archivistkira Civil War, Feature Items

The Words of a Massachusetts Ambulance Driver

Sometimes figuring out a subject for the blog is surprisingly challenging. I like to look at what I’ve done lately, but a lot of that amounts to committee work, organizing incoming materials, and cleaning up data for the catalog and archival management software. And the end of the semester/year is my usual “catch up” time to dig through the piles in my office, problem solve, and return to some on-going projects. Interesting for me, but not “blog” interesting, to be sure–trust me! The most recent collection I processed is the topic of a relatively recent post on “The Sherwood Anderson Odyssey” (if you’re interested in that topic, the finding aid is availableonline), so there’s no need to re-hash that subject just yet. After a bit of digging through the memory banks, I thought it might be fun to revisit a manuscript collection we acquired in three parts back in 2011: the William Leonard Papers, 1864-1865 (Ms2011-106).

ms2011-106_leonard_diary_tp
Inside cover of Leonard’s 1864-1865 diary

William Leonard was born about 1843 in Massachusetts, as were his two sisters, Leonora and Roselia. In his letters, he often mentions Leonora, who he calls “Nora.”He was living with his family in Great Barrington when he was drafted into service in July 1863, supposedly for a three-year term with Company F, 16th Regiment, Massachusetts Infantry. The following year, however, the 16th Regiment mustered out and along with the remaining veterans, Leonard was transferred to the11th Regiment, Massachusetts Infantry.

ms2011-106_leonard_letter_march151865
Page from Leonard’s March 15, 1865 letter to his mother, in which he writes, “You must keep up good courage + not get the blues for we are going to whip them out this Summer. we have got a good man to steer the machine, that fellow they call U. S. Grant. [Ulysses S. Grant] Sheridan [Philip Henry Sheridan] & Sherman [William Tecumseh Sherman] are giveing them fits. I have seen Grant [Ulysses S. Grant] & Mede [George Meade] a number of times this summer I had a great deal rather see you + Pa. I dont want to see Nora because she wanted me to go Soldiering”
The collection includes the 1864-1865 diary of Leonard, along with 35 letters written to his both is parents or specifically to his mother during the same time. His letters indicate that by August 1864 and through Lee’s surrender in April 1865, he served as an ambulance driver, shuttling the wounded from battlefield to hospital, primarily around the Petersburg area.

ms2011-106_leonard_letter_june151864
The earliest of Leonard’s letters in the collection, dated June 15, 1864. He writes about, among other things, the lack of food, stating, “most of the boys are out of rations again but we are going to draw this morning. I have a few hard tack + Coffe + Sugar yet. they had ought to give us rations for the nights to for they keep us up so much.”

While waiting to muster out in 1865, he was stationed around Washington, DC, where he continued to serve in a driver capacity, often civilians in and around the city. He continually reassures his mother not to worry about it and passes along war news, though he had a distinct lack of interest in the soldier’s life, writing, “we have got a good man to steer the machine, that fellow they call U. S. Grant. Sheridan & Sherman are giving them fits. I have seen Grant & Mede a number of times this summer I had a great deal rather see you + Pa. I dont want to see Nora because she wanted me to go soldiering”

ms2011-106_leonard_diary_apr251865
Pages from Leonard’s 1864-1865 diary, noting “Apr 25 Moving Camp and Washing Ambulances. Fireing a cannon every half hour all day. 13 guns this morning + 32 at night for the death of abram Lincoln President of the U.S. who was shot by a man by the name of Booth”

In spite of his medical association during the war, he does not hesitate to share his opinions on what he sees around him. In a May 1865 letter, he wrote that “The Doctors here dont have any thing fit to give any one and the bigest of them dont know how to doctor a hen anyway. They take the wounded men legs and arms off half the time. when there is no need of it, do it practice there has been a number of times I have heard of that…The Doct of the Regt was a clerk in an apothecary shop…” and the following month, detailing the sight of unburied dead men and horses on the battlefield.

After the war, Leonard returned to Massachusetts. He worked in a local woolen mill and later purchased and ran a plumbing and steam-fitting business. In June1886, he married Hattie Goodsell (b. 1862). They had at least one daughter (Nellie, b. 1897). It is unknown when Leonard died, but he does appear on the 1910 census and not on the 1920. Both Hattie and Nellie were boarding with another family in 1920, suggesting William died in the interim. Nellie later married Courtland Sparks and they had a daughter.

