Category Archives: Exhibits

Information about our exhibits

Autumn Exhibit 2024: Alchemy, Spiritualism, and Witchcraft

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woodblock image of two older women in dresses stirring a cauldron as a third figure flies in on a broom and a cat jumps towards them while rats and a snake scurry in front.
“Soul-Killing Witches” image from the frontispiece of the 1928 edition of Robert Calef’s _The Wonders of the Invisible World Displayed_

When our university’s mascot is a spider, it’s not surprising that the return of autumn has us excited for all things fall – football, leaves changing color, and all the spooky things the season brings with it.  In previous blog posts, we have explored some of the materials that we have in the collections, including items related to tales of folklore, witchcraft and spiritualism.

A new exhibit on display in Boatwright Memorial Library through mid-November focuses on similar themes as it highlights some of the Galvin Rare Book Room holdings on alchemy, spiritualism, and witchcraft.  Included are some new additions during the past couple of years that add to the depth of the materials available for research on this topic.  

Many of our witchcraft-related materials were highlighted in an earlier post from 2021, including the newly acquired Del Congresso Notturnao… and the artist book by Raeleen Kao, The Witch is Inside of Me, as well as our 1746 first edition of Augustin Calmet’s Dissertations sur les apparitions… with his thoughts on sorcery, demons, and vampires. Similarly, some of our works on spiritualism also had their moment on the blog as well that same fall.

The exhibit also showcases 3 works on alchemy, which have not been highlighted as of yet. These items point to a particularly fascinating time in history during which the science of alchemy – for it was considered a science based on the transformation of matter – as well as offering researchers an opportunity to explore its philosophies.  Let’s look at these 3 items in a bit more detail.

Thomas Norton, The Ordinall of Alchemy, 1929 (Galvin Rare Book Room QD25 .N6 1652)

Norton was a noted 15th-century alchemist and served as a member of King Edward IV’s Privy Council. He believed the knowledge of alchemy could only be learned by working with a master alchemist, and his Ordinall, a long poem, he provides an account of his own initiation into the art and science of alchemy. Originally written in 1477, the Ordinall was one of the earliest works on alchemy in Middle English and became one of the most influential as it sought to educate English readers on this “new science.” Its first appearance in print in 1652, and the copy in the collection is a 1929 facsimile of that 1652 edition.

Martin Ruland, Lexicon Alchemiæ, 1661 (Galvin Rare Book Room QD25 .R9 1661)

Martin Ruland the Elder (1532-1602) was a German scientist and alchemist who practiced the beliefs put forward by fellow scientist Paracelsus, who pioneered the use of chemicals and minerals in medicine.  Born in 1569, Martin Ruland the Younger followed in his father’s path to become a noted physician and alchemist in his own right. For a time, Ruland the Younger served at the Hapsburg court under Emperor Rudolf II.  The combined knowledge of father and son allowed them to develop a foundational and exhaustive dictionary of alchemical symbols, concepts, and terms, first published in 1612.

Johann Rudolh Glauber, Tractus de Natura Salium, 1658 (Galvin Rare Book Room QD27 .C58 1658)

Born in Germany in 1604, Johann Rudolf Glauber worked in both Amsterdam and the German states as a self-described chemical philosopher. Known for his invention and refinements of scientific equipment such as his distillatory furnaces, he also worked in the wine industry and as a dispenser of medicines.  One account of Glauber’s practical work was in his book, Furni novi philosophici, in which he described materials and processes for constructing and using his chemical furnaces. Other published works included a collection of medial preparations (Pharmacopoea spagyrica)and his Teutschlands-Wohlfahrt. In 1658, he published the small book Tractus de natura salium, in which he discussed the importance of sal mirabile (“miraculous salt,” which became known as Glauber’s salt) for its medicinal properties.

Galvin Rare Book Room Works on Exhibit

  • Charles Beecher, Spiritual Manifestations (1879)
  • August Calmet, Dissertations sur les apparitions des anges, des demons et des esprits: et sur les revenans et vampires de Hongrie…. (1746)
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The New Revelation (1918)
  • Samuel Fowler, Salem Witchcraft: Comprising More Wonders of the Invisible World by Robert Calef & Wonders of the Invisible World by Cotton Mather (1865)
  • Johann Rudolf Glauber, Tractatus de Natura Salium (1658)
  • Raeleen Kao, The Witch is Inside Me, (2018)
  • Jeinrich Kramer & Jacob Sprenger, Malleus Maleficarum (1958)
  • Thomas Norton, The Ordinall of Alchemy (1929)
  • Martin Ruland, Lexicon Alchemiæ (1661)
  • Sir Walter Scott, Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft (1841)
  • Girolamo Tartarotti, Del Congresso notturno delle lammie… (1749)

Fall 2024 Exhibit: Come Sail Away!

