Post contributed by Soroush Marouzi, Research Scholar at the Center for the History of Political Economy.
In 1960, the political activist known throughout Japan by the pen name Reiji Himeoka sat in solitary confinement at Tokyo’s Sugamo Prison. By 1967, now publicly known by his birth name Masahiko Aoki, he had become an Assistant Professor of Economics at Stanford University. His life circumstances had changed drastically over those seven years, but not his desire to understand the world and change it for the better. Today, the Masahiko Aoki papers present rich resources for historians eager to delve deeper into his life and work.
Aoki (right) in conversation with his colleagues.
Aoki was born on April 1, 1938, in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, Japan. He initially intended to become a historian, but his growing interest in Marxism led him to pursue economics at the University of Tokyo. As an undergraduate, he emerged as a leading ideologue, describing himself as an “information propaganda director” of left-wing organizations at the forefront of Japan’s student movement that aimed to discourage the ruling conservative government to sign the revised US-Japan Security Treaty—activities that culminated in his arrest in 1960. After his release, he earned his undergraduate degree in 1962 and his master’s in 1964. After reading the work of Kenneth Arrow and Leonid Hurwicz during his graduate studies, he started to distance himself from Marxism and became increasingly interested in “modern economics.” He left Japan to pursue his PhD in economics at the University of Minnesota under Hurwicz and John Chipman, graduating in 1967 then holding appointments at Stanford and Harvard University over the next two years. Returning to Japan in 1969, he continued his academic career at Kyoto University until coming back to Stanford in 1984 and retiring in 2005. He died in 2015, having dedicated his career to studying forms of economic organizations and making contributions in the theory of the firm, corporate governance, and East Asian economies.
This digital photo of Aoki during an interview comes from a set among the electronic records in the collection.
Aoki’s papers are the most recently processed collection in the Economists’ Papers Archive, which also houses the collections of Arrow, Hurwicz, and Chipman. A substantial portion of this collection highlights Aoki’s role in shaping the economics profession by establishing institutions, such as the Virtual Center for Advanced Studies in Institution, and by leading influential organizations, exemplified by his presidency of the International Economic Association (IEA) from 2008-2011. There are also collection materials that offer insights into Aoki’s graduate education through handwritten notebooks; the production of his scholarly works on game theory through drafts and referee reports; his contribution to the development of the field of comparative institutional analysis through Stanford University Economics Department records; and his relationships and collaborations with economists such as Arrow, Joseph Stiglitz, and János Kornai through correspondence.
Janos Kornai’s email to Aoki, dated Dec 18, 2004, asking for Aoki’s consent to be nominated for IEA’s presidency. He eventually won by one vote–a significant moment in his career.
In his memoir, Aoki described his life as “a transboundary game.” He lived in both the East and West, and he embraced an interdisciplinary approach to studying economics. Crossing boundaries—whether geographical or disciplinary—was a defining feature of the life he led. His transboundary game was marked by constant attempts to understand institutional arrangements in economic life, along with his desire to improve them through tireless professional service. This joint pursuit was perhaps the dominant theme of his life, from his time as the Marxist ‘Reiji Himeoka’ until he became a Stanford emeritus professor of economics.
This black and white portrait of Aoki is an example from an album reflective in tone.
Post contributed by Ani Karagianis, Centennial Archivist, Duke University Archives.
[A small exhibit related to this blog post can be viewed near the Perkins Library service desk for the next month.]
Recently, the Rubenstein Library put up a small exhibit about the Greensboro Woolworth Sit-ins in February 1960. Since I participated in the creation of the exhibit, naturally, I wanted to look more into the early sit-ins and other movements of the early 1960s. It is here where I can say that there is a Duke angle to some subsequent events after the sit-ins. Duke angle #1: Professor William Chafe of the history department. Bill Chafe, who wrote a great book that I was able to devour during the holidays (Civilities and Civil Rights) interviewed three of the four members of the Greensboro Four: Ezell Blair Jr. (known as Jibreel Khazan), Joseph McNeil, and David Richmond. Rather than having me write about their interviews and their experiences of the sit-in, I have provided the readers with some snapshots of them speaking about their experiences in Greensboro, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, and the Woolworth sit-ins. These oral histories can be found in box two of the William Chafe Oral History collection.