Since its acquisition, Leonard’s diary and letters have all be digitized. They are available on our digital platform. The images also include transcripts, which are searchable, in case you want to dig around and see what he talks about most! You can also see the finding aid for the collection online. And, of course, you can always visit us and see Williams’ words in person.

aisforarchives Feature Items, Local/Regional History, New Acquisitions, News, Rare Books

The Sherwood Anderson Odyssey

Woodcut by J.J.. Lankes
Woodcut of Troutdale, Virginia by J.J. Lankes

In 1925, Sherwood Anderson, the father of the modernist style of American literature, visited Troutdale, Virginia not far from the town of Marion, to escape New Orleans oppressive summer heat. By that time, Andersons writings, such as Winesburg, Ohio (1919), The Triumph of the Egg (1921), and Dark Laughter (1925), had brought him critical acclaim and some commercial success. He was so taken by southwest Virginia that he purchased property in Grayson County and built a cabin which he named Ripshin. Anderson once again re-invented himselfhe bought two weekly newspapers in nearby Marion, became active in local politics, and accompanied his fourth wife and Marion-native Eleanor Copenhaver on tours of southern factory towns to rally for workers rights and unions. He traveled the region, commenting on life in Wytheville, Pulaski, Roanoke, and Christiansburg. From the mid-1920s until his unexpected death in 1941 (peritonitis due to swallowing a toothpick from a martini) Anderson became a southwestern Virginian through and through.

Ripshin located in Grayson County
Ripshin located in Grayson County

The published works on Anderson and his writings are immense. The largest collection of his original papers and manuscripts were placed at the Newberry Library in Chicago. In Virginia, several libraries and archives acquired collections related to Anderson and his associates. Because of his connection to southwest Virginia, faculty and students at Virginia Tech have maintained a strong research interest in Anderson. The high-water mark of interest occurred during the 1980s when Dr. Charles Modlin and Dr. Hilbert Campbell in Virginia Techs English Department authored countless books, articles, and presentations on Andersons legacy. To support that research interest, Special Collections at Virginia Tech built a large printed collection of his published works and acquired a small number of original items related to Andersons family.

Scarcity and the passage of time are the greatest challenges of finding new materials for an archives program, especially for a topic with an extensive bibliography. My first efforts to locate available Sherwood Anderson material for Special Collections, nearly ten years ago, resulted in a few sparks but no fire. Then, and quite unexpectedly, in the spring of 2015 I was surrounded with a largely undiscovered cache of original Sherwood Anderson material.

Sherwood Anderson
Sherwood Anderson

The first collection came in March 2015 when a book and manuscript dealer listed a set of eight original Sherwood Anderson letters from 1916-1924. The letters were from Anderson to Llewellyn Jones, the literary editor for The Chicago Evening Post. The correspondence discusses reviews of Andersons recent books, his new writing projects, and a 1918 letter mentions his having this damned Spanish Influenza. Following acquisition of the small collection, it was processed, scanned, and placed online with full transcripts.

As is often the case, the discovery of one collection leads to another. I could not contain my excitement about the new acquisition and shared that information with another book and manuscript dealer. At that time he had largely been securing collections related to Virginia Tech history, such as original scrapbooks and personal papers from past graduates. To my surprise, he mentioned that one of his good friends was Dr. Welford D. Taylor, an emeritus English professor at the University of Richmond who had spent much of his academic career studying Sherwood Anderson.

In the weeks that followed, the dealer arranged for me to meet Dr. Taylor at his Richmond home. Dr. Taylor was a delightful host and an incredible resource on American literature, art, and Virginia history. From these discussions I learned that Dr. Taylor had a large collection of original Sherwood Anderson material that he had amassed over his academic career. Further, he was looking to place the collection in an archives program in Virginia where scholars would benefit. I made multiple trips to Richmond to talk with Dr. Taylor and by June we agreed to the terms of the agreement. His collection included several hundred letters, selected ephemera, and dozens of rare publications related to Sherwood Anderson. In addition, Dr. Taylor donated scarce publications, letters, ephemera, woodcuts, and other related pieces.

A 1928 letter from Anderson describing his opening a small library in Marion.
A 1928 letter from Anderson describing his opening a small library in Marion.