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As the new semester begins, the Book Arts, Archives, & Rare Books division at Boatwright Memorial Library is pleased to announce a specialized exhibit that highlights a distinctive component of its rare book and archival collections: maritime-related materials. Many of these items, which reside in the Galvin Rare Book Room & Archives, have been acquired largely through the generous endowment of the Beverly Lyle Britton Fund. Beverly Lyle Britton, an esteemed alumnus of Richmond College (Class of 1935), devoted much of his professional life to service in the United States Navy, where he held notable positions including Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Navy and Press Liaison. Established following Britton’s passing in 1995, the fund is dedicated to procuring materials that pertain specifically to the United States Navy, maritime history, and the sea. This ongoing financial support has enabled the library to continuously enhance its collection with annual acquisitions.

The current exhibit, titled Come Sail Away, offers a curated selection of the library’s maritime-themed holdings, providing a window into the breadth and depth of the collection. This exhibit serves not only as a sampling of the diversity of the library’s resources but also as an invitation to students, faculty, staff, and the broader academic community to engage with and explore these valuable materials for research and scholarship. The exhibit is located on level 2 of Boatwright Library, just outside the administrative offices.

Below is a list of the exhibit’s categories and some of the corresponding materials on display that are available for use through the Galvin Rare Book Room & Archives. For a more comprehensive exploration of the library’s rare book holdings, we encourage the use of the online catalog—pro tip: select the “Rare Books” tab to focus your search on materials housed in the Galvin Rare Book Room. Additionally, searching for “Britton” will yield results for items procured through the Britton Fund. Archival materials are accessible through the ArchivesSpace database, where new and updated content is continually integrated as it becomes available.

Ships & Ship Life

  • David M. Clinger, Romantick & Whimsical Words of the Sea and of Sailing-ships Stingray Point, VA: 2004.  MS-35 David M. Clinger Collection, Box 26 This miniature book was hand-set in well-work Garamond foundry type and printed on the antique press of Chesapeake Bay Retriever and Sandy Bottom News at Stingray Point Farm, Stingray Point, Virginia. This first edition was limited to 20 copies.
  • Herman Melville, Moby Dick: or, The Whale New York: Norton, 1976 Illustrated by Warren Chappell, Richmond College Class of 1926 — 50th Anniversary Class Gift from the Class of 1926
  • Frank Shay, ed. Iron Men & Wooden Ships: Deep Sea Chanties Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page, & Co., 1924 In 1920, Shay opened a tiny bookshop where he both sold and published books. The initial volume of this work was published by Shay in 1921, then this expanded edition was picked up and published by Doubleday in 1924. (Note: This book is a newly acquired work that is in the process of being cataloged into the collection.)

Latitude & Longitude

  • Matthew Fontaine Maury, A New Theoretical and Practical Treatise on Navigation: in which the auxiliary branches of mathematics and astronomy, comprised of algebra, geometry,…. variation of the compass, etc., are treated of. Also the theory and most simple methods of finding time, latitude, and longitude…..  Philadelphia: Key & Biddle, 1836 Inscribed by the author. Maury was a naval officer and oceanographer and considered one of the founding pioneers of modern oceanography. This work was his first published book, completed at the age of 30 after participating in three extended voyages, including the first circumnavigation of the globe by a U.S. Navy vessel. Maury served as the head of the United States Naval Observatory from 1844-1861.
  • William Whiston, The Longitude discovered by the eclipses, occultations, and conjunctions of Jupiter’s planets: with descriptions of those refracting and reflecting telescopes… that are useful for the discovery of longitude both at land and sea… London: Printed for John Whiston at Boyle’s Head, Fleet Street, 1738  Instrumental in helping pass the British Longitude Act of 1714, Whiston spent a considerable amount of time working on the problem of longitude. This first-edition work explains the various instruments and experiments Whiston explored in his attempts.

