Americas Collections Blog

Civil War Project: The Great Seal of the Republic Redux

(The Great Seal of the Republic, shown on the British Library digitised manuscripts website)

You may recall an earlier post about the Confederate Seal of the Republic, which was supplied to the Southern States by a British firm ("That symbol - the Great Seal of the infant Confederacy - sent to it by its nurse, England").  Well, we've now added it to the Library's digital items site: Digitised Manuscripts, which lets you explore the seal's case, provenance and zoom in on the seal itself.  More to follow.

[MJS]

 

Picturing the Great Alone: photography and the Antarctic

Robert Falcon Scott on the 'Terra Nova' expedition, by Herbert Ponting. Image from Wikipedia.

Last year was a busy one for Team Americas and one of the many things we managed to do was take on some responsibilities for materials relating to Antarctica, thus adding a whole extra continent to our domain. This being the case, when an opportunity to view 'The Heart of the Great Alone' at The Queen's Gallery came up a couple of us jumped at the chance.

'The Heart of the Great Alone' covers various early twentieth century expeditions to the Antarctic, including that of the 'Terra Nova' during which Scott and his team perished. The main exhibition focus is the photography of Frank Hurley, photographer for Shackleton's 'Endurance' expedition, and Herbert Ponting, who produced the official photographs for the 'Terra Nova' expedition. I could write a lot here about these photographers and the expedition but the best thing to do would be to recommend a visit the exhibition itself or the e-gallery.

 
'Midnight in the Antarctic Summer', by Herbert Ponting. Image from Wikipedia.

However, as always with these trips, I had a mind to mull over the Library's materials relating to the Antarctic when I got back. The Library's collections from this area are not the largest in the world, with institutions such as the Scott Polar Research Institute and the Royal Geographical Society (to name a few) holding a wealth of material, but there is a noteworthy body of material which is well supported by the wider collection of Official Publications and Newspapers (especially in the case of an expedition such as the 'Terra Nova').

That said, there are some stand out items and a notable collection of miscellaneous materials held here. Captain Scott's diary is one of the Library's star collection items and the journal 'The South Polar Times' (shelfmark: Tab.444.d.6.) was the first publication printed on the Antarctic continent. Publications by Frank Hurley and Herbert Ponting also feature, including Ponting's 'The Great White South' (1921, shelfmark: 010460.g.1). These items contribute to a wealth of published material relating to the Antarctic and explorers such as Scott and Roald Amundsen.

As well as holding materials relating to the initial exploration of Antarctica, the Library has a significant collection regarding the continent in the later twentieth century; where scientific progress and international co-operation become the order of the day. Materials arising from events such as the Antarctic Treaty or organisations such as the British Antarctic Survey, as well as many academic texts and articles regarding the continent, are insightful on their own but also suggest an evolving relationship between global society and the frozen continent.

[PJH]

Kodak: framing the last 120 years

'Kodak factory at Harrow, 1890s'. Photographer unknown. British Library Kodak Archive A.1787

The news that Kodak is formally filing for bankruptcy protection has been coming for some time but it still represents a significant moment in the history of photography. Ever since George Eastman marketed his company's first camera in 1888 Kodak has framed the personal, family, social and political histories not just of the Americas but of a significant portion of the world.

As such, I decided to dig around and see the mark Kodak has left on the British Library's collections. In short, it's a big one. Some of the earliest materials we hold relating to Kodak were published by the company itself, for example the Kodak Press publication, 'Picture Taking and Picture Making' (1898, Shelfmark: YA.1998.a.14770). This body of material is quite large and covers various subjects, from 'Motion Picture Laboratory Practice, and Characteristics of Eastman Motion Picture Films' (1936, Shelfmark: 778.1258 DSC) to the journal, 'Dental Radiography and Photography'.

Far larger is the body of material which owes a debt to Kodak equipment in its production, including a number of our photobooks, travelogues, newspapers, journals, and so on. Some early examples here include the Countess of Aberdeen's, 'Through Canada with a Kodak' (1893, Shelfmark: 10470.b.35) and Alfred Leader's, 'Through Jamaica with a Kodak' (1907, Shelfmark: 010470.e.5). Both also illustrate how quickly Kodak developed an intimate relationship with the international traveller and the travelogues many of them produced.

