Library of Congress's Blog, page 166

Highlighting the Holidays: A Magical Card

Happy holidays from the Library of Congress! With more than 155 million items in its collections, it’s no surprise that the institution could really celebrate the season all year, highlighting a variety of holiday-related items. We’ll deck the halls for the next several days featuring historical holdings from the nation’s library.

Christmas card from Mrs. Harry Houdini. 1935. Rare Book and Special Collections Division.

While this card,ca. 1935, may not have magically appeared in mailboxes, its recipients were receiving a bit of cheer from, as the card states, “the oldest living lady magician in the world.”

Beatrice “Bess” Rahner was a performer in her own right when she married Ehrich Weiss. Together they became the well-known couple Mr. and Mrs. Harry Houdini. In the early years of their marriage, they performed in full partnership on stage. Harry ultimately became the star of the show, and they both devoted themselves to his career. However, Beatrice knew and could practice the art of illusion and, as this card documents, she recognized her role as such.

Following Harry’s death Oct. 31, 1926, Bess moved to Hollywood to continue promoting her husband’s memory and legacy. In fact, she kept a full-time publicist on her payroll for 16 years after his death, just to keep his legend alive.

 

 

 

Calling Mr. Wolfe

Quick: what do the movies “Mary Poppins” and “Pulp Fiction” have in common?

Well, yes, they’re both motion pictures.  But now, both are listed on the Library of Congress National Film Registry, a collection of films – 25 are added each year – deemed worthy of preservation due to their cultural, historic or aesthetic significance.

Julie Andrews as the fix-it lady who dropped out of the sky

Furthermore, both feature characters who swoop in and help others sort out their messes, literally or figuratively – Mary Poppins (played by Julie Andrews) in that movie, and Winston Wolfe (played by Harvey Keitel) in “Pulp Fiction.”

After that, it’s all contrast – one’s family fare, the other’s, ah, not. One features a song called “I Love to Laugh,” while the other makes you hate yourself for finding something so dark so funny.

This year’s list (which brings the grand total in the registry to 650) also includes John Ford’s Irish love story “The Quiet Man,” the U.S. space-program history “The Right Stuff” and the 1960s Edward Albee play-turned-movie “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf,” starring the Brangelina of the 1960s, the married actors Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Instead of “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” the Liz & Dick movie could have been called “Mr. and Mrs. Snider” – the more they drink in this flick, the snider they get.

This year’s additions also include “The Magnificent Seven,” which of course is the 1960 cowboy remake of Akira Kurosawa’s classic of feudal Japan, “The Seven Samurai” and “Forbidden Planet,” a 1956 science-fiction classic that featured Leslie Neilsen as a serious character.

Surely.

There are also several films of artistic or historic value, including the 1919 silent film “A Virtuous Vamp” and the 1966 documentary “Cicero March,” about a revealing event in the Civil Rights Movement.  And tucked into this year’s list is the 1989 provoc-umentary “Roger & Me” by Michael Moore.

You can, and should, nominate films to be considered for the National Film Registry. The online form to submit your suggestions can be found here, and you might also want to refer to a list of movies that haven’t yet made the cut.  Please participate!

 

 

 

You’re Supposed to Steep Tea in Boiling Water

The destruction of tea at Boston Harbor. 1846. Prints and Photographs Division.

On Dec. 16, 1773, a group of Bostonians dressed as Mohawk Indians boarded ships docked in Boston Harbor and dumped some 340 chests of tea into the water. Today marks the 240th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party.

“A number of brave & resolute men, determined to do all in their power to save their country from the ruin which their enemies had plotted, in less than four hours, emptied every chest of tea on board the three ships commanded by the captains Hall, Bruce, and Coffin, amounting to 342 chests, into the sea!! without the least damage done to the ships or any other property. The matters and owners are well pleas’d that their ships are thus clear’d; and the people are almost universally congratulating each other on this happy event,” reads an article from the Dec. 20, 1773, edition of the Boston Gazette, recounting the details of the infamous nonviolent political protest.

This protest was a challenge against the Tea Act of 1773, which gave the nearly bankrupt British East India Company a monopoly on tea exports to America and forced the colonists to acknowledge British taxation, a thorn in their sides due to a monumental war debt from the French and Indian War. The Tea Act, and the facts that the colonists were required to provide room and board to the British standing army in America and had to pay taxes on everything from molasses to paper goods to glass, were all fuel to the fire of the impending American Revolution. Although Parliament repealed most of these taxes, the seeds of resentment, mistrust and anti-establishment had been planted in the colonists’ minds.

