New exhibit – Student Activism on Campus: A Movement for Change

Social activism has historically been an important catalyst for change. In the US this was never more true than during the golden age of student activism lasting through the 60s, 70s, and 80s. This was a time of historical movements taking place at highschools and on University campuses across the country. Specifically in the context of the civil rights movement, Universities became microcosms of progressive, rebellious societies stimulated with political discourse. Politicians, and influential guest speakers flocked to these Universities to preach their message, and students listened in droves.

The ABCs of Katherine Anne Porter: Q is for…

Quiet!

For Katherine Anne Porter, the perfect writing environment was “A study room where nobody but the FBI could catch me.” Porter loved to socialize, but to be a productive writer, she had to put everything second behind her work. Porter sought out quiet, solitary places where she would have no demands on her time. No interruptions for cooking, reading thru the mail, or social outings. During her time lecturing at the University of Michigan in the 1950s, she became what she called a “Sunday writer,” where she would spend the weekend hiding in the empty library as it was the only time and place where she wouldn’t be interrupted.

Porter’ writing habits made her into somewhat of a hermit. sparking rumors in social circles of what she was really up to besides writing. Whispers circulated that she had become a drunk, taken a new lover, broken up with an old one, or was in the middle of a complete breakdown. Porter addressed the rumors in her correspondence, writing, “In each and every single, solitary case, I have disappeared sure enough, and have reappeared after a certain time with a new, completed work… and yet nothing convinces some people!”

You can explore digitized letters by Katherine Anne Porter’s online in the online exhibit Katherine Anne Porter: Correspondence from the Archives, 1912-1977.

Browse the finding aid to the Katherine Anne Porter papers to learn more about Porter’s hobbies and manuscripts!

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Mattie Lewis is a student in the Masters of Library and Information Sciences program and Graduate Assistant with the Katherine Anne Porter Collection at UMD.

The ABCs of Katherine Anne Porter: P is for…

Pulitzer!

On the 50th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prize in 1966, the award distinguished fiction published in book form was given to The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter. Porter, 76 at the time, was the oldest winner that year. Pulitzer winners receive an invitation to an award dinner, a certificate and a cash prize; contrary to popular belief, only the winner in the Public Service News Organization receives a medal. 

The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter brought together all of Porter’s published short stories (26 in total) into a single volume. Renewed interest in Porter’s work came from emerging critics and scholars who praised Porter’s smart yet simple style. As political ideas changed over the years, readers found new meaning in Porter’s explorations of death, femininity, and memory. One critique wrote “Miss Porter’s best stories are so transparent that they disappear as stories, as style, as literature, while leaving the humanity of their pictures wordlessly intact.”* The The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter also won the National Book Award for fiction in 1966.

_{^{*Donoghue, D. (1965, November 11). Reconsidering Katherine Anne Porter. The New York Review. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1965/11/11/reconsidering-katherine-anne-porter}}

You can explore digitized letters by Katherine Anne Porter’s online in the online exhibit Katherine Anne Porter: Correspondence from the Archives, 1912-1977.

Browse the finding aid to the Katherine Anne Porter papers to learn more about Porter’s hobbies and manuscripts!

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Mattie Lewis is a student in the Masters of Library and Information Sciences program and Graduate Assistant with the Katherine Anne Porter Collection at UMD.

New Exhibit: The Joy of Cooking in Special Collections

It’s the holiday season and we have cooking on the mind in Special Collections at UMD! For many, our relationship with food stems from a desire not just to sustain ourselves, but also to find comfort within and to bring comfort to others. Food helps us understand who we are by reflecting our heritage, talents, or personality. What we cook and eat can provide a glimpse into how adventurous, nostalgic, creative, communal, organized or practical we truly are. Eating and cooking gives us the opportunity to create and share memories, especially when exploring recipes passed down over generations. Even when we cannot be with our loved ones, aromas and flavors can evoke nostalgia and connect us with our past.

A new exhibit in the Special Collections & University Archives reading room, The Joy of Cooking in Special Collections reflects our human desire to share a meal, find joy, and explore who we are through the experience of cooking and eating. On display are cookbooks, recipes, and other items from Special Collections and University Archives that highlight the joy of cooking.

Included in the exhibit are personal recipes and annotated cookbooks from the literary archive of American Author Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980). Porter loved to cook and was inspired by her world travels to experiment in the kitchen. A native Texan, she spent time in Paris, Mexico, Washington D.C., and New York among other locations across the word. Her recipes for classic holiday dishes include turkey stuffing, eggnog, beef bourguignon, and roasted goose, perfect for a throwback holiday feast!

Porter collected a wide variety of cookbooks from the classic to the strange, often writing notes and substitutions over the original recipe, or simply writing “this” next to the recipes she wanted to cook. Her archives include both typed and handwritten recipes, sometimes featuring personal reminiscences about her favorite dishes. Porter was known to craft her own recipes and send samples off to friends, including her highly requested hell broth-a fermented pepper sauce made with dark rum, cognac, and three pounds of mixed hot peppers. You can read more about Porter in the kitchen in our ABCs of KAP blog post.

