Maryland Suffrage News Now Available in Chronicling America

Don’t let the end of Women’s History Month be the end of reading and research about women’s history! The Maryland Suffrage News is now available online at Chronicling America, and it is full of information about how women built up the suffrage movement in Maryland from 1912 to 1920. A weekly newspaper that was published out of Baltimore, the Maryland Suffrage News was edited by its founder, Edith Houghton Hooker, and managed by Dora G. Ogle. 

Maryland suffrage news. (Baltimore, Md.), 15 Jan. 1916. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn89060379/1916-01-15/ed-1/seq-1/>

As an activist newspaper, the Maryland Suffrage News focused on grassroots organizing, announcing and reporting on such actions as meetings, petitions, and parades. One distinctive strategy was suffrage pilgrimages across the state. The newspaper informed readers of upcoming events and related what had happened at previous events. You can search the name of your county to see what activities were taking place there: where the meetings were held, who were the speakers, how many attended. Activists would have been able to read remarks made in meetings on the other side of the state, or even in other states, as they strategized to win Maryland over to their cause county by county.

Brood X Cicadas are on their Way: Find them in the Newspapers

Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.), 21 June 1915. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88065726/1915-06-21/ed-1/seq-3/>

It’s that time of year! After spending 17 years underground, the Brood X cicadas will emerge around the third week of May. “For about four to six weeks after the cicadas emerge, woods and neighborhoods will ring with their buzzing mating calls” (Kelly Kizer Whitt, EARTH, April 1, 2021). Have no fear, though! The cicadas are harmless. They won’t eat crops, and they won’t bite you. They just come to do their business and leave. Once the eggs are laid, the adult cicadas will die; the baby cicadas will hatch and burrow back into the ground for 17 years; and the cycle will repeat.

Cicadas are already trending in the news in the Mid-Atlantic region. Perhaps you’re wondering what the community thought of Brood X’s arrival in the past. Chronicling America is a great resource to compare current news articles about the 17 year cicadas with historic news articles about the brood. 

Catoctin clarion. [volume] (Mechanicstown, Md.), 12 June 1919. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84026688/1919-06-12/ed-1/seq-4/>

In a 1919 article of the Catoctin Clarion, published in Thurmont, Maryland, there is a quote from a 1669 book that details a cicada visit from years earlier: ““It is to be observed,” he says, “that the spring before there was a numerous company of flies, which were like for bigness unto wasps or bumble-bees, they came out of little holes in the ground, and did eat up the green things, and made such a constant yelling noise as made all the woods ring of them and ready to deaf the hearers” (Catoctin clarion. [volume] (Mechanicstown, Md.), 12 June 1919. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84026688/1919-06-12/ed-1/seq-4/>). Of course, they weren’t flies, and they didn’t “eat up the green things.” However, their mating rituals were the same. Hundreds of years later, the Brood X cicadas are likely to do so every 17 years for hundreds of years to come, despite what some 1919 headlines might have led people (who didn’t read the article) to believe.

Catoctin clarion. [volume] (Mechanicstown, Md.), 12 June 1919. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84026688/1919-06-12/ed-1/seq-4/>

Women’s History Month: Suffrage Pilgrimages in Historic Maryland Newspapers

In celebration of Women’s History Month, we’re going to take a look at suffrage pilgrimages that took place in Maryland in the summers of 1914 and 1915.

Back in August 2020, the Historic Maryland Newspapers Project and the Maryland State Archives co-hosted a social media campaign in honor of the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment. Many of the posts created for the campaign came from a newspaper digitized by HMNP in Chronicling America titled the Maryland Suffrage News.

_{One of HMNP’s Instagram posts for the #MDSuffrage and #MarylandWomenVote social media campaign}

Searching Digitized Newspapers in Chronicling America

Welcome to Chronicling America! 

