Category: Special Collections

100-year old issues of The Lamron, now available at Milne Library!

Old news is new news … in the College Archives collection in Milne Library! Two 100-year-old issues of the Lamron have found their way back to campus, thanks to a thoughtful donor and the good judgement of the folks at the Livingston County Historical Society. The near-pristine issues, from the estate of 1920 Geneseo Normal School alumna Harriet Fugle, had been among a box of locally historical items given to the LCSH last spring. The folks at LCHS in turn offered the Lamrons to Milne for the College Archives collection, deeming it a more fitting “forever home” for them – and we agreed!

The Lamron as most of us know it dates back to 1922, when the editors introduced vol. 1, no. 1 “in its new dress” (p. 4). Beginning in 1917, however, the Lamron was published in varying formats, seemingly at the whim of each year’s editors. Milne owns scattered issues from that earlier period – vol. 1, nos. 1-3 (1917-18) and vol. 3, nos. 1-2 (1919-20). The newly-donated issues – vol. 2, nos. 1-2 (Jan. 1919 and Feb. 1919) – will nicely fill a gap in this exceedingly rare “old series.” Click the links below to see/read both.

100 Year Old Issues of The Lamron

 

The Lamron “new series” is available online at New York State Historic Newspapers for the years 1922 through May 1974 (with a few scattered issues missing), and we are beginning the process of making 1975 – current issues accessible online as well. Of course, the complete 1922 through May 2019 run is available in print in the College Archives collection on Milne’s lower level. As we library types like to say: check it out!

 

Researching Local or College History? Make an appointment or drop in!

Milne offers a handy Appointment Calendar: https://www.geneseo.edu/library/special-collections-milne-library

as well as drop-in hours:

  • Mondays: 1-4pm
  • Thursdays: 1-4pm

For in-depth research questions, including anything involving the Wadsworth Family Papers or the Carl Schmidt Collection in Historic Architecture, appointments are required.   Milne Special Collections has you covered!

Special Collections Appointment Calendar:

Dr. Walter Harding to be Subject of Exhibit

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Dr. Walter Harding (1917-1996)

Library Intern Demi Monachino and Milne Library’s Special Collections Librarian, Liz Argentieri, are currently hard at work creating an exhibit dedicated to one of the college’s most distinguished and influential professors, Dr. Walter Harding, who was on the Geneseo faculty from 1956 to 1983. Dr. Harding was one of the world’s leading Thoreau scholars, and we find ourselves up to our elbows in the many essays, articles, and tributes he wrote centering on Henry David Thoreau (an original Transcendentalist and the author of Walden). Among all of these scholarly documents on Thoreau, however, we are also finding some truly amazing information on Dr. Harding himself.

This man, who accomplished so much in a lifetime and amassed one of the world’s largest collection of Thoreauviana, was a large influence on not just the Geneseo community, but the world. It is somewhat hard to believe that a professor from our small college town in western New York was sent to Japan by the State Department to teach Thoreau there, and received letters from the likes of President Jimmy Carter, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Albert Einstein, just to name a few. For us, Dr. Harding is truly starting to come alive once again through these testimonials and remnants of his legacy, found in our own Milne Library and in the Thoreau Society’s Walter Harding Collection at Walden Woods, where we’ll be visiting later this spring.

Walter Harding wrote the definitive biography of Thoreau

Walter Harding wrote the definitive biography of Henry David Thoreau

Image courtesy of the Thoreau Society

Image courtesy of the Thoreau Society

The goal of the exhibit, which will be on display in Milne during the weeks surrounding the annual Walter Harding Lecture this fall, is to share with current Geneseo students and faculty the kind of awe and pride Dr. Harding’s life and work has inspired in us. We want to reintroduce to the community this remarkable man and scholar that many have never had the pleasure to meet (and some may have never heard of), and to open their eyes to a man who, despite having such a large global impact, always remained humble. In this presentation of Dr. Harding’s knowledge, wit, and accomplishment, we only hope that we do justice to his legacy.

~ Article written by Demi Monachino

Local Resources: Gay Alliance of Genesee Valley

GAGV

Photo of the GAGV’s LGBTQ Resource Center’s new library.

If you are new to Western New York, you might not be privy to the city’s extensive history in the LGBTQ movement that formed what is known today as the Gay Alliance of Genesee Valley (GAGV). The GAGV has been monumental in making Rochester a safer place to live for those who do not fall into a binary with regard to sexuality or gender expression.

You may have witnessed the impact of the GAGV right here on-campus: the rainbow signs hanging by many faculty and staff’s offices indicate they have received SafeZone Training. This training serves as an educational tool to educate supportive faculty, staff, and students on LGBTQ terminology, issues, and questions.

Recently, the GAGV has opened the doors of its new LGBTQ Resource Center at 100 College Avenue in Rochester. This resource center serves an educational and safe space for LGBTQ individuals as well as their allies. The center features a library, archives, and hosts weekly social events.

  • The library contains over 10,000 fiction and nonfiction books, periodicals, and DVDs, which are all available for you to borrow. You can browse the center’s collection online via LibraryThing.
  • The archives have plenty of historical material that help document the progression of the LGBTQ movement in Rochester, including The Empty Closet, the original publication used to advance the rights of so many individuals in Western New York.
  • The resource centers hours are:
    Monday-Friday 9:00am-5:00 pm &
    Wednesdays, 6:00-8:00 pm.
    Everyone is welcome!
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The volunteer staff of the GAGV Library & Archives.