Sea-faring Adventures

  • Hamilton M. Baskerville, My Cruise Diary: North Cape & Russia Cruise, 1931  Richmond: Whittet & Shepperson, 1932. Privately printed for the author for distribution among his friends, #62/200. This work is inscribed by the author: “For the library of the University of Richmond, presented by the author, alumnus, 1899-1900.”
  • Frank I. Wilson, Sketches of Nassau… Raleigh, NC, 1864 Teacher, reporter, and writer, Frank Wilson of North Carolina published this work documenting his travels to Nassau in 1864 aboard a blockade-runner.

Exploring the South Pacific

  • Alexander Dalrymple, An Historical Collection of Several Voyages & Discoveries in the South Pacific Ocean London: Printed for the author and sold by J. Nourse, bookseller in ordinary to his majesty, 1770-1771 This important collection, published in two volumes in 1770-1771, contains accounts of notable Iberian and Dutch voyages in the southern hemisphere, translated and edited by Alexander Dalrymple (1737-1808). Hydrographer to the Admiralty from 1795, Dalrymple produced this work as part of his research into the belief at the time that there existed an undiscovered continent in the South Pacific. These volumes were intended to demonstrate the knowledge of the region to date. The first volume covers sixteenth-century Spanish and Portuguese voyages, beginning with Ferdinand Magellan and including those of Juan Fernández, Álvaro de Mendaña y Neira, and Pedro Fernandes de Queirós. The second volume contains the seventeenth- and eighteenth- century Dutch voyages of Jacob le Maire and William Schouten, and Abel Tasman.
  • Rockwell Kent, Voyaging Southward from the Strait of Magellan New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1924 Graphic artist and avid traveler Rockwell Kent takes readers on an illustrated adventure of his sailing the southern tip of South America, dramatically illustrated with the author’s woodcuts.

Artist Book

  • Jessica Spring, Fathoming  Tacoma, WA: Springtide Press, 2015 Book Arts Collection #37 From the colophon: “”[L]etterpress printed with handset Latin Condensed and Bernhar Gothic with vintage maritime cuts. The edition includes a varied copy for each of the seven seas, featuring collectible tobacco cards sold with packages of cigarettes from 1924-37. Printed by Jessica Spring and bound in an adaptation of Hedi Kyle’s flag book structure with Japanese maritime maps from 1945 [on exterior of concertina spine]. [Drop-spine] boxes bound and portholes scuttled by Gabby Cooksey. Removable flags are held in place with sewing rather than attached to concertina spine (as in the traditional flag book binding by Hedi Kyle). Concertina attached at either end to blue cloth over boards with three circular cut-outs in each, displaying illustrations and the title. Spine is letterpress printed with various nautical terms and their definitions on recto, with historic maritime maps on verso.”

Manuscript Material

  • SC-1: Ship’s Log of Whaling Journeys (1850s) This manuscript documents at least four different voyages during the 1850s, although the entries record varying levels of detail. Many are dated and often include the longitude and latitude of the vessel as well as information about the weather. The intent of the various sailings was clear, no matter the ship: they were hunting whales. On September 4, 1858, for example, the author documented that the crew “saw a very large school of sperm whale which is something uncommon in this latitude and longitude. Sketches and drawings of whales highlight some pages, especially when their hunt was successful.  In fact, the main image on our blog is from this manuscript! 

From Curiosity to Codex: A Voyage Through Natural History Illustration

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In collaboration with the Virginia Museum of Natural History, Boatwright Memorial Library’s Science Librarian, Heather Ervin, and Rare Books and Special Collections have put together a new exhibit case on the second floor of the library themed around visual science communication. Visual science communication is used in order to teach scientific ideas in a visual manner. This often means that scientists and artists must work together in order to create an educational piece of scientific visualization. Common representations of visual science communication are textbook depictions of nature, photographs, and videos.

            Scientific visualization has changed greatly over the years. Even 30,000 years ago, human beings made cave paintings of animals that they came into contact with. Although art historians and scientists alike are unsure what the intent was behind these scientific artworks from the Paleolithic period, we are able to conclude that by rendering human forms, plant life, and animals in a scientific manner with pinpoint accuracy became important to the teaching and learning of not only art, but science as well. These two areas of study revolved around each other, and it would be difficult in many regards to separate the two.

            With the invention of the printing press, scientists were able to share and spread knowledge of animals and plants much more easily, and with the ability to print drawings of the animals and plants discussed in the texts, anyone who possessed the book could now have an image of the specimen in their minds. This trend of visual science communication continues to this day.

