from the society’s collection - from maps to manuscripts, war images to newspapers, cartoons, illustrations and more. My personal favorite is the ...
This just in for people looking for something to do in Worcester this Saturday…The Antiquarian Society is teaming up with the other venerable Worcester institution to be celebrating its bicentennial in 2012. That’s right, on Saturday, October 20th from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., the First Baptist ...
Although we're often holding newsworthy events, conferences, and lectures, the bicentennial has brought even more media attention than usual to AAS and its offerings. Just yesterday, the Society was prominently featured in a front page story on the Constitution in Worcester's Telegram and Gazette. You can read the article here: The source of it ...
Did you know that the American valentine industry started right here in Worcester in 1848? That America’s first widely mass-produced valentines were designed by a woman named Esther Howland in her workshop on Summer Street? That Victorians ate conversation hearts? That Valentine’s Day greetings were part of a larger cultural debate in early America about ...