Most colonists applauded the action of the Boston Tea Party, while the powers-that-be in London reacted swiftly and severely. In March 1774 Parliament passed the Intolerable Acts, which closed the port of Boston and stripped Massachusetts of self-government, among other measures. The American Revolution began a year later.

The guide “The American Revolution, 1763-1783” documents this tumultuous time in American history from British reform and colonial resistance to America’s war victory through various Library of Congress collections and presentations. This resource is one of several that highlights the ups and downs of the nation’s development, from its early beginnings as a settlement to a post-war United States.

Uncovering a Treasure

(The following is an article written by Mark Hartsell, editor of the Library of Congress staff newsletter, The Gazette.)

The file boxes of Charles and Ray Eames yielded all sorts of eclectic items to archivists processing the collection at the Library of Congress – a letter from Georgia O’Keefe in this one, a receipt for a Moroccan robe in that one, printed butterflies in another.

An untitled Madonna by Martín Ramírez, ca. 1951. Estate of Martín Ramírez / Prints and Photographs Division

Buried in one carton, senior archives technician Tracey Barton found a crumpled, yellowed tube of paper that, when unrolled, revealed an astonishing image: a crowned Madonna standing atop a blue orb, a snake at her feet devouring a rabbit, cars riding down canyon roads, all drawn in childlike fashion in pencil, crayon and colored inks. The flip side was equally amazing.

The paper support was constructed of more than 20 pieces of junk mail – postmarked envelopes, solicitations for racy photos, ads for gardening supplies – glued together. The artwork bore no obvious connection to the Eameses, a husband-and-wife team that in the 1940s and ’50s pioneered modern design in furniture and architecture.

Sorting through the miscellany of their lives, Barton had made a stunning discovery: a previously unknown work by an artist described in the New York Times as one of the most important of the last century.

Barton, a senior archives technician in the Manuscript Division, in 2009 had begun processing a large and disorganized addition – about 220 boxes – to the Library’s collection of Eames material.

“It was very, very eclectic, which is what I love about the chaos of this addition,” she said. “You never know what you’re going to find.”

The artwork Barton found bore no signature, but the makeshift canvas offered clues to the creator’s identity: The junk mail was a strong sign the piece was an example of “outsider art,” a term generally applied to the work of self-taught artists.

Barton conducted an online search based on her hunch about the nature of the piece and on places and dates she lifted from the junk mail: “Auburn California 1951 outsider art.”

“All of a sudden, Martín Ramírez came up,” she said.

Ramírez, it turned out, was a prominent figure in outsider art, and the style of the drawing Barton discovered perfectly matched other examples of his work.

The artwork’s paper support is made up of more than 20 pieces of junk mail – ads for gardening supplies, racy photos, vitamins and magazine subscriptions. Photo by Abby Brack Lewis

In recent years, Ramírez has been the subject of two major retrospectives at the American Folk Art Museum in New York and one at the Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid. The New York Times, in a review of the 2007 show at the folk art museum, called Ramírez “simply one of the greatest artists of the 20th century.”

“From the moment his work was seen by his first champion, nobody has ever doubted the beauty, the importance and the cultural significance of Ramírez’s art,” said Brooke Davis Anderson, who curated the shows in New York and Madrid. “He’s never had a bad review.”

An Immigrant’s Tale

Ramírez’s story is fascinating and tragic. He grew up in Mexico, got married, had children and, in 1923, bought a small ranch in the state of Jalisco. Two years later, he emigrated alone to California, where he hoped to find work that would support his family. Because of political and religious strife in Mexico, Ramírez decided not to return home.

He would never see his family again.

Ramírez, impoverished and disoriented, was arrested in 1931 and hospitalized at Stockton State Hospital, where he eventually was diagnosed as schizophrenic.

In the mid-1930s, he began to make drawings using whatever paper was at hand – scraps from examination tables, bags, magazines, envelopes, bits glued together with a paste of bread or potatoes mixed with saliva. On these canvases, he created images that reflected the traditions of his Mexico home and his experiences in California – Madonnas and caballeros, churches and tunnels, trains and animals.

Martín Ramírez / Estate of Martín Ramírez

In 1948, Ramírez was transferred to DeWitt State Hospital near Sacramento, where he lived the rest of his life – and where his art was discovered.