            The exhibit in collaboration with the VMNH honors this culture of visualizing science by incorporating preserved specimens from their collection, including a snapping turtle, box turtle, viper, cowfish, fence lizard, spotted salamander, rattlesnake rattles, and seahorses. In addition to the physical specimens provided by the museum, the Rare Books Room has provided several books with drawings of similar specimens in text. 

            As our world becomes increasingly digital, it is still important to preserve physical objects that communicate visual science. The digital world does, however, continue this tradition of visual science communication in an accessible manner, which not only helps those who are trying to learn about a particular science, but also preserves the trend of visualizing science for generations to come.

We appreciate the opportunity to work with the Virginia Museum of Natural History, with special thanks to Marshall and Arianna.

Books displayed: 

The animal kingdom, arranged according to its organization… by P. A. Latreille and Georges Cuvier. QL45 .C944 v.2

Brehm’s illustriertes Thierleben fur Volk und Schule; bearbeitet von Fredrick Schodler by Alfred Edmund Brehm and Friedrich Schoedler. QL 605.4 .S22 1897 v.3

Animate creation; popular edition of “Our living world”… by J. G. Wood and Joseph B. Holder. QL 50 .W882 1885

Popular zoology by Joel Dorman Steele and J. W. P. Jenks. QL 48 .S8 1887

The Riverside natural history… by J. S. Kingsley and Friedrich von Hellwald. QL 45 .K56 1888 v.3

For further reading, check out the libguide made by Heather Ervin at  https://libguides.richmond.edu/bio_display_SP24, and consider reading Visual Science Communication: Learn About It. (n.d.). Guild of Natural Science Illustrators at https://www.gnsi.org/visual-scicomm. 

Freaky Folklore: Witchy Origins

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For centuries, folktales have been used to guide (or spook) children into being good little boys and girls. There are countless stories of ghouls, goblins, trolls, and witches eating, stealing, or maiming children throughout many different cultures. The subject matter is the most simple and classic trope one could have throughout literature: good versus evil. The children often represent a pure and curious innocence, and the monstrous creatures within the stories represent the corruption of souls. Throughout these tales, the children often leave the comfort of their homes, knowing that they were not supposed to do so or at least being aware of the dangers that lurk on the outskirts of their community. After they have left, they are hunted by or stumble upon these creatures. The children have to find a clever way out of becoming victims to the evil ways of the creature they are up against, as many children have before them. These stories are prevalent in communities across the globe to read to children as they grow up, hoping to imbue them with concepts of goodness, obedience, and hope while warning them of the nature of evil.

The stories of the Brothers Grimm are likely the most recognizable of these folktales, but there are varieties of stories from Japanese, Norse, Russian, and many more cultures that fall into this category. When selecting books for the children’s folklore aspect of this exhibit, it became clear that the genre was incredibly varied. Stories weren’t just about one type of creature, and often, the creatures changed from region to region. Regardless of which creature was most prevalent within the culture, they all represented negative characteristics. Greed, laziness, hatred of others, self-isolation, trickery, and violence are by and large the most repeated traits from the stories we have in our collection. These vices may seem simple, and perhaps they are. We are all warned when we are children to be good, to be kind. The simplification of evil was deliberate. Some stories (like the Brothers Grimm) have more intense elements that we today might not deem suitable for children, but the origins of these stories are much more sinister than what the stories portray to children.

The theme of guiding others away from moral depravity was not just limited to children’s fiction literature and folktales, but indeed have origins in the treatises on the very serious crimes of witchcraft. Dark magic is hinted at within children’s literature, but the intense hold that the fear of witchcraft and devil-worship had on not only Americans, but communities across the oceans as well, was far from written about in these children’s texts. During the 17th and 18th centuries, it was believed that those who practiced witchcraft had powers to transform into other creatures, or that they transformed as a result of their sinister devotion to the devil, a consequence of evil within their hearts. The infamous witch trials of these centuries were at the forefront of the minds of the author’s who would end up writing stories of witches for children in later centuries. Even after the popularity of witch trials waned, the stories of the things that go bump in the night continued to be told. The Galvin Rare Books Room has in its collection a 1928 copy of the 1489 translation of the Malleus Maleficarum, which serves as a great example of the origins of witchcraft literature and stories of devil-worship under patronage of the church (in fact, written by a man of the cloth himself). This text, as well as Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft (from 1841) and The Discoverie of Witchcraft (from 1930), all describe women as being the primary users of dark magic. These witches were to blame for the moral depravity in the community, and the church would show people how to avoid such sinful behavior. 