The Welford D. Taylor Collection on Sherwood Anderson, 1927-1992 (MS2015-045), represents a significant collection of material on Andersons years in southwest Virginia. The collection documents Andersons life in a small mountain community, newspaper publishing, finding inspiration for new writing, labor organizing, the publishing industry, and reactions to literary criticism. A highlight of the collection is over fifty letters written between Sherwood Anderson and J.J. Lankes, a significant illustrator and woodcut artist who worked with Anderson and other literary luminaries. The letters begin in 1927 continuing until the early 1940s. There are dozens of documents from other members of Andersons family including correspondence from Eleanor Copenhaver Anderson and his son Robert Anderson. Dr. Taylor is also represented in the collection, as he corresponded with Andersons family and associates for many years.

The 21 volume set of The Complete Works of Sherwood Anderson (1982).

Other gems include The Complete Works of Sherwood Anderson, edited by Kichinosuke Ohashi (1982), a rare, out-of-print, set of Andersons work published in Japan still in original custom-made boxes.

The Welford D. Taylor Collection on Sherwood Anderson represents one of the most significant acquisitions for Special Collections at Virginia Tech in recent memory. It will be a deep resource for scholars studying both Sherwood Anderson and the history of the southwest Virginia. The complexity of the collection has made processing much slower than expected, but once fully arranged and described there will be further updates and the release of a detailed finding aid. Those goals symbolize the end of this acquisitions story, but serve only as one chapter in the lengthy and ongoing odyssey to find and acquire new Sherwood Anderson materials for Special Collections at Virginia Tech.

Although still being processed, the collection is available for research use in the reading room. If you want more information about this and other Sherwood Anderson related collections held by Special Collections at Virginia Tech please send an email to specref@vt.edu

archivistkira Feature Items, Local/Regional History

Chilhowie Milling Company and Benefits of Business Records

Here at Special Collections, one of our goals is to acquire materials that people use for research and personal interest. On the blog, we talk a lot about different formats of collections, different topic areas represented, and even different uses for those collections. When we work with researchers, especially students, we talk about collections as primary sources: first hand accounts of events, place, people, etc. One of the forms that these primary sources can take (and one we don’t talk about quite as much as personal letters or diaries, for instance), are business papers. But, collections of business papers (letters, ledgers, account books, and the like) can tell you plenty. This week, I thought I’d share one such collection: theChilhowie Milling Company Correspondence from 1916 and 1917.

Letter from Norolk & Western Railway Company, February 24, 1917
Letter from Nordyke & Marmon Company. Inc., June 19, 1917
Letter from Stone Printing & Mrg. Co. (Roanoke), October 22, 1917
Handwritten order from Bluefield, WV, December 1917
Freight bill from Norfolk & Western Railway Co., November 24, 1917
Handwritten sketch, possibly a proposed plan for the revision of the mill, n.d. (c.1917)

You can view the finding aidfor this collection online, though it isn’t one we have had a chance to digitize in its entirety just yet. You may notice that the finding aid says this collection was previously processed, but in 2015, we did some additional organization and description. We don’t have the time and opportunity to revisit every collection, but when we can, we like to try and improve access. In this case, there was a brief description of the collection, but no contents list or detailed notes. Plus, we discovered that the collection had originally been described as theChilhowie Mining Company Correspondence. The milling company corresponded with a number of mining and ore related companies, but its missionwasn’t mining.

So, why look ata collection like this? It can tell you about business in the context of local history (or local history in the context of a business)–in this case, a business that existed in Smyth County, Virginia for over a century. You can get a sense of what it took to run a large business, the corporate partners and/or suppliers needed, the raw materials gathered, and, in this, what it took to renovate and rebuild. In atwo year period, the Chilhowie Milling Company wrote back and forth with nearly 40 different parties. To name a few specialized companies, this list included:

  • Bank of Glade Springs
  • B. D. Smith and Brothers Printers
  • Bristol Door and Lumber Company
  • Crystal Springs Bleachery Company
  • Ferger Grain Company
  • Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills
  • Gruendler Crusher and Pulverizing Company
  • Invincible Grain Cleaners Company
  • Millers National Insurance Company
  • Norfolk and Western Railway Company
  • State of Virginia Dairy and Food Division
  • Virginia Iron, Coal, and Coke Company
  • Virginia Leather Company
  • Virginia Portland Cement Company
  • Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company