'Shrimp Fisher (September 1908)', entry for Eastman Plate Competition by L. Hillier. British Library Kodak Archive A.1997 

The Library's Kodak related collections do not end with published material, however. Two collections of particular note are, 'The Oral History of British Photography' and the 'Kodak Ltd. Archive'. Kodak receives multiple mentions in 'The Oral History of British Photography', often as a reminiscence but also because of the interviewing of people such as Robert Lassam (former curator of the Kodak Gallery). The Kodak Archive held here was donated in 2009 and is the corporate archive of Kodak's UK arm, providing access to photographs and documents which illustrate the development of photography in the UK as well as the company's history.

Kodak's global reach and legacy is borne out by how pervasive materials relating to or facilitated by the company are in the collections of the British Library and libraries across the world. This, therefore, is one of the many ways in which the significance of today can be impressed upon us.

[PJH]

War, Struggle and Equality: the Tuskegee Airmen

War bonds poster featuring an unnamed Tuskegee airman (displayed on Wikipedia's Tuskegee Airmen entry)

On January 10th the Institute for the Study of the Americas hosted a screening of the documentary, 'Double Victory', an account of the Tuskegee Airmen and their exploits in World War Two. These pilots of the 332nd Figther Group and 477th Bomber Group of the U. S. Army Air Corps were the first African American aviators of the U.S. Armed Forces but they faced a struggle against institutionalised racism in order to fly, fight and be treated as equals during and after the war.

'Double Victory' is a documentary account of this struggle, narrated by Cuba Gooding Jr. and produced to be viewed alongside the film 'Red Tails' (both productions are Lucas Film projects). The high point of the evening, however, was the attendence of two Tuskegee Airmen, Le Roy Gillead and Alexander Jefferson. Gillead and Jefferson's recollections added a great deal to the evening, with Jefferson talking about the struggle for African American men to be allowed to fly and his experiences as a German POW and Gillead highlighting the struggle for equality undertaken by officers who did not see front line service.

Both men also talked about their pride at being awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, along with roughly 300 other Tuskegee Airmen. During the award ceremony, President George W. Bush paid tribute to the airmen, saying, "The Tuskegee Airmen helped win a war, and you helped change our nation for the better. Yours is the story of the human spirit, and it ends like all great stories do – with wisdom and lessons and hope for tomorrow." A copy of the act bestowing the medals can be found here and Library holds a number of resources relating to the Tuskegee Airmen, their forces service and the relationship their actions had to the subsequent Civil Rights Movement.

The Library's collection of American newspapers contain a number of insights, with articles such as the Chicago Defender's, '332nd Flies Its 200th Mission Without a Loss' and many accounts of how the Freedman Field Mutiny and other incidents regarding racial equality were reported. There are also published service accounts, Alexander Jefferson's, 'Red Tail Captured, Red Tail Free' (shelfmark: YC.2005.a.5960) is a good example, and various journal articles on the exploits and legacy of the Tuskegee Airmen in Europe and the US.

[JJ and PJH]

A Hankering to Travel: Charles Dickens and North America

Portrait of Charles Dickens from J. Forster's 'The Life of Charles Dickens' (shelfmark: YA.1993.a.5369)

The British Library's Folio Gallery has a new exhibition up, 'A Hankering After Ghosts: Charles Dickens and the Supernatural'. The exhibition has been put on to mark the bicentenary of the birth of Dickens, who was born on the 7th February 1812, and is well worth a look. While I paid the exhibition a visit the other day it reminded me of some of Dickens' writings, which I had been meaning to read for some time, the notes on his travels to North America in 1842.

 'American Notes for General Circulation' is a travelogue resulting from Dickens' travels and experiences in America and Canada, the Library holds a copy at shelfmark, Cup.410.g.25. The account is well worth a read for the author's flair and as an interesting travelogue in its own right. What caught my attention was Dickens' devotion of the final thematic chapter to the topic of slavery in America. Dickens is strongly critical of the practice and goes to great lengths to illustrate the horrors of slavery through the reproduction of adverts regarding run away slaves.