Church authority dominated the role of moral guide, but as the centuries passed, so did the authority of religion. Who, then, would guide the children into doing rightly? It may be argued that this role passed to the authors of children’s literature. Parents could read these simplified stories to their children, simultaneously entertaining them and reminding them of what to do and what not to do. This transition of power might provoke a few questions to think about. What authority has guided you to do rightly? Is it religion? Family? Perhaps, it is much less simple. Perhaps, we are guided by and away from our greatest fears, whether it be creatures that lurk within the dark, misty woods or the very darkness that lurks within our own souls. 

For further reading on the subject of folklore and fairy tale origins, consider reading Werewolves, Witches, and Wandering Spirits: Traditional Belief and Folklore in Early Modern Europe by Kathryn A. Edwards.

Edwards, Kathryn A., ed. Werewolves, Witches, and Wandering Spirits: Traditional Belief and Folklore in Early Modern Europe. Vol. 62. Penn State University Press, 2002. https://doi.org/10.5325/j.ctv1c9hp4x.

For more information on how folklore affects children and their educational development in the early 20th century, read Gudren Thomsen-Thorne’s “The Educational Value of Fairy-Stories and Myths.” 

Thorne-Thomsen, Gudrun. “The Educational Value of Fairy-Stories and Myths.” The Elementary School Teacher 4, no. 3 (1903): 161–67. http://www.jstor.org/stable/993304.

For more information on moral lessons within dark fairy tales and folklore, consider reading “Peasants Tell Tales: The Meaning of Mother Goose” in The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History by Robert Darnton published in 1984. 


List of Items Displayed:

  • The Goblin Spider PZ8.1 .G63 1899
  • Fairy Tales from Grimm / edited and with an introduction by Hamilton W. Mabie. Pictures and decorations by Ethel Franklin Betts. PZ8.G882 Fl
  • Fairy Tales of the Grimm Brothers / Decorated by Aldren Watson for the Peter Pamper press. PZ8.G882 F
  • Fifteen Norse Tales / by Sir George Dasent ; selected by E. E. Reynolds ; illustrated by Doris Pailthorpe. PZ8 .A89 Fi 1931
  • Russian Fairy Tales: illustrations by A. Alexeieff. PZ8 .A26 Ru
  • The Princess and the Goblin / by George Macdonald ; illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith. PZ8 .M1754 P
  • Malleus Maleficarum / translated with an introduction, bibliography and notes by the Rev. Montague Summers. BF1569 .A2 I5 1928
  • The Discoverie of Witchcraft / by Reginald Scot; with an introduction by the Rev. Montague Summers. BF1565 .S4 1930
  • Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft / Addressed to J. G. Lockhart, Esq., by Sir Walter Scott, Bart. BF1531 .S5 1841
  • Pierio Valeriano’s Hieroglyphica PJ1093 .V3 1594

The Books Behind ‘Barbenheimer’

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This summer gave way to the cultural phenomenon that was ‘Barbenheimer,’ which can be best described as the seemingly bizarre comparison between two feature films, Barbie and Oppenheimer. Both of these films were released on the same day in July, and many expected them to be the two best films of 2023. On the surface, Barbie and Oppenheimer could not be more different from one another, Barbie being a comedic film about children’s toys finding a way to enter the real world and Oppenheimer being a drama about the man behind the creation of the atomic bomb. When creating this exhibit, we wanted to find common ground between these two films through textual evidence within our collection here in the University of Richmond’s Galvin Rare Books Room and show that perhaps within the American experience, ‘Barbenheimer’ is not such a bizarre concept. 

When selecting books for the Barbie portion of the exhibit, we aimed to have a blend of Mattel produced items as well as philosophical discussions on how Barbie has affected society and where exactly the toy originated from. Our 1964 edition of Barbie’s Easy as Pie Cookbook published by Mattel is without a doubt a gem of this exhibit. In addition to the cookbook and a Barbie doll herself, we’ve featured two more modern books that go further into detail on not only who created Barbie, in Barbie and Ruth, but also how the concept of Barbie as an ideal woman with the power to pursue anything she dreamed might have consequences on our society, in The Good, the Bad, and the Barbie. These three books offer a glimpse into the philosophy behind Barbie directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Margot Robbie as Barbie and Ryan Gosling as Ken. The film is very introspective despite being a comedy, and it shows how Mattel has constructed a seemingly perfect image of Barbie that might unintentionally strike questions of living a purposeful life and dealing with the consequences of having human flaws. Mattel’s Barbie’s Easy as Pie Cookbook falls in line with this image of easy-going perfection, and our other two book selections begin to peel back the curtain in many of the same ways that Gerwig’s film does.

