Category Archives: Cultural Studies

Photographic material acquired

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Summer 2011 brought our biggest accession of the year and fulfills a need that was identified before my arrival on campus. Nearly all photographic negatives, contact sheets and slides dating from the 1960s to 1990s that were formerly stored in the basement of Holmes Hall have been transferred for processing to the archives. Once processing is complete, we estimate the collection will occupy 130 linear feet.

This collection was inadequately protected both because of the physical environment of the basement and at the item level: negatives were in legal-sized envelopes and contact sheets were in shoe boxes. We are spreading the costs over a couple of budget cycles but our goal is to re-house the entire collection and make the index publicly available.

Also included in this photo transfer were some of the newer slides stored within the campus photographer’s office in good-quality sleeves, so material from the mid-1990s only needed a stable physical space.

It should be noted that other photographic material remains in various places in Holmes Hall, but this large transfer is a great start to ensuring that the collection is protected for the future. Additionally, research requests can be handled by archives staff, instead of taking up our photographer’s already well-used time!

More 19th Century student works

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Awhile back the complete run of Argus issues, 1894-present, was posted online. Since then we have added ten other periodicals to the same website. With publication dates beginning in 1870, these student and alumni news publications are now available for viewing through keyword searches or browsing by year or decade.

Spoof issues sit side-by-side with works that were published by and for Greeks and Independents; news accounts and reports from other schools are present with literary efforts of students; competing orations are printed much as prized athletic competitions are emphasized about today.

News tidbits from alumni as well as observations on campus society and politics are included, and ads for local businesses show types of preoccupations outside students’ academic work.

Browse or search for topics and names from IWU’s history. This collection offers countless glimpses of life at IWU spanning 140 years!

Check out the Museum class exhibits!

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Four groups of students prepared exhibits for ANTH 270 this semester. This project required them to become familiar with artifacts on a topic, research it using primary and secondary sources, and create a visually appealing and informative display.

One of the groups used ethnographic material collected by Dr. Rebecca Gearhart. Their exhibit, titled Rhythms of the East African Coast is located in a display case by the Anthropology department on the second floor of CLA.

The remaining three groups used materials from the University Archives. The exhibit titles and locations are as follows:

The Long Lost Fame of the IWU College of Law, 1st Floor, John Wesley Powell Rotunda

     –photographs and documents related to the Bloomington law School and IWU College of Law.

Turbulent Titans: Student Issues from 1970-1971, 1st Floor, across from Circulation

     –an analysis of issues tackled by the student publication “Rhetoric and Propaganda.”

The Center of the University: Its Rise and Its Demise, 3rd Floor, outside Thorpe Center

     –photographs, an architectural plan and documents surrounding the history of Old Main/Hedding Hall/Duration Hall.

Great job, ANTH 270!

Selected mysteries, part one

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Special Collections houses a number of mysteries some enterprising researcher may be able to mine for treasures. Here are a few items and what little information we have about them:

Five photo albums from the 19th Century, some with people identifed, some not, and only one with clues about the people’s relationship to IWU.

Barry Lennon Farm Records, 1842-52

Correspondence and photos from World War I soldiers

Correspondence from several World War II servicemen to Nell (Carmichael) Livingston

Notes, reports and ephemera of Henry Filip, physicist at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in the 1970s

A journal with some ledger-type of entries (1842-45) but mostly a beautiful, albeit dense handwriting. The name that appears the most is Thomas Storm Hubbard. Interestingly, on one page where he writes his names several times there also appears, in large letters, the word “Fearlessness.”

Conduct of Life

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The collection we call “Conduct of Life” holds over 200 books from secular and religious perspectives dating from 1560. The topics include moral, social and practical considerations aimed at youth of both sexes and women. French, Latin and English seem to the the languages represented in this collection, but you can browse the entire list from our online catalog by following the directions on this guide.

Note: A few of the titles in the catalog are also held in the Main Stacks.