In the cases of some other business history materialsat Special Collections, there might be even more to be learned! Interested in the personnel rosters of a textile mill? The account ledgers of a local grocery store? Records from a Saltville salt supplier during the Civil War? You might want to stop by and see us. You never know what new tidbits are to found, what reflections you might find on a given economic situation, or even what family history you can discover in business records!

vtspecblogger Civil War, Feature Items, Just for Fun, Uncategorized

Hitting on a Girl, Civil War Style

I love stumbling across letters in our collections that offer a glimpseof everydayromance. It’s something we can all relate to. So I when I came across a letter while digitizinga collection from a Confederate soldier confessing his feelings of “somethingmore than friendship, farexceeding gratitude,” I was excited to share.

The letter, found in the Koontz Family Papers,was written by Angus Ridgill, a private from Alabama, to Nellie Koontz, a young woman living in the Shenandoah Valley, in August, 1863. The letter was ostensibly written as a thankyou note toNellie and her family for housing him recently as a lone soldier, but Angus also uses the opportunity to confess his infatuation with her.

1d49b8983ad26a6afd275f5622cdfb1f
First page of Angus Ridgill’s letter to Nellie Koontz, dated August 17, 1863. See it online here

He writes:

“I amnaturally a creature of impulses, and the first fewmoments I passed in yourcompany was sufficient tomake me entirely subservientto your will, be that what it may.”

He continues with assurances that this confession was not hisoriginal intention of the letter, that he doesn’t expect his feelings to be fully reciprocated, and can only wait for an appropriate response-

“still I do trust thatyou will allow me time andopportunity to prove anythingwhich you may wish to know…”

He finishes with an apology:

“if all thistime I have been presumingtoo much upon your formerkindness I most humbly askyour pardon, hoping at thesame time that I havenot forfeited your friendship.”

Whether Angusever received a response from Nellie is notknown. But seeing as this letter was not immediately torn to shreds, but instead, carefully saved alongside those from her brothers and cousin (who were also off fighting for the Confederacy), we can assume his message hadsome significance to her.

An ‘A.G. Ridgill’ is listed as a private in the Washington Battalion, Louisiana Artillery, andinthe 1870 census, Angus Ridgill is listed as age 24, making himonly 16 or 17 when he wrote this letter. Inthe 1860 U.S. Census, Ellen F. ‘Nellie’ Koontz was listed as 16 years old, making her19 in 1863 at the time ofthis letter. I guess this provesteenage love messages were alive and well 150 years ago, just with more cursive and less emojis.

Sadly, census records also tell us that Angus and Nellie didn’t end up together. In the 1880 census, A.G. Ridgill, now 33, is listed as living in Van Zandt, Texas, working as a farmer and married to an Elizabeth, age 29. Alsoliving with him is an 8 year old step son, and two daughters, ages 5 and 3. In the same yearNellie, now listed as Nellie F. McCann, is married to N.F. McCann, an editor, and also has ason, 8, and two daughters, ages 4 and 2. Hopefully they both found true love with their respective spouses and were happy with their marriages and families at this stagein their lives.

In addition to thisletter, the Koontz Family Papers contains correspondence from brothers George and Milton Koontz and their cousin George Miller, each of whom served in the Confederate armies of Virginia. The collection also includes letters sent from other friends and two diaries and a sketchbook from Milton Koontz. The entirety of this collection is now online, including transcripts. Take a look at the collection here.

 

vtspecblogger Events, Feature Items

In Support of the Veterans in Society NEH Summer Institute

Masthead for the Veterans in Society Summer Institute website
Masthead for the Veterans in Society Summer Institute

For months, co-directors Jim Dubinsky of the English Department and Bruce Pencek of the Library, along with Heidi Nobles have been working to plan and seeking to provide for every detail necessary to make this three-week long NEH-supported Summer Institute for College and University Teachers a reality. This past Monday (the 11th) was the first day in a schedule that will have the 25 extraordinarily accomplished participants from all over the country in Blacksburg this week and in D.C. next week before returning to Blacksburg for the third and final week of the program.