Also on display are cookbooks from the rare books collection and Maryland collection, the latter featuring regional recipes to the state of Maryland including regional favorited such as Old Bay, crabs, and oysters. Many regions have their own culinary traditions and local residents often pride themselves on loving those food items that are most closely connected with their hometown. Maryland embraces its connection to seafood, especially Maryland Blue Crabs, and the increasingly ubiquitous Old Bay spice which pops up in both sweet and savory treats, as well as beverages.

Cookbooks from the rare book collection range from medieval cooking with medicinal herbs to regional dishes from across the world. Some early cookbooks combined domestic medicine with cooking and other household skills, so the savvy reader could review a copy of A Treatise of Domestic Medicine (1888) to find a remedy for rickets as well as a dozen or so fish recipes to cook for the family. 

Some rare book dishes may seem unfamiliar today, such as beef tongue toast, boiled pigeon, or mock turtle soup. The format may also seem unusual, with the ingredients not listed separately at the top and the instructions condensed in one paragraph. The recipes within however, are glimpses into the culinary past and can inspire nostalgia for a home cooked meal.

The exhibit also highlights cooking in postwar Japan from the Gordon W. Prange Collection. On August 15, 1945, Japan surrendered unconditionally to the United States and Allied Powers, ending World War II. In the aftermath, thousands of U.S. military and civilian personnel and their families moved to Japan to oversee the rehabilitation of the defeated nation. Materials from the Gordon W. Prange Collection highlight how the “American dream” was represented by these communities and how in turn, the Japanese people envisioned their own dreams as they rebuilt their lives. These highly illustrative and colorful cookbooks each tell a story of food and community in this unique post-war environment.

The exhibit is on display in the Maryland Room thru December 23, 2022. Visit us or contact us to learn more.

Special thanks to Prange Collection Coordinator Motoko Lezec and Katherine Anne Porter Graduate Student Assistant Mattie Lewis for their inspiration for this exhibit!

New Exhibit – Watershed Moment: Celebrating and Protecting the Chesapeake Bay

Spring is finally here, bringing longer days, warmer weather, and flourishing wildlife. Maryland neighbors the Chesapeake Bay, a brackish estuary into which all rivers of the adjacent watershed empty. Did you know the land-to-water ratio of the Chesapeake Bay’s watershed is 14 to 1, greater than any other coastal body of water in the world? This means our actions on land have a big impact on the Bay’s health. While some human activity can pollute or harm the Bay, other human interventions are crucial to promoting and protecting the region’s unique biodiversity and cultural significance.

The latest exhibition in the Maryland Room at Hornbake Library, Watershed Moment: Celebrating and Protecting the Chesapeake Bay, showcases the Bay’s vast and varied landscape and efforts to preserve its unique resources. We hope this exhibit inspires a greater appreciation for this region we call home and an awareness of our own responsibility in protecting the environment.

On display are items from Maryland and Historical Collections, including representations of the Bay and advocacy materials from local environmental organizations. A spotlight on the records of the Coalition to Preserve Black Marsh demonstrates the importance of community involvement in conserving the Bay and surrounding watershed. The Black Marsh Natural Area (North Point State Park, Baltimore County) is a tidal freshwater-brackish wetland home to a variety of unique shrubs, flowers, and wildlife, including the bald eagle. In the 1990s, the Coalition to Preserve Black Marsh, a group of local residents and environmentalists, raised awareness of this area’s vulnerable wildlife and sought to preserve its undisturbed wetlands. The coalition’s records reveal a commitment to education and community-led decision-making. We encourage you to visit to learn more about how we can all advocate for the Chesapeake Bay environment.

Items on display showcase the unique biodiversity of the Chesapeake Bay watershed and efforts to protect its natural resources.

Exhibition is open Monday–Friday, 10am–4pm in the Maryland Room at Hornbake Library and on display through May 6th.

To explore more, visit Special Collections and University Archives to view the Coalition to Preserve Black Marsh records and other materials related to the Chesapeake Bay.

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Exhibit curated by Jacob Hopkins, an MLIS student and the Graduate Assistant for Reference, Outreach, and Engagement, Maryland and Historical Collections, Special Collections and University Archives.

New Exhibit: Takejiro Hasegawa (1853-1938) Innovative Publisher of Meiji Japan

Visit Hornbake Library and explore three exhibit cases inside the Maryland Room which showcase the publishing career of Japanese publisher Takejiro Hasegawa.

Hasegawa used national exhibitions and world’s fairs to promote his publications. He began his career during the Meiji period beginning in 1868 when Japan rapidly industrialized & adopted Western ideas & practices. He ran a thriving business importing products from the West including books. By 1884, he decided to become a publisher, focusing on educational books written by Westerners living in Japan.

Hasegawa published a series of Japanese folktales in English, French, German and other European languages and in the Western manner reading from left to right with attractive illustrations.  Initially he published these folktales to help Japanese learn Western languages and was later motivated to sell books in Western markets.  Hasegawa used national exhibitions and world’s fairs to promote his publications. Included in the exhibition are images from the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago where Japan spent lavishly to showcase itself with a Japanese temple, tea garden, and exhibits.  One of every six Americans visited the Chicago exposition to see the 65,000 exhibits spread across 633 acres of fairgrounds.