A collaboration between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress, the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) awards organizations grants to create state partnerships for newspaper digitization. As a result, state partners contribute digitized newspapers to Chronicling America. As of January 2021, Chronicling America contains over 17 million pages of digitized newspapers that are freely accessible to the public. Newspapers from 48 states, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico are included in this remarkable collection (check out this map for a visual!). Newspapers in Chronicling America go as far back as 1777, but as seen in this data visualization, most of the digitized newspaper titles were published between 1850 and 1922. For the state of Maryland, the Historic Maryland Newspapers Project at the University of Maryland Libraries partners with other archives, libraries, and historical societies throughout the state to digitize newspapers published in Maryland for Chronicling America.

_{The citizen. (Frederick City, Md.), 01 March 1895. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn89060092/1895-03-01/ed-1/seq-1/>}

For the Maryland collection, Chronicling America contains issues from 50 newspaper titles from across the state published between 1840 and 1951. Some highlights from the collection include:

Holiday Festivities in the Newspapers

It’s the holiday season! Let’s take a look at all the ways people in Maryland have celebrated Chanukah and Christmas over the years found in historic Maryland newspapers from Chronicling America.

Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.), 16 Dec. 1893. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85025350/1893-12-16/ed-1/seq-5/>

It’s the Holiday Season: Shopping and Advertisements in Historic Maryland Newspapers

Holiday shopping has always been popular. But thanks to the ample opportunities for online shopping, free shipping, early Black Friday deals, and stores opening on Thanksgiving, it’s fairly easy to spot the ways shopping has changed throughout the twenty-first century.

With the COVID-19 pandemic enacting many changes, it’s fair to assume that holiday shopping is going to be a little different this year: Amazon shifted their annual Prime Days from the summer to the fall, Target and Walmart announced store closings on Thanksgiving Day, and many small businesses will continue to rely on curb-side pick-up and online ordering this holiday season. 

Spooky Celebrations

_{Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.), 31 Oct. 1921. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88065726/1921-10-31/ed-1/seq-1/>}

All Hallow’s Eve, All Hallow Eve, Hallow Eve, Hallow Even, Hallow E’en, Hallowe’en, Halloween, Eve of All Saints’ Day–whatever you want to call it or however you’d like to spell it–is a day with origins dating all the way back to the Celts, and it came to the American East Coast in the 1600s (“Halloween 2020”). More common in Maryland and southern states, Halloween wasn’t celebrated nationally until the Third Wave of Immigration (“Halloween 2020”). Today, many people in the US have come to observe Halloween as a commercial and secular holiday, but the way that people celebrate it may differ by individual or family. We can recognize these differences throughout the years, across the state of Maryland.

Frederick the Great and His Court: Appearances can be deceiving

This is the sixth and final post in a series retelling Luise Mühlbach’s Friedrich der Grosse und sein Hof (Frederick the Great and His Court), originally published in serial form in Germany and later reprinted by the Baltimore newspaper Der Deutsche Correspondent in 1858. Jill Fosse of the Division of Digital Systems and Stewardship has been translating the story from Der Deutsche Correspondent for our enjoyement. At the end of last month, Jill retired after nine years of service to the Libraries. A huge thanks to Jill for, not only her willingness to translate snippets of Der Deutsche Correspondent for us, but for her genuine enthusiasm for the task. I hope you all have enjoyed the fruits of Jill’s labor as much as the staff of the Historic Maryland Newspapers Project has!

Unfortunately for us readers, Jill’s departure means that we’ll be leaving the story right before a masked ball AND a war. Don’t despair! To finish reading the story in German, head over to the January 19, 1858, issue of Der Deutsche Correspondent on Chronicling America. The story continues thru the February 20, 1858, issue and is found on page 1 in the sixth column of each issue. Those of us who require an English translation can access a copy through Project Gutenberg and resume the story in Book III, Chapter IX, “The Masquerade.”