The official name of the Institute is “Veterans in Society: Ambiguities and Representations.” The impressive list of faculty include Jonathan Shay, author of Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character and Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming. Among his other accomplishments, Shay has served as the Chair of Ethics, Leadership, and Personnel Policy in the office of the U.S. Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel and, in 2007, received a MacArthur fellowship for his work on trauma and the moral injuries of war. Jim Marten is past president of the Society of Civil War Historians, author many books, including Sing Not War: Civil War Veterans in Gilded Age America and the award-winning The Children’s Civil War. Donna Musil is a documentary filmmaker, writer and activist, whose film, Brats: Our Journey Home will be shown as part of a three-show film series that is open to the public. More about that in a moment. Actually, these are just three of the stellar faculty that are participating in the Institute along with Tech’s own Paul Quigley, Director of the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies and James I. Robertson, Jr. Associate Professor of Civil War History; Edward Fox, Professor of Computer Science; and David Cline, also from the History Dept. and who specializes in 20th century U.S. social movements, oral history, and public history. You get the idea . . . and I’ve left all kinds of folks out. For a complete list, see the Institute’s terrific website.

So, what is it that all these fine folks have come to Virginia Tech to discuss and study? Broadly speaking, they are defining the dynamic that may be leading to the emergence of a new interdisciplinary field, that of Veterans Studies. More specifically, the topics range widely, from the ways in which classical literature may play a part in understanding and assisting veterans to the role commemoration and monument building play in cultural memory and the process of reconciliation following war; from the ways in which stories of military service can be captured in oral history to a consideration of the unique perspectives offered by women veterans; from asking, “Who is a veteran?” and considering the social status of veterans to the effects of war on military children and the ways the voices of veterans emerge in music and literature . . . and everything in between and beyond. The reality is that the fact and aftermath of military service define threads that run through every culture, across the generations, and have an impact on the most significant aspects of life and society. Through the seminars, presentations, and activities listed on the Institute’s syllabus, the participants will seek to investigate these and other questions, while defining the beginnings of individual research projects.

Display of materials related to veterans at Special Collections for the Summer Institute
Display of materials related to veterans at Special Collections for the Summer Institute

On their second full day in Blacksburg, the members of the Institute had an opportunity to hear about collections of primary sources that may be of interest to them at Special Collections. We set up a display of a few documents and other items and, after a brief introduction, made that exhibit available to them, and to the library community for much of the week. While some of the materials have been displayed before, there were several items that have not been exhibited in recent memory.

Theophilus Cocke Letter, 1907, Ms2008-057
Theophilus Cocke Letter, 1907, Ms2008-057

For example, to the right is a scan of a letter written in 1907 by Theophilus Cocke of Carroll County, Virginia. Mr. Cocke was a veteran of the Mexican War (!) writing about the provisions of a new pension bill that would raise his allotment from $12 per month to $20.

In a letter written from Kansas in June 1865, H. E. Norton complained that veteran members of his Michigan Brigade were due to be mustered out following the end of the Civil War, but were instead sent west. He writes, “[I]t is Generally Believed that the Michigan Brigade was Basely sold by the Governor of the State of Michigan for we could never have been transfered to this Dept. if he had not consented to it.” Norton ended up in Nebraska Territory. Extended tours are, apparently, nothing new.

From the Conan W. Vaughan Papers, Ms1991-050: photographs from the European theater, 1945; a copy of Stars and Stripes; a French 10 franc note; and a piece of a German Ju-88 shot down over Iceland
From the Conan W. Vaughan Papers, Ms1991-050: photographs from the European theater, 1945; a copy of Stars and Stripes; a French 10 franc note; and a piece of a German Ju-88 shot down over Iceland

Once in Washington, the Summer Institute participants will spend a day at the Library of Congress and visit Arlington National Cemetery. They’ll talk about the LC’s Veterans History Project and stop at the Confederate memorial, Arlington House, and the U.S. Colored Troops graves. On the way back to Blacksburg, they’ll stop at the D-Day Memorial in Bedford.

Back in town, there will be more seminars, more opportunity to explore topics of interest, and to discuss ideas with the other participants. More time to check out primary sources.