The Galvin Rare Books room did have quite a few illuminating works when we began to put together the Oppenheimer portion of the exhibit. The film, directed by Christopher Nolan and starring Cillian Murphy, highlights the life of Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer and his work on the Manhattan Project, which produced the uranium and plutonium atomic bombs. It also showcases the aftermath of the project and how Dr. Oppenheimer went on to push against the production of the hydrogen bombs, expressing concern for the morality of killing hundreds of thousands of people once again. We wanted to not only feature Dr. Oppenheimer’s work, but to showcase the lasting effects of the Manhattan Project and American perspectives on nuclear warfare. The two books that are particularly fascinating are Nobody Wants A Nuclear War and Hearings Regarding Communist Infiltration of Radiation Laboratory and Atomic Bomb Project at UC Berkley. Nobody Wants A Nuclear War is a children’s picture book written in 1986 describing how frightened children were that because of the constant threats between the United States and the USSR, another atomic bomb would be dropped. Instead of the war being on foreign ground, the children were scared it would be where they lived. This book is particularly striking in relation to the mental consequences that nuclear warfare had on generations to come, even forty years after the atomic bombs were dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, and it shows how the effects of war become more real when they threaten you instead of your enemy. The second work is the transcript of hearings in which a government appointed investigation interviews many important figures who worked on the atomic bomb projects throughout World War II, including General Groves who spearheaded the military portion of the project as well as Dr. Frank Oppenheimer, Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer’s brother. The interviews were conducted in order to investigate who leaked top-secret information to the USSR or to communist parties within the United States. These two rare items in our collection highlight the long-lasting effects of nuclear warfare in the mind of Americans, and they express a feeling of mistrust and doubt over the decisions that the government had made in the past.

The Barbenheimer exhibit aims to foster thorough questioning of the American experience in many of the same ways that Barbie and Oppenheimer aim to do as well. As you peruse the exhibit, consider whether or not these films and books of the cultural phenomenon of ‘Barbenheimer’ seem all that different. In both of our Barbie and Oppenheimer themes, it is clear that an existential doubt emerges: what is the purpose of consumption and creation? What consequences do my actions and my life bring? If I aim to bring good to the world, will good come after me? 

List of items displayed:

  • Barbie’s Easy as Pie Cookbook PZ10.L39 Ba 1964
  • The Good, the Bad, and the Barbie NK4894.3.B37 S76 2010
  • Barbie and Ruth NK4894.2.H324 G47 2009
  • Robert Oppenheimer QC16 .O62 M66 2013
  • Hearings Regarding Shipment of Atomic Material to the Soviet Union during World War II E743.5 .U4 1950 
  • Nobody Wants a Nuclear War PZ7.V67 No 1986 p. “Sometimes i’m scared”
  • Three Poems for Now PS3523.I648 T4 1972 
  • Hearings Regarding Communist Infiltration of Radiation Laboratory and Atomic Bomb Project at UC Berkeley E743.5 .U64 1949 
  • Three Lectures on Atomic Physics QC173 .S53 1926

Walker Symposium this week

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(Note: This post was authored by Taylor McNeilly, Processing & Reference Archivist.) Hi all, and welcome to another #WyattWalkerWednesday. This week I wanted to give a quick sneak peek of the exhibit we’re putting together for the Walker symposium – which starts this afternoon at the University of Virginia! Please check out the video below, which discusses the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection, its importance at large, and its importance to the University of Richmond.


Wyatt Tee Walker and the Politics of Black Religion from University of Richmond on Vimeo.


The symposium’s website can be found here, which includes a full schedule of the talks from this afternoon through Friday afternoon. The symposium will wrap up with a short reception Friday evening.

Throughout the Thursday and Friday events here at the University of Richmond, the Rare Books and Special Collections staff will be holding a small exhibit of materials from the collection. The items chosen will align with the symposium’s theme, and should add an extra depth to the experience for attendees.

Items that will be on exhibit include a selection of Dr. Walker’s published works that focus on the Black religious experience and its role in politics, including the role of music in the Civil Rights Movement. Some manuscript material will be available to view as well.