If you cannot make it all the way up to Rochester, no worries! Milne Library and SUNY Geneseo have many available LGBTQ resources. You can find many books on LGBTQ topics in Milne’s collection as well as specialized LGBTQ research databases.  Aiden Cropsey, Coordinator of LGBTQ Programs and Services, along with the student-led Pride Alliance, host several events throughout the year, and even have their own floating book collection. You can also like and follow them on Facebook!

All photos and images used with permission from the Gay Alliance of Genesee Valley.

~ written by Brandon West

Government Documents Are Moving Back to Milne

GDocsCollectionThis summer, the library is moving our government documents back to Milne in preparation for building renovations in Fraser. The loss of the space in Fraser gave us opportunity to work with faculty across several disciplines in a re-evaluation of this collection. “We know that there just isn’t enough space to bring everything back to Milne. However, most of the material in this collection is available online. In fact, over 95% of materials currently published by the Government Printing Office are freely available in full-text online,” said Justina Elmore, Coordinator of the Government Documents Collection. “We spent last semester working with faculty to determine what and how much of this collection we could, and have room to, retain.”

Now that the size of the collection has been reduced to just the government documents that our patrons actually use, the library has begun the process of moving them back to Milne. Additionally, Milne Library will continue to offer quick delivery via IDS for any deselected items that are not yet online, should the need arise. Luckily, there are two Federal Depository libraries in the area from which to draw.

Bringing these materials back to Milne will make finding and using government documents easier. Most of the material will become part of the general collection, allowing us to reduce the number of places a researcher must look in order to find materials on a particular topic.

“A Camera in 1888” Exhibit Opening Tuesday, Nov. 4, 6-7 p.m. in Milne Library

Please join us at the opening of an exhibit featuring the remarkable, often beautiful and historically important photographs of Martha Blow Wadsworth (1864-1934) from Milne Library’s Special Collections.  The event will take place in Milne Library on Tuesday, Nov. 4, from 6-7 p.m., and light refreshments will be served.

camera1888“A Camera in 1888: Martha Blow Wadsworth, Chronicler of American Moments” highlights photographs taken during her travels to Alaska with an Army surveying party, to Panama while the canal was being built, and to the American west and southwest (again with an Army surveying party ) — all in the early 20th-century. Through the talented eye of one local amateur, the exhibit illustrates what the consumer camera, introduced in 1888 by Kodak, made possible. It will be on view through December in the lobby of Milne Library.

Ms. Wadsworth was a native of St. Louis who lived  in Avon, N.Y. with her husband, Herbert Wadsworth (of the prominent Geneseo family).  An avid horsewoman and amateur photographer, she has been described as vivacious, energetic, and adventurous. Thirty-three of her albums, as well as hundreds of glass slides, from which the photographs have been selected were donated to Milne Library in 1976 by nephew-in-law Michael Moukhanoff and are housed with the larger Wadsworth Family Papers collection.

“A Camera in 1888” was curated by Special Collections Librarian Liz Argentieri and Regina Carra ’15, with assistance from Jack Scott ’06. It is part of the larger campus-wide program, 1888 in America: William Trost Richards’ Seascape Contextualized, which opened Oct. 24 and runs through the end of the semester.

Historical Cookery Now Available

Reprints.Cook

Image credit: Warner’s Safe Cook Book

As part of the Genesee Valley Historical Reprint Series, Milne Library is pleased to share the release of 8 reprinted cookbooks originally published between 1817 and 1921. This collection may not be the best resource for everyday cooking in the modern kitchen, but if you want to know how to cook chicken soup (starting with choosing the unlucky bird!) and other little-known culinary tricks, these are the books for you.

Old cookbooks preserve otherwise lost culinary and household knowledge. Many of these reprinted books, which are largely put together by the members of institutions and societies local to the Geneseo area, include recipes and advice for removing stains, concocting cleaning agents, and creating curatives that many people may be glad to rediscover. Warner’s Safe Cook Book has a robust section of miscellanea which ranges from laundry (“To Clean Clothing,” “To Keep Furs,” and “Old Fruit Stains”), to first aid (“For Severe Sprains”), to smoothing irons and putting together a bouquet of herbs. The Genesee County Cook Book offers “Substituting for Wheat in Any Recipe,” and The Genesee Valley Cook Book contains a recipe for “Good Paste,” as well as for various lotions and creams.

Also illuminating to read are game recipes that used to be quite common but are now almost never seen, calling for creatures such as turtles, blackbirds, and squirrels. One might find it interesting to know that the old nursery rhyme “Sing a Song of Sixpence” speaks truth in the line “Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie,” for that is how many birds are needed in a Blackbird Pie!

More timeless, and contained in each of the eight cookbooks, are sections on jams, pickling, and preserving, which may be useful to cooks interested in canning or gardners with excess crops.

The cookbooks in the Genesee Valley Historical Collection, and in the Genesee Valley Historical Reprint Series, remind us of what life must have been like for women and their families during this time period, and how important and fortunate it was that they shared their wisdom in book form, when this wisdom otherwise was contained within families and communities and mainly passed on orally. My own reliance on the internet for simple cooking basics, or to learn something new, reminds me how lucky we are to have (often) free and easy access to this vast world of cultural and academic knowledge.

The books in the Genesee Valley Historical Reprint Series are available free online, through our website at go.geneseo.edu/omp.  The titles are also available for purchase through Amazon.com (with proceeds supporting Milne Library’s Special Collections), and the originals are available for the community to browse and check out at Milne Library.

~ written by Allison Brown

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