Religion collections

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As can be expected, given IWU’s origins, special collections holds an array of books related to Methodist Church governance, history and liturgy. Sermons and insights into the religious and philosophical leanings of IWU presidents, many of whom were also Methodist ministers, are available in the archives. Samplings of other religions represented in special collections are below.

Additionally, we hold one manuscript collection of former Bloomington Wesley Methodist Church minister and mystery writer Charles Merrill Smith. Our collection holds photographs, book manuscripts, publicity material, correspondence and more. Smith was also an IWU Board of Trustee’s member from 1958-1968.

A selection of more traditional religious texts in the collection follows. Many are in languages students on campus are studying, and the varying publication dates offer opportunities for exposure to different type-faces. These books could be great for developing reading skills in languages over time!

[al-Qurơān]. Manuscript of undetermined date, written in Naskh letters within gold leave border and occasional floral illumination. (Call no.: BP100 1000z)

Lombardica hystoria. An incomplete incunable also known as Legenda aurea regarding the lives of saints. (Call no. BX4654 .J3 1496)

The life of Mahomet : together with The Alcoran at large / translated out of Arabick into French, by the Sieur De Ryer, Lord of Malezair, and Resident for the French King at Alexandria : now faithfully English’d. (Call no.: BP75 .L57 1718)

Directorio para informaciones de los pretendientes de el santo habito de N. seraphico P.S. Francisco. (Call no: F1381 .C37 1737)

Evangelische Deutsche Original-Bibel : das ist, die gantze heilige Schrift. Polyglot Bible in German fractur, Hebrew and Greek. (Call no.: BS701 1740)

Biblia Hebraica. (BS715 1753)

Vollständiges marburger Gesang-Buch. (Call no: BV410 .V65 1774)

The whole book of Psalms collected into English metre. “This Sternhold and Hopkins version of the psalter was given a first class treatment, with its green morocco binding with gilt decoration, marbled endpapers, gilt edges, and, most important, a fore-edge painting. Such paintings were expensive additions to books printed between the 1780s and the 1830s. A watercolor, applied to the edges of the pages as they were fanned, was evident only when the book was open. This scene shows an English cathedral.” (Call no.: BX5145 .S74 1787)

Codex sinaiticus petropolitanus. Two facsimile volumes of the Greek New Testamaent held at the Imperial Library of St. Petersburg. (Call nos.: BS64 .S32 1911 and BS64 .S3 1922)

Codex juris Canonici (Call no.: BX1935 .C31917)

And some texts mentioned in the last blog post. Click on the images for a larger picture and available descriptions:

1220 Bible created in England

1220 Bible created in England

  

Leaf from a two-column Medieval manuscript Bible. IWU has 10 matted Medieval manuscript leaves
pali mss Untitled Buddhist manuscript in Pali

This is a Burmese text with gilded edges, decorated front cover; written in ink on hand-made paper; accordion folded. The physical description is [247] p. ; 1072 cm., folded to 16 x 39 cm. And that’s everything we know about it!

Buddhist manuscript of unknown date

Buddhist manuscript

Powell and the American West

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Special Collections has four collections of material for researchers interested in John Wesley Powell and the western U.S. 

  • a manuscript collection of correspondence and articles written by researchers who have contacted IWU for information on Powell over the years,
  •  a collection of books by and about Powell and the American West,
  • a wide range of material collected by Marcia Thomas during two years of research for the award-winning volume John Wesley Powell: An Annotated Bibliography, and
  • a web-based collection of images providing access to the John Wesley Powell Collection of Pueblo Pottery.  The physical collection is located on the first floor of the library.

Anyone interested in using these collections is welcome to contact me or visit the archives. 

Ecology Action Center Collection

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In October 2006, we opened a new collection for primary source materials: The Ecology Action Center Collection of organizational records.  The group began as one of the first not-for-profit recycling centers in Illinois in 1971.  Today, it continues to work with the three local governments (McLean County, Town of Normal, and City of Bloomington) to increase recycling and environmental awareness for business and community members.