Several of Hasegawa’s publications are on view in the exhibit cases and you can read the full text of the fairy tale Momotaro displayed on the adjacent iPad. The world’s fair publications are from the University Libraries’ Special Collections and University Archives collections and Hasegawa’s fairy tale books are on loan from John Schalow, former UMD Libraries Special Collections cataloguer who curated this exhibit.

Djuna Barnes and the Women’s Suffrage Movement

While Djuna Barnes is most known for her fiction writing, she also had significant ties to the women’s suffrage movement.  Djuna’s connection to the women’s suffrage movement started at a young age.  Djuna’s grandmother, Zadel Gustafson Barnes, was a writer, journalist, and poet. Zadel wrote profiles of well-known suffragists such as Frances E. Willard and participated in the National Woman Suffrage Association’s International Council of Women. Zadel was also active in the temperance movement, which was closely tied to the women’s suffrage movement.

Despite Djuna’s familial connection to the women’s suffrage movement, she had no qualms about occasionally mocking it.  In an August 1913 article Djuna portrays the suffragists as making ridiculous statements such as “cleanliness is next to women suffrage.”  These depictions portray suffragists as foolish caricatures.  Djuna continues this approach in her 1913 article, “70 Suffragists Turned Loose.”  Djuna engages with negative stereotypes of suffragists, such as portraying them as figures who emasculate and intimidate men.  However, some of Djuna’s criticism is about the perceived conservatism of some suffrage leaders such as Carrie Chapman Catt.  Djuna portrays Chapman Catt as admonishing aspiring suffragists for the length of their dresses and preparing them for speeches in front of audiences from “the factory world.”  Djuna criticizes Chapman Catt’s focus on respectability politics and her classism, showing a willingness to engage in more nuanced critiques of the suffrage movement.  

Rebecca Hourwhich Reyher and Women’s Suffrage

The suffrage movement had many national leaders, but it could not have functioned without local figures such as Rebecca Hourwhich Reyher.  Hourwhich Reyher was the head of the National Women’s Party’s Boston and New York offices.  

To learn more about Rebecca Hourwhich Reyher, take a look at the Ferdinand Reyher papers and the Faith Reyher Jackson papers.  Ferdinand Reyher, Hourwhich Reyher’s ex-husband, was an author and journalist.  Faith Reyher Jackson, Reyher and Hourwhich Reyher’s daughter, was a dancer, author, and master gardener.  Both collections contain materials related to Hourwhich Reyher.  For example, the Ferdinand Reyher papers contain a letter from the famous suffragist Alice Paul.  

To learn more about Rebecca Hourwhich and other items in Literature and Rare Books related to suffrage contact us!

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Caroline Ackiewicz, Candidate for Master of Library & Information Science, University of Maryland.

Favorite Books in Literature and Rare Books

Now that summer break has arrived, many of us are looking for book recommendations.  If you’re stumped, check out some of the favorite books of famous women that you can find in Literature and Rare Books.  

Amongst the most influential books in Literature and Rare Books’ collections is Mary Wollstonecrafts’ Vindication of the Rights of Women.  Vindication of the Rights of Women was an essential work for many suffragists such as Susan B. Anthony and Millicent Garrett Fawcett.  Garret Fawcett even wrote the foreword to the centenary edition of Vindication of the Rights of Women.  Other writers such as George Eliot and Virginia Woolf have praised Wollstonecraft and her work. 

Another work that influenced Susan B. Anthony was Elizabeth Barret Browning’s epic poem Aurora Leigh.  Aurora Leigh describes a woman writer and her attempts to find love and fulfillment in her work.  Reading Aurora Leigh inspired some of Anthony’s thinking regarding how women balance marriage and independence.

If you’re looking for a whole series of books to read you can browse The Rose and Joseph Pagnani Collection of Girls’ Series Books’ collection of Nancy Drew Mystery Stories books.  You can also check out our online exhibit on Nancy Drew and other Girls’ Series Books.  The Nancy Drew series was a childhood favorite of several notable women such as Gayle King, Hillary Clinton, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and Sonia Sotomayor, who loved reading books where a smart young heroine was at the center of the adventures.

Contact us to learn more about these works or other items in Literature and Rare Books!

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Caroline Ackiewicz, Candidate for Master of Library & Information Science, University of Maryland.

Updated Resource: Djuna Barnes Papers Finding Aid

The Djuna Barnes papers finding aid has recently been updated with an inventory of the extensive Barnes Library, which is comprised of over 1000 titles owned by author/artist Djuna Barnes.  The library’s highlights include first editions of Barnes’ works like Ryder, Ladies Almanack, Nightwood, and The Antiphon.  The Barnes Library also includes unique items such as books from the 18th century, books with annotations by Barnes, a copy of Shakespeare’s works that Barens was given for her 16th birthday, and presentation copies of works from other notable authors such as Charles Reznikoff .  These items and more, can be found under the Inventories/Additional Information heading in the finding aid or by searching the online catalog!