Tarmo Pasto, a professor of psychology and art at Sacramento State College who frequently visited DeWitt, began to supply Ramírez with material and to save his art. He also arranged for shows of Ramírez’s art in the early 1950s.

Solving a Mystery

Barton frequently shared her discoveries with Margaret McAleer of Manuscript, who serves as the Eames collection’s main archivist. Barton and McAleer were moved by Ramírez’s story and by the piece Barton found.

“I thought it was gorgeous,” McAleer said. “It amazes me that someone who tragically was in a psychiatric facility – and whatever he was dealing with in his mind – could have created such a composition.”

Still, a big question remained: How did this artwork make the unlikely journey from a psychiatric ward to a file box at the Library? Barton and McAleer hoped the answer would reveal itself as the collection was processed.

A year after the discovery, McAleer received a three-word e-mail from Barton: “I found it.”

The “it” was the solution to the mystery: a letter to Charles Eames from Don R. Birrell, director of the E.B. Crocker Art Gallery in Sacramento. In the letter, Birrell references a conversation they’d had about “schizophrenic drawings” and informs Charles that he’d just mailed to him several examples of this art to keep “if you wish.”

It all made sense: The Crocker gallery put on Ramírez’s first solo show, and the letter was dated April 9, 1952 – shortly after that show closed.

“I glanced at this letter from a gallery director, and all of a sudden it all came into focus,” Barton said. “I got a chill up my spine.”

The piece found by Barton is one of the earliest Ramírez drawings in existence, according to Victor M. Espinosa, who has extensively studied and written about Ramírez.

A Rare Find

Espinosa says most of the drawings Ramírez made on recycled paper – like the Library’s – were destroyed long ago and that the bulk of his surviving works were produced after 1953, when he had access to drawing paper.

“This is an amazing example of the way Ramírez worked before he had access to regular paper,” Espinosa said.

The image shows Ramírez’s representation of the Virgin Mary as the Immaculate Conception – one of only 15 Madonnas in Espinosa’s database of the roughly 500 known works by Ramírez. At the Madonna’s feet, a snake devours a rabbit – something Ramírez might have seen in Jalisco. The virgin, wearing traditional Mexican garb, holds before her a shawl evocative of another traditional Mexican garment, a rebozo.

“What’s nice about the Madonna is that you see an honoring of a Catholic, iconic tradition, but he’s made it a hybrid figure by giving it a Mexican costume,” Anderson said.

Lynn Brostoff performs an X-ray fluorescence examination of the Martín Ramírez piece. Photo by Katherine Blood

Repairing a Masterpiece

The passing decades – and the time spent rolled up in a file box – took their toll on the piece: The Madonna suffered insect damage, large tears, deep creases and some losses.

After the discovery, Library conservators repaired some damage and stabilized the piece but took a light approach to cosmetic work. What may appear as damage, after all, is part of the piece’s story to tell.

“It is thrilling to welcome this new treasure to the Library’s visual art collections and share Tracey’s discovery with the world,” said Katherine Blood, a curator in the Library’s Prints and Photographs Division. “We are honored that the Ramírez family has entrusted this uniquely compelling piece of the artist’s legacy to the Library’s care.”

The Martín Ramírez Madonna will be on view to the public for three months, through March 15. The piece will be on display in the “Exploring the Early Americas” exhibition on the second floor of the Jefferson Building.

You can learn more about Ramirez and the significance of his painting in this brief video featuring curator Katherine Blood and blog post from the Library’s Prints and Photographs Division.

Pic of the Week: Trimming the Tree

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas … in the Great Hall of the Library of Congress, that is. Every year, the Library decks its hall with a tall tree, replete with lights and ornaments for the enjoyment of the institution’s patrons. Here, you can see workers are putting on the finishing touches. How do you decorate for the holidays?

Photo by David Rice

A Celebration of Mexico: A Revolutionary Film

This Thursday and Friday, the Library of Congress is hosting a special “Celebration of Mexico” to honor the culture and history of Hispanic Americans and highlight the Library’s collection of Hispanic materials, which is the largest in the world.