Veterans In Society Summer Institute Presents Film Night
Veterans In Society Summer Institute Presents Film Night

There is also a public component to all of this. The Institute is sponsoring a Free Movie Night. The showing of Coriolanus has already gone, but on July 21st they will be showing The Best Years of Their Lives, a terrific, Oscar-winning movie about returning World War II vets, and on July 25th will be a showing of Brats: Our Journey Home, the documentary mentioned above, with writer and director Donna Musil on hand. These shows begin at 7PM in the MultiPurpose Room on the first floor of Newman Library. Again, the public is invited and admission is free!

archivistkira Feature Items, University History

Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College and Polytechnic Institute: 1915

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University is, geographically speaking, a large entity. We have campuses in multiple locations, research centers throughout the state, and Virginia Cooperative Extension (which includes107 county and city offices, 11 agricultural research and Extension centers, and six 4-H educational centers). Here in Blacksburg, there are more than 135 buildings, an airport, acres of land, and a LOT of people. But, of course, it didn’t always used to be this way. In 1872, Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College started with one building (the former Preston and Olin Institute) and around 250 acres of land purchased from “Solitude” owner, Robert Taylor Preston. By March of 1915, a little over 100 years ago, Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College and Polytechnic Institute had grown…

Map of Virginia Polytechnic Institute, 1915
Map of Main Campus of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, March 5, 1915 (click on the image for a larger version)

By then, it had 5 dormitories, 2 generic “academic” buildings and several identified academic buildings (Mining Hall, Science Hall, and Agricultural Hall), a library, a mess hall, machine and wood shops, a hot house, an administration building, a field house/track, and several utility buildings. This map, however, is also dotted with 19 private residences of faculty members, employees, and administrators. [Joseph Eggleston, then president of the university, lived in the Grove, which was completed in 1902, but it doesn’t appear on this map. It would be just off the south/south-east edge.] Most of these houses were on either side of thecurrent Drillfield and this area was called “faculty row.”

If you look at this map in the modern age, some things may seem a little familiar: the old dormitory buildings are pretty much in the same location as the current Upper Quad (which has some neat history of its own); the current library building is on the site of the old one (#35 on the map); and the Agricultural Hall is the approximate site of the current Ag Quad.At the same time, there have certainly been some major changes: “Faculty row” houses have been replaced by academic buildings on one side of the Drillfield and dorms on the other; Miles Field is gone, replaced by a much larger athletics region a little further out; and the old Infirmary (#34) would be somewhere under Squires today. It’s all a matter of give and take over time, as our campus has continued to make way for what’s new.

Given the change of the last 100 years (and in the 43 years before that),it’s hard not to ask: What will happen in the next 100 years at Virginia Tech? Whatever happens, it’s bound to be exciting!

vtspecblogger Civil War, Feature Items, Local/Regional History

If Thou Hast Crushed a Flower

One of my favorite parts of working in Special Collections is that I’m always coming across something beautiful and unexpected that I never knew we had. Case in point: the Daniel Bedinger Lucas scrapbook. Opening the average looking notebook cover reveals page after page of intricate pressed flower arrangements surrounded by handwritten poetry and and prose. There’s even a few locks of hair delicately woven and stitched into some of the pages. What’s unexpected is how vibrant most of the flowers still look- it’s really hard to believe they were picked some 150 years ago. Despite being so delicate, most of the arrangements have held up exceptionally well.

 


So who was the man behind this beautiful book? Daniel Bedinger Lucas was born March 16, 1836, at “Rion Hall” in Charleston, Virginia (now West Virginia). He attended the University of Virginia, and then studied law under Judge John W. Brockenbrough of Lexington, Virginia. In 1859 he began practicing law at Charleston but moved the next year to Richmond. The scrapbook was compiled some time during this period in the early 1860s, when Lucas was working as a lawyer in Richmond.
At the beginning of the Civil War in 1861 he joined the staff of General Henry A. Wise and took part in the Kanawha Valley campaign, but his physical disability from a childhood spine injury kept him from active service in the last years of the war. Toward the end of the war he ran the blockade to defend his friend John Yates Beall, accused of being a Confederate spy, but was unable to defend him against the charges. Beall was executed on Governors Island, New York.


Barred from the practice of law until 1871, due to restrictions on the service of ex-Confederates, Lucas turned to literature and became co-editor of the Baltimore Southern Metropolis. At this point his writing became more than just a hobby, and many of his poems were published in this magazine. Lucas’s volumes of poetry include The Wreath of Eglantine (1869) and Ballads and Madrigals (1884). He wrote three plays about the Civil War. His books include The Memoir of John Yates Beall (1865) and Nicaragua, War of the Filibusters (1896). He was known as the “poet of the Shenandoah Valley.”