Frederick the Great and His Court: Kings don’t cry

This is the fifth post in a series retelling Luise Mühlbach’s Friedrich der Grosse und sein Hof (Frederick the Great and His Court), originally published in serial form in Germany and later reprinted by the Baltimore newspaper Der Deutsche Correspondent in 1858. Jill Fosse is translating the story from German for our enjoyment.

In the last installment, three men summoned by Frederick had just arrived, although their purpose wasn’t revealed until now…

January 12, 1858.

“The emperor of Austria is dead. What use can we make of this?” Friedrich is bent on retaking Silesia, which Austria wrenched away from his ancestors. They swore revenge, and Friedrich can be that avenger.

“Are you ready to help and give me advice in this quest?”

“Yes!” they roar. The king then brings out the battle plans he has been working on. He has also prepared a document to publish to the people, justifying the war to win back lands from the Austrians. The three men are sworn to secrecy.

January 13, 1858.

Further consultations on war plans leave the king pumped and ready to avenge Prussia’s treatment by Austria as a constantly snubbed vassal. He also feels the need to do something heroic, to earn the love and respect of the people. And he wants fame. He can only get all this on the battlefield, as he tells his friend Jordan, who swears undying loyalty to him. But Friedrich is alarmed at his old friend’s appearance—he looks close to death.

January 14, 1858.

Friedrich is gloomily staring out of the window, self pityingly musing on how lonely is the life of a prince, with few friends—and those may be dying. At that moment Jordan comes back with the sad news that the king’s friend Ulrich Friedrich von Suhm has indeed died and hands the king Suhm’s last letter. This is the last straw, and after reading the letter the king bewails his terrible loss and sheds bitter tears. He then pulls himself together and says that death can no longer have any hold over him. He will not die in battle as death has taken his friend in his place.

Poor Fredrick. I guess it really is lonely at the top, but I suspect the king won’t be down for long with a war to think about. Frederick’s plan kicks into action in the next post.

Frederick the Great and His Court: Return of the king

This is the fourth post in a series retelling Luise Mühlbach’s Friedrich der Grosse und sein Hof (Frederick the Great and His Court), originally published in serial form in Germany and later reprinted by the Baltimore newspaper Der Deutsche Correspondent in 1858. Special thanks to Jill Fosse for translating the story from German as it was published in Der Deutsche Correspondent.

In today’s post, we finally meet the namesake of the story, Frederick the Great.

January 8, 1858.

At the palace of Rheinsberg, the king has returned. He locks himself in his library, ignoring even his favorite flute, and busies himself with maps and plans, astrolabes and land surveyors.

January 9, 1858.

While courtiers worry over what the king is up to, he himself is preparing to take the part of Brutus in Voltaire’s Death of Caesar. However, he is suddenly felled by a fever and takes to his bed. His doctor has no idea what to do to help, except—there is one possible remedy but he cannot not give it to the king as its safety and efficacy has not been tried out yet on a lesser mortal. The doctor and the king tussle back and forth over the medicine, the king insisting on trying it, the doctor hesitating. It is a brown powder from Peru that the Peruvians call quinine. Several courtiers come into the room, wanting to relay important news.

January 11, 1858.

It appears that Emperor Charles IV has died.

“Oh, such a fuss about such unimportant news,” says the king, lying back on his pillows. “It just means that Maria Theresa is now Empress of Germany [sic]. That’s all and it doesn’t concern us. But, it is also important that the king should be completely well when he hears this news. It should not be said that the news made me ill. Give me that powder!”

Once again the king and the doctor argue about the quinine, but of course the king wins and takes the powder. Now he feels totally restored and ready to enjoy the festivities of the play the court is about to perform. He gets up, dresses, dictates three letters requesting the immediate presence of certain powerful men at his court, then goes to the music room and his waiting court, where he is the life and soul of the party, playing his flute better than ever, and ignoring the news about the emperor’s death.

The next day, the three important men arrive at the palace…

Cliffhanger! Who are these three important men that Frederick has summoned to his court? And what is Fredrick really up to?