Dickens is withering in his criticism of Republicans who maintain a system at odds with their stated values, denouncing these individuals as thinking they, 'will not tolerate a man above [them]: and of those below, none must approach too near' (p. 41). He also notes there to be a significant proportion of this group who would, 'glady involve America in a war, civil, or foreign, provided that it had for its sole end and object the assertion of their right to perpetuate slavery' (ibid). While the causes of the later civil war are complex such a statement does seem unnervingly prescient.

Even though the Library's 'A Hankering After Ghosts' led me to call up Dickens' 'American Notes' this chapter caught my attention for another reason, the Americas department's collaborative doctoral award on slavery in Canada. The award is currently open to applications and anyone who is interested can find more information on this previous post.

[PJH]

Narrating Slavery and Freedom in Canada

['Off for Canada', an illustration from, Glenelg [pseud.] (1889), Broken Shackles, Toronto: William Briggs]

As with the United States, slavery is part of Canada's heritage. This heritage is complex, including the enslavement of native peoples, participation in the African slave trade and Canada's role as an Underground Railroad safe haven (to provide a simple sketch). As these examples suggest it is also an interconnected heritage, involving the United States, Britain and various Caribbean territories, as well as Canada itself. The British Library's collections, therefore, provide a unique resource for the consideration of this history. Information and accounts are contained in many elements of the collections, with monographs, newspapers, pamphlets, journals and various other materials all providing insight into slavery in Canada and its associated connections with the rest of the Americas.

My motivation in sketching this out is to promote a collaborative studentship being offered by Sheffield University in partnership with the British Library. 'Narratives and Depictions of Slaves and Former Slaves in Canada: 1800 - 1900' is an opportunity to conduct PhD research into the Canadian collections of the British Library, investigating how the experiences of slaves and former slaves in Canada are represented therein. It is also an opportunity to contribute to understandings of the richness of the collections here, drawing out the significance of the works held and illustrating their connections to materials and individuals from other parts of the Americas and the British Empire.

The link in the previous paragraph contains more information on the project, eligibility and the application process. There are also contact details for Dr. Jane Hodson (studentship supervisor at Sheffield University's School of English Literature, Language and Linguistics) and myself should you wish to discuss the project further.

[PJH]

Mulberry Row

 
Monticello, VA , photo M. Shaw

The Soane Museum Study Group arranges a series of talks on architectural topics.  Thursday night saw Danielle Willkens (the Bartlett, UCL) present a paper entitled 'A Case for Ruins and a Cause for Concern: the Digital Mulberry Row Project at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello', a survey of the buildings provided for the enslaved workers at Jefferson's Charlottesville residence, with some natty 3D fly-through reconstructions and some thoughts about what happens when these places, people and activities are commemorated, reconstructed; or, as has more often been the place, erased from history.  In particular, she wondered what visitors take away from reconstructions of such sites, and, if the decision to reconstruct is taken (e.g. if they look spick and span, perhaps it looks like things weren't so bad), what period of habitation should be rebuilt: Monticello went through at least three phases of slave housing, from an a relatively dense and populated village, with a nail factory, to a more limited collection of more aesthetically constructed buildings.  I liked the suggestion that the neglected ruins spoke particularly eloquently of the social status of enslaved black workers, when compared to the attentions lavished on the main house.

All this is now a live issue, as Mulberry Row is the recipient of a NEA grant, and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation is now working on restoring and interpreting the Row, drawing on more than fifty years of archaelogical and historical work.  You can follow the process - and comment on it - via their blog.

All this reminds me of my recent visit to Lancaster, whose connections to the slave trade have only recently been brought to the surface and memorialised.  No reconstruction is perfect, and memorialisation brings with with it all kinds of cultural and aesthetic complexities, but there are also many dangers and potential hurts in forgetting as well.