During the event, the Library will present the world premiere of the oldest-known documentary footage of Mexico. The institution has the only existing copy of the film, “The History of the Mexican Revolution,” a compilation documentary shot by several newsreel cameramen over a span of nearly 30 years. These compilation histories represent the first documentaries in Mexico’s rich cinematic history. The film is part of the Library’s John E. Allen, Inc. Collection, which contains many unique and best-serving copies of American films like WWI- and WWII-era actualities, sound era dramatic fathers, silent films from New York-area studios and the “all-black newsreels” from the 1940s.

In this short video, Mike Mashon, head of the Library’s Moving Image Section, talks about the historical and cultural importance of this film and the Library of Congress Motion Picture Laboratory’s efforts to preserve it.

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“A Celebration of Mexico,” a two-day conference and accompanying display at the Library of Congress, will open on December 12, the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a popular national holiday in Mexico. For more information and more videos, visit the website.

InRetrospect: November Blogging Edition

The Library of Congress blogosphere was a cornucopia of posts on special holidays and  more. Here is just a taste.

In the Muse: Performing Arts Blog

#Britten100: Benjamin Britten & Peter Pears at the Library

November 22  marked the hundredth birthday of British composer Benjamin Britten.

Inside Adams: Science, Technology & Business

Civil War Thanksgiving Foods

Ellen Terrell explores how Civil War soldiers celebrated the holiday.

In Custodia Legis: Law Librarians of Congress

Armistice Day/Veterans Day

Megan Wood discusses the importance of the holiday.

The Signal: Digital Preservation

Ten Tips for Preserving Your Holiday Digital Memories

Mike Ashenfelder offers advice for keeping your holiday memories safe for the future.

Teaching with the Library of Congress

Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn”: Controversy at the Heart of a Classic

The Library’s primary sources can help provoke student thinking regarding the novel’s central issues.

Picture This: Library of Congress Prints & Photos

Sequoyah: A Man of Letters

This Cherokee Indian invented the written form of his spoken language.

From the Catbird Seat: Poetry & Literature at the Library of Congress

A Thanksgiving Poem for Lincoln 

Abraham Lincoln receives poems in thanks for his Thanksgiving proclamation.

Folklife Today

Putting Foods By for the Winter

Stephanie Hall talks about food preservation.

Library in the News: November 2013 Edition

Making a splash in the news headlines was the public opening of The Seth MacFarlane Collection of the Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan Archive. The Library of Congress hosted MacFarlane, Druyan, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Bill Nye “The Science Guy” and a host of other scientists and educators during a special event in Nov. 12. Full coverage over the course of a couple days came from a variety of outlets.

“Now billions of people on our “Pale Blue Dot” can take a look at the historical letters, studies, and musings of pioneering space scientist Carl Sagan,” said Dara Kerr of CNET.

Calling MacFarlane a “science geek,” The Washington Post’s Reliable Source column quoted the celebrity expressing concern that “science literacy is fading.”

Sara Ash from MSNBC said, “The program was filled with talk after talk by people who knew Sagan, worked with him, or were mentored by him. Each speaker might have laid out different facts of their interactions with Sagan, but their stories were all the same. He was one of a kind in his ability to talk to people of all ages and backgrounds and inspire in them the desire to know more about where we came from.”

Other outlets that ran stories included the Cornell Chronicle (Sagan was a professor of astronomy at the university), ABC News, Mashable, The Examiner, Roll Call, Mother Jones, Scienceline and space.com.

Also going public in November – on public display that is – was the Library’s Nicolay copy of the Gettysburg Address, which is presumed to be the first draft of the historical document. (The Library also has the presumed second draft.) The exhibit also marked the 150th anniversary of the famous speech.

The Washington Post featured a transcription of the entire speech. The Baltimore Sun featured a picture slideshow, with a variety of images from the Library of Congress, including the Gettysburg Address on display.

Library curator Michelle Krowl spoke with PBS Newshour in commemoration of the address’s anniversary. “What you see is that Lincoln worked on the address in Washington first, and then probably got to Gettysburg and changed his mind about the ending. So you can think about what might have inspired Lincoln to change that ending about a new birth of freedom and a government of the people, by the people and for the people.”

CNN talked about the work that goes into preserving such a document. “To protect their two copies of the Gettysburg Address, preservationists there [Library of Congress] fabricated custom cases with gaskets that purge all of the oxygen around the document and replace it with inert argon gas. When you take away the oxygen, you take away the potential of oxidation, which can erode the delicate original material.”

Countless other news outlets – broadcast and print, local and national – covered the anniversary and referenced the Library’s copies of the address.