In 1869, Lucas married Lena Tucker Brooke, of Richmond. Their only child, Virginia, was born in 1873. He reentered the practice of law in 1871 and took a prominent role in the Democratic party politics of West Virginia, acting as Democratic elector in the elections of 1872 and 1876, to the legislature in 1884 and 1886, and as a member of the supreme court of appeals from 1889 to 1893. He died at Rion Hall in Charleston on June 24, 1909.

The entire scrapbook is scanned and can be seen online here. I will leave you with one of his many poems from the scrapbook titled “If Thou Hast Crushed a Flower”
If thou hast crush’d a flower
the war may not be blighted;
If thou hast quenched a lamp
once more it may be lighted
But on thy harp, or on thy lute
the string which thou hast broken
shall never in sweet sound again
give to thy touch a token!

Ms1995-012_Scrapbook_Spread081

archivistkira Architecture, History, Feature Items, International Archive of Women in Architecture (IAWA), New Acquisitions

The Coade, Hard Facts…about Artificial Stone

Working with the History of Food & Drink Collection for the last few years has helped me build up an interest in advertising. Since 2011, we’ve been acquiring materials for our Culinary Pamphlet Collection, which contains hundreds of pamphlets, booklets, and cards/card sets. Much of the collection consists of small recipes books that consumers would either have sent away for or received free, full of recipes that use a product or products and aimed at encouraging future purchasing. In 2013, we started building the Culinary Ephemera Collection, which contains things likelabels, broadsides, trade cards, puzzles, menus, and postcards. There are lots of great bites of culinary ephemera–just the kind of items you’ll find me blogging about on “What’s Cookin’ @Special Collections?!” It’s through food and food advertising history that I first got into trade cards, but that’s not the only place you’ll find them.

Which brings us toCoade’s Lithodipyra or Artificial Manufactory Trade Card:

Ms2015-045_tradeCard_jpg

This collection is among what we call our “1-folder collections.” The entire collection, in this case, consists of the single trade card, probably printed around 1784. But, there’s a great deal of history to even a single small piece of paper. (In other words, don’t let the size of a collection fool you!)

The image is believed to have been one carved above the door at the factory. The woman whose belt is labeled “Ignea Vis” (or, “Firey Force”) appears to be overpowering a winged figure, who has both a tail and a trumpet, but we have no other clue to who or what he represents. The text reads:
Coade’s Lithodipyra or Artificial Stone Manufactory For all kind of Statues, Capitals, Vases, Tombs, Coats of Arms & Architectural ornaments &c &c; particularly expressed in Catalogues, & Books of Prints of 800 Articles & upwards, Sold at ye Manufactory near Kings Arms Stairs, Narrow Wall Lambeth, opposite Whitehall Stairs, London
The Latin above the three women reads, “nec edax abolere vestusas.” This is most likely the second half of the second of two lines from Ovid’sMetamorphosis:Iamque opus exegi, quod nec Iovis ira nec ignis/nec poterit ferrum nec edax abolere vetustas. Of, if you prefer: “And now my work is done, which neither the anger of Jupiter, nor fire,/nor sword, nor the gnawing tooth of time shall ever be able todestroy.” It seems an obvious advertising suggestion at the timelessness of the artificial stone manufactured by the company. Which brings us toCoade’s Lithodipyra or Artificial Stone Manufactory.

 

Coade’s was a company run by Eleanor Coade (1733-1821). Her first business was as a linen-draper, but she eventually shifted to making artificial stone, referred to as “Coade stone.” (Seeing a woman run any sort of business at time is only one of the reasons the trade card is such a stand-out item!) She ran the company from 1769 until her death in 1821, at which point her last business partner, William Croggon, continued the business until 1833. Coade produced stone for famous architects of the time, including John Nash. Nash’s works using the stone included the Royal Pavilion, Brighton, andthe refurbishment of Buckingham Palace in the 1820s. Other sites using the stone wereSt. George’s Chapel, Windsor and the Royal Naval College, Greenwich.