[MJS]

Interconnected worlds: thinking across the Library's collections

 
“Exterior of the Boiling House, Antigua” from William Clark (1823), Ten Views from the Island of Antigua (Shelfmark: 1786.c.9)

Tuesday 13th October saw various members of British Library staff come together to produce a public display of the Library’s African, Caribbean and South Asian materials. The event sought to mark Black History Month and highlight the cross-connections that exist between the Library’s collection areas. In doing this the event also aimed to assert the interconnectedness of Africa, Britain, the Caribbean and South Asia over a long historical period, with display items covering the early 1600’s until the mid twentieth century.

The Caribbean materials on display articulated how these interconnections were expressed through knowledge transfer, individual biographies, the development of industrial processes and the growth of globalised transport networks. The arrangement of African and South Asian materials around those from the Caribbean provided further details and nuance to the narratives on display, illustrating how cause and effect operated on a global level, in particular as a result of the slave trade. The display of account books from slave traders based in Africa (some of which can be found at Shelfmark: Add ms 43841) and letters detailing the kidnap, sale and enslavement of individuals (an example is John Toogood’s 1720 account, held at: India Office Records/E/1/11 ff. 326-328v) added depth to the displayed illustrations of slavery in operation in the Caribbean, represented in part by William Clark’s idealised depiction above. Further, the display of India Office records regarding the transportation of indentured labour from South Asia to the Caribbean (for example: India Office Records:L/PJ/1/86), one of the responses to the ending of the slave trade, again illustrated how developments in one area could have marked effects on another.

While the event attempted to illustrate through the Library’s collections that the global interconnectedness we perceive as being a modern phenomena is not, in fact, new, it should still remind us of the myriad connections people and places maintain across the globe today. Indeed, this is part of a theme of an event being held at the Library next week, on the 25th October. Entitled "Our Memories of the Uprisings: the 1980's revisited", the event seeks to discuss the unrest of the 1980’s, its causes and contexts, and highlight the continuing significance of these years to multicultural, globalised contemporary Britain. Here too we can perceive how the Library’s collections of interconnected materials, from newspapers, to oral histories, to music and printed books provide opportunities for detailed research into the subject.

[P.J.H.]

Polar resources: 400 years of exploring the final frontiers

 

The voyage of the "Fox" in the Arctic Seas: a narrative of the discovery of the fate of Sir John Franklin and his companions / Francis Leopold McClintock. London: John Murray, 1859. BL: 10460.d.2.
 

Information about the Polar Regions is currently being accumulated in vast quantities by governments and scientific bodies across the globe. This is not a new phenomenon as the history of human interaction with the Arctic and Antarctic is one littered with paper, maps and other notations. The British Library collections are a significant repository of these materials, with holdings relating to the Arctic dating back at least as far as the sixteenth century. In the current geopolitical climate these materials can provide us with insights into how current interactions of government and corporate interests with the Polar Regions may develop.

The North West Passage has long been a subject of fascination to explorers, profiteers and geopolitically minded governments and the history of its exploration by British interests is well documented at the British Library. In sixteenth-century accounts of the search for a passage to the East via the north of the Americas, by the likes of Sebastian Cabot and Martin Frobisher, we see concerns familiar to current interest in the Arctic. Rights of access to profitable trade routes and prospecting for resources are significant concerns to these explorers, set against a background of major geopolitical change as Europe’s power balances shift in the aftermath of Columbus navigating to the Caribbean.

Nineteenth-century collections in the Library bear out a similar tale, although by this point the major actors in the sphere of Arctic exploration and exploitation are the British Navy, Canadian government and Hudson’s Bay Company. The writings of Sir John Barrow are spread across the Library’s collections and his accounts of the significance of the Arctic to the British empire are punctuated with warnings about threats to sovereignty posed by business interests and geopolitical concerns raised by the actions of countries such as Russia. We also begin to clearly see the importance of science as a tool for envisioning, delimiting and enforcing control over the Arctic, as evidenced by the significant role of factually accurate illustrations and detailed cartographic charts in writings from this time.