Other preservation efforts of the Library include maintaining the largest comic-book collection in the United States, with more than 11,000 titles and over 130,000 single issues. David Dissanayake of bleedingcool.com came to the Library to talk with the curators of the collection and check out some of its most treasured items.

“Knowing that there is an institution collecting and preserving comics for future generations puts my mind at ease. … Preserving comics is such an important undertaking, not only for comics as a medium, but for our culture and for history itself.”

Speaking of preserving items of historical value, the Library in November announced a collaboration with WGBH Boston to preserve a collection of American public radio and television content, dating back through the 1950s.

It was covered by was the Associated Press, the Huffington Post, Broadcasting & Cable and The Boston Globe.

Finally, an article poking a little fun at today’s “selfie” (self-portrait), highlighted an interesting find at the Library.

“Although its current rampant incarnation is quite recent, the ‘selfie’ is far from being a strictly modern phenomenon,” wrote The Public Domain Review. “In fact, the picture considered by many to be the first photographic portrait ever taken was a ‘selfie.’ The image in question was taken in 1839 by an amateur chemist and photography enthusiast from Philadelphia named Robert Cornelius.”

(The “selfie” in question is part of the Library’s historical photograph collections.)

Picking up the story were websites Neatorama, Open Culture, i09 and Fast Company.

A Temperate Nation

Today marks the 80th anniversary of the end of Prohibition. On Dec. 5, 1933, the United States repealed the nationwide prohibition on alcoholic beverages, by ratifying the 21st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. And, while the masses may have raised their glasses, there were certainly those among them not happy with the decision. Temperance activists championed Prohibition because they felt alcohol was a social ill.

Kansas became the first state to outlaw alcohol, in its constitution, in 1881. Enter Carrie Nation – talk about someone you’d want on your team in a bar brawl. Nation was a hatchet-wielding, 6-foot tall, 175-pound weapon of mass destruction who left the dust and rubble of early 20th-century saloons in her wake. A staunch supporter of the temperance movement, Nation was arrested some 30 times for her position against alcohol. Talk about an axe to grind!

On Dec. 27, 1900, Nation brought her campaign to Wichita, Kan., where she smashed the bar at the Carey Hotel. This first public demonstration kicked off her harangue on hooch, which continued for 10 years. But her public protests didn’t stop there … Nation stood on her soapbox against foreign goods, corsets, tobacco, fraternal orders and, most importantly, short skirts. According to the Kansas State Historical Society, as her anti-alcohol activities became widely known, many barrooms adopted the slogan “All Nations Welcome But Carrie.”

Nation died in 1911, before Prohibition became a national law with the enactment of the 18th Amendment in January 1920. A story on her death in the Lincoln County Leader, Sept. 1, 1911, carried a sub-headline that read “Saloon Smashing Made Her Famous – She Realized a Fortune Hatchets.” (Apparently she made a good deal of money selling souvenir hatchets.)

“During her career Mrs. Nation
wrecked hundreds of saloons, using a 
hatchet, which became as well known
 as she. She was absolutely with out
fear, invading saloons, demolishing 
mirrors and furniture and assailing 
bartenders and proprietors without re
gard for her own safety. She had 
many narrow escapes from injury and
 was roughly handled on several occasions.”

A Celebration of Mexico: A Champion of Reform

The Library of Congress has the largest collection of Hispanic materials in the world, including rare items of Mexican origin. Next Thursday and Friday, the institution is hosting a special “Celebration of Mexico” to take a look at some of these items and to also honor Hispanic and Mexican heritage. As part of the celebration, several of the institution’s curators have highlighted a few of the Library’s most treasured artifacts in a series of brief webcasts.

Bartolomé de Las Casas is known throughout history for his stand on the rights of native Americans. The Library holds several of his writings in his collections, including this book to inform the Spanish Crown that officials and landowners in the New World were behaving cruelly toward their indigenous subjects and to plead for redress. His book had an enormous impact, prompting Emperor Charles V to recognize the humanity of indigenous peoples and to issue the New Laws of the Indies in 1542, ending the absolute power of individual Spaniards.

Library of Congress Hispanic Division specialist Barbara Tenenbaum shares insights into the history of the early Americas and Dominican priest and social reformer Bartolomé de las Casas.

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“A Celebration of Mexico,” a two-day conference and accompanying display at the Library of Congress, will open on December 12, the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a popular national holiday in Mexico. For more information and more videos, visit the website.