Due to the symposium and exhibit, the Rare Book Room will be closed to appointments Thursday afternoon and all of Friday. Regular open hours will be observed this week and next, however, and we are always reachable via email or phone. As a reminder, the portions of the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection that are available online can be found through our Preservica website. This includes the inventory of Dr. Walker’s sermons, which are themselves only available on-site.

We hope to see you at the symposium!

Wyatt Tee Walker and the Politics of Black Religion Symposium

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(Note: This post was authored by Taylor McNeilly, Processing & Reference Archivist.)  Hi all, and welcome back to #WyattWalkerWednesday! I know it’s been awhile since we posted last, and I promise we’ve been hard at work behind the scenes, processing the collection and answering questions. I’ll have an update later next month about that, but I wanted to take this week’s post to discuss an upcoming symposium happening in about three weeks.

In a similar vein to the previous symposium, held in the fall of 2018, the Wyatt Tee Walker and the Politics of Black Religion symposium will use Dr. Walker’s life, work, and legacy as a starting point. This symposium, as the name suggests, focuses on the interconnected worlds of black religion and politics, especially through the lens of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s through today. One such thread that may be of particular interest to long-time blog readers is the role of music in both arenas, a topic that was deeply significant to Dr. Walker and his work.

Scholars will be coming from as far afield as Reed College in Portland, Oregon, and will be held across three days. The first day is hosted at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, while the second and third days are hosted here on campus. And of course, the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection will be there: there will be an exhibit of pieces from the collection throughout the third day.

The symposium will be held February 19-21 and is free to attend with no advanced registration required. For more information on the speakers, schedule, and other details, please visit the symposium’s website.

The Walker Collection and South Africa Week

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(Note: This post was authored by Taylor McNeilly, Processing & Reference Archivist.) Next week the University of Richmond will be celebrating International Education Week with activities all week focused on South Africa. Given Dr. Walker’s close relationship with President Nelson Mandela, we knew we had to get in on the action! For this #WyattWalkerWednesday, I’ll be giving you a sneak peek into some of our activities for South Africa Week, but make sure to stop by campus next week to get in on all the fun!

Perhaps the most important role that the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection will play during South Africa Week will be during the Illuminated Tree Walk. Trees hold a special place in South African tradition and culture, and a large part of this event is intended to respect that tradition. The path of the walk begins at the International Center at 5pm and ends at the Heilman Dining Center, where a special dinner is being offered. Along the walk will be pop-up stations highlighting various aspects of South African culture and history. Some of these stations will explore themes such as justice, reconciliation, commemoration, and environmental stewardship. One such station will be manned by Rare Books Special Collections staff, and will focus on Dr. Walker, President Mandela, and the role of the U.S. civil rights movement in anti-apartheid.

Nelson Mandela speaks at Canaan Baptist Church of Christ in Harlem as a guest of Dr. Walker during his first official visit to the U.S. as President of South Africa.

As a special setup, the Walker Collection station will include not just a table on which materials from the collection highlighting the previously mentioned themes will sit, but also a projector and screen setup showing digitized images from the collection. These images are taken from a photo album documenting President Nelson Mandela’s trip to Canaan Baptist Church of Christ as a guest of Dr. Walker. This visit was part of President Mandela’s first official visit to the United States and was perhaps a capstone in his relationship with Dr. Walker, who had been an outspoken anti-apartheid activist both domestically and internationally.

For more information about Dr. Walker’s ties to U.S. and South African anti-apartheid work, as well as to view more of the images documenting President Mandela’s visit to Dr. Walker’s Harlem church, come by the Illuminated Tree Walk next Wednesday at 5pm! And as always, check back here for more updates on the collection and its status as we continue to work on opening it to the public.

The Rescheduled Wyatt Tee Walker Symposium

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(Note: This post was authored by Taylor McNeilly, Processing & Reference Archivist.) The Wyatt Tee Walker Symposium originally scheduled for Thursday, September 13 and canceled due to Hurricane Florence has now been officially rescheduled! I’ll take this week’s #WyattWalkerWednesday post to discuss some details and how it pertains to the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection.

Originally announced during the second memorial held in honor of Dr. Walker at Gillfield Baptist Church in Petersburg, VA by President Crutcher, the Wyatt Tee Walker Symposium will consist of a panel of speakers, a keynote address, and a special preview exhibition of materials from the collection. Since its announcement, the event has become the first major event of UR’s School of Arts & Sciences yearlong theme of Contested Spaces: Race, Nation, and Conflict. The event is hosted by the Office of the President, the Office of the Provost, and the School of Arts & Sciences.