Historical collections are a significant resource to contemporary researchers interested in today’s Polar geopolitics. Scratching the surface of the Library’s collections reveals a long history where exploration and science are used to assert sovereignty and define borders. It also suggests cyclicality to these events and highlights the significance of wider geopolitical pressures, motivated by periods of change, to the intensification of interest in the Arctic across a broad historical transect. More information on these resources can be found here should you wish to use these collections to supplement your research.

[P.J.H.]

Talking plants

 
Hans Sloane, A Voyage to the islands Madera, Barbados, Nieves, S. Christophers, and Jamaica....., London, 1707-25. Shelfmark: 38.f.4

Team America is very pleased to welcome our first guest blogger - Professor Miles Ogborn, Queen Mary, UOL: 

My current research seeks to understand the ways in which knowledge of the natural history of the Caribbean islands, especially Jamaica, was produced and communicated in the period between the late seventeenth century and the early nineteenth century. During that period, it was the plant life of those islands that was the prime focus for natural philosophers, many of whom were doctors interested in the medical uses of plants. There was also a concern to search for agricultural products that could play a profitable part in Britain’s imperial economy.

What I am interested in is the range of forms of communication of botanical knowledge. This involved speech, correspondence, collections of specimens (herbaria), and printed matter from newspaper articles to scholarly papers and elaborate volumes of botanical engravings. I want to know who communicated with whom about the plants of Jamaica and how they did so, thinking about both local discussions of plants and those which spanned the Atlantic world. I ask what the protocols were for these forms of communication? Who could be part of the ‘conversation’? And who the audiences were that they addressed. There are various elements to this: the role of polite sociability in the work of men of science in the Atlantic world; the particular forms of knowledge that were communicated between doctors and patients; attempts to make the knowledge of plants ‘public’, via both print and botanical gardens (and the intersection of the two in printed catalogues of the gardens’ collections); and the cross-cultural communication of botanical knowledge between Europeans and enslaved and indigenous people. Eighteenth-century Jamaica was a slave society based on deadly forms of agricultural labour on land which had been appropriated from its earlier inhabitants. It was a society of great brutality. Yet there was also an acknowledgement, albeit a circumscribed one, that enslaved Africans and Amerindians had knowledge of the botanical riches of the islands.

In doing the research it has been vital to be able to work across the range of material held in the Caribbean collections in the British Library. The communication of botanical knowledge depended upon images as well as many sorts of text. It has been crucial to the research to be able to consult, for example, the letters held in the manuscripts collections from Henry Barham (a Jamaican doctor) to Hans Sloane (then returned from Jamaica to London) as well as reading their published accounts of the natural history of the island. It has also been necessary to work between the manuscript correspondence of Thomas Dancer (the superintendent of Jamaica’s botanical garden) with Edward Long (a historian of the island who dealt in both ‘civil’ and ‘natural’ history) about the difficulties of getting public support for the island’s botanical garden, and the published garden catalogues and reports of speeches in newspapers in which Dancer celebrated the public spirit of this venture. It is only with such a range of material ready to hand that the range of forms of communication can become apparent, along with moments in which other voices are partially heard. For example, along with celebrating the contributions by European planters and plant collectors to the botanical gardens, in 1792 Dancer listed the Akee tree (a crucial part of Jamaica’s national dish of Akee and saltfish) as being an ‘African Fruit, introduced by Negroes in some of Mr. Hibbert’s ships.’ There is here a sense, albeit anonymous, of the African contribution to Jamaican botany, and to the talk about plants, their names and their uses.

  

Professor Miles Ogborn, School of Geography, Queen Mary, University of London

London Group of Historical Geographers

Drilling deeper: resources on oil in the Canadian collections

 

“Filling Oil Drums at Dingman’s Well,” Alberta. By Lane and Mitchell, 1914.

The history and expansion of Canada is one that frequently intertwines with oil resources and their exploitation. This is perhaps best illustrated by the significance placed on the search for coal and oil by Sir William Logan’s Geological Survey of Canada. The Survey was significant in orientating Confederate Canada and locating many of the minerals on which the economy came to depend.