 

You can see the finding aid for the collection online. It offers a little more context to the trade card (designed by sculptor John Bacon, who studied at the Royal Academy). A trade card often seems like a simple thing, without much to do, other than advertise a company–but that isn’t usually the case. There’s a great deal of thought as to what goes into the design, what effect it might have, and what its real intention is. Certainly, Bacon probably thinking of this as a work of art, nor was Coade expecting it to last 231 and find its way to our collections, but it really is a work of art and it still has value over two centuries later. What that value is…well, art is in the eye of the beholder, just like research value. It’s up to you and me to figure out what this small, but not insignificant collection can mean.
archivistkira Feature Items, Just for Fun, Local/Regional History

Memories of a Glass Plate Negative

Although I sometimes find it hard to believe, back in February, I celebrated 6 years with Virginia Tech Special Collections. Time flies when you’re having fun, and since then I’ve processed, scanned, scoured through, or somehow handled a LOT of manuscript materials. I certainly can’t remember everything about every item, but there are plenty of things that stick with a person: a particularly exciting image, a sad letter, a plan from a local house that has to be seen to be believed…I could make you a long list.One thing you can never forget, however, is your first collection. Only about a week or so after I started, while trying to learn how processing happened here (every institutions has its methods), we bought a glass plate negative with two copies of a print. It’s not a life-changing finding aid in the scheme of things (though it is a cool plate!), but meant (and still means) something to me.

TheIvanhoe, Virginia, Moonshine Still Glass Plate looks, well, like this:

Print made from glass plate negative of a still near Ivanhoe, Virginia, c.1932
Print made from glass plate negative of a still near Ivanhoe, Virginia, c.1932

This is a print made from the plate and it depicts a working still. If the approximate date we have is close, then this was a still that was in action during Prohibition in the United States. We were primarily interested in it for the local history (Wythe County) connect. In 2009, the culinary history collection was well established, but we hadn’t started collecting materials on the history of the cocktail in America just yet. I always feel like this item was a little ahead of its time, since we would start collecting on the cocktail, distilling, and Prohibition about three years later.

If you’re curious what the plate itself looks like, I’ve made an attempt to photograph it, but our digital camera doesn’t like to focus on an object like this (which makes the prints extra helpful!):

Ms2009_028_IvanhoeStill_plate

There’s a short and sweet finding aid for this collection available online. We didn’t have much to go on, so it’s by no means my longest or most researched guide, but it was how I started learning about Virginia Tech Special Collections and how I started experimenting with EAD (that’s Encoded Archival Description, the XML schema we use to create our finding aids). Six years later, I would say I’ve come a long way, but I’m still learning everyday. I’ve worked with collections ranging in size from a single item tomore than 100 boxes. Our processes have changed and evolved, too, as we’ve added new software, skills, and people to the department. I can’t wait to see what happens next, and I hope you continue to follow us the blog and visit us! We have a lot of memories on our shelves, waiting to be discovered.

vtspecblogger Feature Items, University History

Panoramas of Campus to Immerse Yourself in the Not-too-distant Past

Panorama of the Duck Pond, from 1995

This week I wanted to share a small collection of panoramic photographs that were taken of various locations around the Virginia Tech campus back in 1995 (and a couple from 2000). The photographs were made by University Relations, and although they were taken recently (well, relative to most of our collections!) they were still captured non-digitally on film and given to us as oversized 2.5″ X 16″ photographic prints. Seeing a flat 360 degree view is one thing, but once we scanned them and installed a panoramic viewer on our Special Collections Online site, they really came to life in a very immersive way. You can see the above picture of the Duck Pond with the viewer here.

Spring Graduation at Lane Stadium, 1995

Most of the photos will look pretty familiar, with one noticeable difference being the smaller stands in Lane Stadium with roughly 15,000 less seats. You can immerse yourself in the 1995 Spring Commencement ceremony here. Another would be the absence of Torgersen Bridge behind the Pylons in this view of the Drill Field. Torgersen Hall and the bridge over Alumni Mall were not completed until 2000.

You can see all the panoramic photos in this collection here.

But I’ll leave you with one more panorama here, a vertigo-inducing shot from the floor of the War Memorial Hall foyer looking straight up at the vaulted ceiling. This one might best be seen without the viewer!

Ceiling of the War Memorial Hall foyer