The panel will consist of four speakers: Corey Walker, Vice President, Dean and Professor of Religion and Society at Virginia Union University; Chris Dorsey, President of Higher Education & Leadership Ministries of the Christian Church Disciples of Christ; Laura Browder, Professor of American Studies; and Thad Williamson, Associate Professor of Leadership Studies and Philosophy, Politics, Economics, and Law. Each panelist brings a different area of expertise that Dr. Walker’s life has touched on, including activism, theology, civil rights, urban development, and more. The keynote speaker will be Dr. Joseph Evans, Dean of the Morehouse School of Religion and Senior Pastor of Mount Carmel Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. Dr. Evans was also a Walker Scholar and close friend of Dr. and Mrs. Walker. He also conducted our oral history with the Walkers in 2016, which is believed to be the final recorded interview with Dr. Walker.

To support this symposium and help provide some material context for the life and work of Dr. Walker, Boatwright Library Rare Books and Special Collections will be putting on a short “sneak preview” of the collection. This will include manuscript material as well as objects from the collection highlighting the work Dr. Walker did throughout his life. If you have any interest in what the collection holds and are in the area, this is a fantastic chance to get a quick look into the collection!

Besides this post, you can get additional details about the symposium – and register to attend the panel, keynote, or both – on the Wyatt Tee Walker Symposium webpage. And in the meantime, keep an eye on this space for more information about the Dr. and Mrs. Wyatt Tee Walker Collection, my progress in processing it, and what else the Rare Books and Special Collections is up to!

Other People’s Mail

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Working with archival material allows the researcher opportunities to learn about different places and other times.  Photographs of long-vanished buildings or reports of events long over are reminders of things no longer present.  But perhaps the most immediate, and occasionally the most poignant, way to immerse yourself into a different world is through reading other people’s mail.

Stacks of World War II letters

World War II Correspondence

Archival collections often contain a variety of correspondence, including business communications, official statements, organizational announcements, and academic inquiries.  For many researchers, however, it is personal correspondence that best brings the past to life.  When reading mail sent years or even centuries ago, one can’t help but try to fill in the gaps, to hunt for clues in deciphering the stories behind the penned or penciled words, seeking the individuals who wrote or received the letters.  Recently, the Rare Books & Special Collections division of Boatwright Memorial Library purchased a collection of more than 700 letters, the majority of them written during World War II.  The collection is a compilation of several different sets of correspondence.  Although connected by the time period, these different sets offer a view into the lives of many individuals, each with their own story to tell.

For example, one set of about 100 letters written on U.S. Navy letterhead share the story of a young couple named Paul and Charlotte.  Paul wrote almost daily between March and July 1944, and through his letters, readers come to know a bit about life in the Navy, the challenges of planning a wedding via correspondence, and enough of a hint about Charlotte’s world to spark curiosity.  A bit of research uncovered that Charlotte and her family were Jewish immigrants to the United States, having left Germany in 1934.

The largest set of correspondence in the collection are the approximately 250 letters written by George Orlikowski to his girlfriend, and later his wife, Mary Zyla Orlikowski, which cover the time between July 1942 and March 1945.  In addition to learning much about both of their lives, many of the envelopes and stationary are humorous by themselves.

World War II letter

Letter from George to Mary with code for salutations

In one letter written in December 1944, George offers a secret code to Mary so that she can know where he is at in the Pacific after he sails without the censor catching on to them; he indicated he would change which salutation he uses in his letters to her to identify his location. Even after more than 70 years, the letters still carry the scent of his cigarette smoke.

Perhaps the most intriguing series of correspondence in this collection are the variety of letters sent to Dorothy “Dot” Raynham, a female college student, by a variety of soldiers between 1942 and 1944. With at least fourteen different men writing her from nearly all branches of the military, these letters offer glimpses of military life as well as life on the home front for at least one college student and her family.  Whether it is a bomber pilot wistfully recalling their dance to a Glenn Miller tune or a sailor encouraging her in her schoolwork, the range of correspondents suggests there may be an interesting story about this particular moment in her life.

Reading other people’s mail in the archives offers a glimpse into the past, one way to bring history alive, for researchers of all types, including University of Richmond students.  This collection has already been utilized in several classes, including a Weekend College session doing hands-on history and a first-year seminar exploring a life in letters.  Materials from this collection as well as correspondence from other collections is currently on exhibit on the first floor of Boatwright Library through the end of April.