The Geological Survey also analysed the geology of the Athabasca Oil Sands that are the subject of significant global attention today and developed the initial water-based method for separating the oil from sand. It is worth stating therefore that the oil sands have long been part of Canada’s history and heritage; they are well documented, much researched and have been in use since the nineteenth century (and for centuries prior by surrounding First Nations groups). As a result this history can be excavated in the collections of the British Library, throwing light on both sides of the current debate about the continuing use of the oil sands.

The reports of the Geological Survey of Canada from the nineteenth century provide a good starting point - for example, Joseph B. Tyrrell’s Report on a part of Northern Alberta and portions of adjacent districts of Assiniboia and Saskatchewan..[Shelfmark: C. S. E. 16, 1987; also various Geological Survey records, as well as other government Canadiana, are held at Mic.F.232]. Moving into the twentieth century there are various official publications regarding the sands, for instance the National Energy Board’s Canada’s Oil Sands: Opportunities and Challenges to 2015, Shelfmark: YD.2006.b.1987, 2004] and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research The Future of Heavy Crude Oils and Tar Sands: 1st International Conference [Shelfmark: 4060.580000 1981 DSC].

The content of the collections also bears out the significance of twenty first century debates regarding the contemporary use of the oil fields. There are various materials and perspectives, such as Chatsko’s Developing Alberta’s Oil Sands: from Karl Clark to Kyoto [Shelfmark: YC.2006.a.15533, 2004] or Nikiforuk’s Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent [Shelfmark: YD.2009.a.1687, 2008]. There are also various illustrative perspectives collected, such as Dubois et al’s comix reportage work Extraction! [Shelfmark: YD.2008.a.3230, 2007]. In short, whatever your starting hypothesis regarding the oil sands the Library’s collections should provide plenty of scope to furnish discussion.

[P.J.H.]

The Future of the Polar regions

 

Mounted Police Barracks, Churchill (Geraldine Moodie, 1907): Building Arctic Canada

Recently the British Library was host to a panel discussion on ‘The Future of Antarctica.' Chaired by Dr Gabrielle Walker, with Professor Klaus Dodds, Robert Culshaw and Sara Wheeler contributing, the event focused on what the 21st century might hold for Antarctica.

The panellists discussed the significance of the Antarctic as a wilderness, site of science and exemplar of international co-operation. They also highlighted the potential threats facing the continent, from global warming to resource exploitation and tourism, as well as the challenge of maintaining international co-operation, and the high standard of science done there in the 50 years since the Antarctic Treaty of 1959.

My thoughts were inevitably turned to how the Arctic can provide clues as to how things may turn out in Antarctica, since it has been explored and used by humans for much longer. Accounts such as William Baffin's journal of a search for the North West Passage, which is to be found, along with many other accounts, in Purchas' Pilgrimes (1625, Shelfmark 679.h.13), or John Barrow's Chronological History of Voyages into the Arctic Regions (1818, shelfmark 303.i.4) illustrate just how much probing has been done of the Arctic in the last 400 years.

One need only look at how the massive 20th-century developments in geo-mapping and submarine technologies have affected access to the Arctic to envisage how further advances could begin to affect a Pole considered more inaccessible. The increasing exploitation of the Arctic (not to mention flag planting), facilitated by environmental and technological change, is a persistent reminder of how even the most remote of places are inexorably drawn under human influence.

With this in mind, historical collections on the Arctic, such as those at the British Library, provide insight and even warning about how dramatically humans can impact on these most inhuman of environments. Over the coming months, the Library will host ESRC-supported discussions of the 'New Geopolitics of the Polar Regions'  and this interaction of thinkers and relevant historical materials will continue to be invaluable.   

[P.J.H.]

