In celebration of Archives Month 2008, the Society of American Archivists Student Chapter at the University of Wisconsin-Madison is featuring a Wisconsin archival repository each day in October. The Lawrence Archives was the featured repository on Monday, October 20.
Happy Birthday, Miss Smith!
October 15 is the birthdate of Zelia Anne Smith, Lawrence’s first full-time librarian. Miss Smith was born in Waupaca in 1859 and graduated from Lawrence in 1882. While at Lawrence, she was president of the Lawrean literary society, senior class poetess and vice president, as well as a student assistant in the library. After graduation, Zelia taught private school in Appleton and worked as library assistant at Lawrence. In September 1883, Miss Smith became chief librarian, the first to hold the position, in which role she served until she died suddenly in May 1924.
During the nearly 42 years Miss Smith was librarian, the library moved from its home in Main Hall to the new Carnegie Library and increased in size from fewer than 10,000 volumes to almost 45,000. She was known by students for her ability to “squelch” noise in the library merely by tapping her pencil. In addition to being the sole library employee for many years, Miss Smith served as Alumni Secretary. She was held in such high regard by the alumni that they took up collections to buy her a new desk and to send her on a vacation to Europe.
At an alumni event, Dr. James Arneil, ’90, toasted Miss Smith saying, “The one enduring and endearing bond between the old university and the new college is our beloved librarian, Zelia Anne Smith. God bless her! May she live to be a hundred! She is an institution all by herself, and has made everyone of us members of her faculty, her devoted constituency.”
A portrait of Miss Smith hangs in the University Librarian’s office.
Digital Collection Featured on OCLC Web Site
One of the Llibrary’s digital image collections, “Art of the Poster,” has been selected as one of four featured “Collection of Collections” for October by CONTENTdm. Lawrence’s collection includes more than 160 digital images of historic posters dating from 1890 to 1918. Designed by artists well-known for the work in other media, these posters helped bridge the gap between “high art” and popular visual culture.
Welcome Milwaukee-Downer Alumnae!
Welcome to the Milwaukee-Downer Reunion and to the Mudd library and University Archives! Feel free to visit the reference desk or University Archives with any questions you may have. And take a look at the Milwaukee-Downer College digital collection, the Elizabeth Richardson digital collection, and oral history transcripts from Milwaukee-Downer Reunion 2006.
Special guests this weekend include Charles Richardson, brother of the late Elizabeth Richardson, and James Madison, author of the biography on Elizabeth Richardson, Slinging Doughnuts for the Boys: An American Woman in World War II.
Elizabeth Richardson Exhibit
A Look at the Life of Elizabeth Ann ‘Liz’ Richardson, 1918-1945
This exhibit features photographs, letters, scrapbooks, and sketch books of Elizabeth Richardson, a 1940 graduate of Milwaukee-Downer College who served in the American Red Cross as a Clubmobile woman from 1944 until her death in July 1945 at the age of 27. Many of the materials in the exhibit were donated to the Lawrence University Archives by Elizabeth’s brother, Charles Richardson, in May 2008.
The exhibit is done in honor of the Milwaukee-Downer College Reunion that will take place October 3-5. Charles Richardson will be attending, as will James Madison, author of the 2007 biography on Elizabeth, Slinging Doughnuts for the Boys: Am American Woman in World War II.
The Toes Is the Toes
In 1991, John Phillips (presumably not THE John Phillips who, a hundred thousand years ago, along with his wife Michelle teamed up with Cass Elliot and Denny Doherty) suggested in The New England Journal of Medicine that the toes be named. In his letter (1991, vol. 324, no. 7, p. 497) he proposed that the pedal digits be called
- porcellus fori
- porcellus domi
- porcellus carnivorus
- porcellus non voratus
- porcellus plorans domum
Anyone who had Sister Monica for Latin in high school will immediately recognize the root porcus or pig, and should be able to translate:
Attend the Convo!
Just a reminder that the first convocation of the year is on Thursday, September 25 at 11:10am in the Chapel. The Library will be closed for this and all convos during the academic year. See you in the Chapel!
Welcome Ye New Deck-Swabbers!
If it’s between 1 and 4 bells on Friday, September 19, all hands had better be in the Aye-brary, for it’s the Aye-brary Open House. Any snaggle-toothed son of a sea dog missin’ this event will be meetin’ up with Davy Jones forthrightly. And avail yerselves of the Aye-brary’s “New Swabbie” page if ye know what’s good fer ya.
Arrr!
Constitution Day!
Members of the Constitutional Convention signed the United States Constitution on September 17, 1787 in Philadelphia.
Public Law 108-447, signed into law on December 8, 2004, mandates all educational institutions receiving federal funding to do something educational about the U.S. Constitution on September 17 each year. This year’s Mudd Library exhibit features a variety of library materials related to the Constitution. Check it out in one of the first floor exhibit cases.
Oral histories from Reunion Weekend 2008 are now online!
The audio files and transcripts of oral histories done with alumni during Reunion Weekend 2008 are now online. Two interviews done before and after the weekend are also included. Take a look at them here.