Little Red Book

Charlottesville, VA, can boast one of the lowest ratios of restaurants per head in the USA; the same must surely be true of the number of bookstores.  Despite Virgin Atlantic lowering the baggage weight limit, several titles made their way back across the Atlantic after a recent trip.  The haul included this slim volume, Joesphine Cleary Winsatt, Recollections (1926), which I picked up at Blue Whale Books and have added to the collections:

OCLC lists twelve copies, none of which are in the UK (or even Europe).  It is a memoir of Wimsatt's 'career as a war wanderer' during the Civil War (25), written up during her time in China (it was printed by North China Star Press, Tientsin).  As a young girl of five, she 'thoroughly enjoyed' the adventures caused by her flight from Washington, D.C. (her family were Confederate sympathisers - they had a pet Mexican monkey that they named 'Abe'), but concluded that 'as I look back at those far off times I think that the War of the Rebellion, like all other wars, was unnecessary, selfish, and cruel' (11).  The volume captures some of the Southern views of the 'Yankees', and offers historians all sorts of glimpses of the past: details of the nursing of the wounded,  a vignette of a breakfast with General Lee, an account of the diphtheria outbreak in Charlottesville, and stories of entertainments ('Starvation Parties') near the University of Virginia 'which was not in operation during the war, as all the students who were old enough to carry arms had become soldiers.' 

Wimsatt also took part in a play, representing one of the Southern States (she was Maryland),but 'as I reached the Goddess [of Liberty], Abe Lincoln, acted by Bob Maupin, one of the large boys, stepped forward and threw a chain over my shoulders, to indicate I was captured by the Union.  I buried my face in my hands and burst into tears, a bit of acting that was not in the program, but which was highly applauded by the audience'. (24)  She concludes her memoir: 'Although I am an old woman now, I am still at heart, I think, a Little Rebel.'

[M.S.]

Photo-shoots

It struck me this morning that I didn't manage to fit in a second visit to our Points of View exhibition, which closed last Sunday. I really enjoyed my only visit but now will have to make do with visiting its website or pouring over the exhibition catalogue.

However, should you be in a photographic frame of mind at the moment, I would suggest you go along to the Portal of Texas History. One of the more recent additions to this impressive online archive of Texan history is a collection of over 400 photographs of places, events and evidence relating to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on 22nd November 1963, which are to be found in the Dallas Police Department archive. Included are a number of crime scene photos showing various views from and inside the Texas School Book Depository – such as the view from the window which overlooked Kennedy’s motorcade route, and a lonely bottle of Dr Pepper.

The Dallas PD JFK archive also includes a selection of Lee Harvey Oswald’s personal possessions which were collected as evidence from his home, e.g. letters, pages from his photograph albums, the famous photos of Oswald posing with a rifle, and his copy of George Orwell’s 1984 (the 1962 New American Library Signet Classics edition). You will also find mug shots and the distinctive finger print card of Jack Ruby (he lacked the top half of his left index finger), who, of course, shot Oswald.

This photographic archive allows us to explore and travel through the investigation in the weeks following the Kennedy assassination, examining all the evidence compiled by the DPD. The Portal of Texas history is a good example of how State material can be made available to the wider research community – great for historians and conspiracy theorists alike.

[J.J.]

Revolt against the English

Yesterday, I did a short 'show and tell' for a visitor from Rhode Island.  This included some early Providence printing, Thomas Jefferson's inscribed copy of Notes on Virginia (which was also owned by Henry Stevens, the nineteenth century book dealer and gunpowder merchant, who bought for both the British Museum and John Carter Brown), and a collection of colonial female printers to tie in with a recent acquisition of a letterpress facsimile of the Declaration of Independence.

We also looked at some of the large collection of pamphlets dating from the American Revolution, many of which were printed in several editions - in New York, Pennsylvania, Boston, but also by sympathetic printers in Britain, such as J. Almon in London, and also in Edinburgh.

One of these particularly caught our eye.  To some extent, it may be counted as an official publication - Abstract of the Resolutions of the General Congress Assembled at Philadelphia (New York, reprinted Edinburgh 1775) [8176.a.38]. It begins thus

THE CONGRESS RESOLVES to acknowledge the King,

But not to obey him in any one thing...

We sometimes wish all government documents were as iambic and rhyming.  This, however, originated in the New York Gazette, and is a tory account of the Continental Congress in verse - or 'Dogrel Metre, for the help of weak memories' (p. 1). 

[M.S.]