Some good soundbites courtesy of these interviews:
Jibreel Khazan (labeled as “Jabriel Kajan”, 1974, speaking about his youth NAACP council and providing a little background of the idea behind the protest:
Joseph McNeill, 1978, reflecting on the movement the role of the Greensboro community:
David Richmond, 1972, providing a breakdown of the day’s plans:
Post contributed by Baylee Staufenbiel, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of History, Florida State University.
During my recent research visit to the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, I had the opportunity to work with the Duke University’s extensive holdings on medieval and early modern medicine. The highlight of my trip was Latin MS 182, a copy of the Pantegni Practica, a foundational medical text traditionally attributed to Constantine the African. The Pantegni is particularly significant as it one of the most comprehensive and well-known texts to synthesize Greco-Roman and Arabic medical knowledge. The Practica is interesting as it was never completed by Constantine. Various copies appeared, but current scholarship is unsure of the provenance of the additional chapters. The Rubenstein’s copy has some of these chapters that may have been compiled or written by his pupil Joannes Afflacius, who’s attribution is given to the accompanying treatise Liber Aureus. Figure One shows the table of contents of the Rubenstein’s Practica (33r).
Figure One: Pantegni Practica, 33r, Latin MS 182, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
As I worked with the Pantegni Practica, I really began to think about the roles of translators, manuscripts, prints, and productions. Constantine’s contribution to the spread of Arabic texts is undeniable. I have begun to think locations like Monte Cassino and Salerno as more than places of translation and transmission of texts. They are nodes for the establishment of epistemic authority. The texts, knowledges, and individuals that came from these locations constructed what would become medical and anatomical practice throughout the medieval and early modern periods.
The reliance on authoritative voices continued with my exploration of early modern sources. For example, in “On the Liver” (Sec. A Box 183, 1654-1677, England), I saw a compelling look at how seventeenth-century physicians balanced classical authority with contemporary anatomical findings. A Latin paragraph detailing liver striation was followed by an extensive English letter discussing Hippocrates, Galen, and early modern physicians’ beliefs about the structure and function of the liver. Shown in Figure Two, this text demonstrates the enduring influence of ancient medical models, even as new anatomical observations complicated long-held theories. The discussion of Rufus of Ephesus (70-110 CE) and Schenckius (likely Johannes Schenck von Grafenberg, 1530-1598) reinforced how early modern practitioners continued to situate their work alongside pre-existing medical authorities. The letter references humoral theory mentioning the relative temperature of the liver as well as the questions about its role in conception (notably Galen saw the liver, heart, and brain as the seat of the natural, animal, and vital souls respectively). As my research is focused on perceptions of the uterus, reading a meditation on the function of a specific organ further suggests that understandings of the internal body were constantly in flux, even for a well discussed structure like the liver.
Figure Two: “On the Liver,” David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University
My time at the Rubenstein Library was an incredible privilege. The collection provided invaluable access to texts that shaped medieval and premodern understandings of medicine and the body. Engaging with these manuscripts firsthand enriched my assessment and evaluation of these texts in my current research project. I am deeply grateful to the Rubenstein staff, curators, and archivists who made this trip possible.
Contributed by Dartricia Rollins, Visiting Librarian for Oral History at Emory University, Rose Library, and former Assistant Director of Charis Books and More.
With support from the Mary Lily Research Travel Grant program, I visited the Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture, and the Rubenstein Library, to spend time researching the Charis Books and More and Charis Circle collection. This allowed me to extend the digital campaign I started with my co-worker Saisha Gupta in 2023, “You Had to Be There,” into the Charis 50th celebration campaign in 2024, “take root among the stars.”
In early 2023, Saisha and I had the idea to highlight Charis’s history as “women’s history” for Women’s History Month in March. This required the quick and dedicated work of the archivists in the Rubenstein Library to locate and digitize dozens of Charis photos. In that process one photo stood out to us most: Octavia E. Butler, the author of many speculative fiction novels, most famously The Parable of the Sower.
Octavia Butler signs copies of her book Blood Child and Other Stories for eager readers at a table in Charis Books and More, Atlanta, GA, c. 1995. From the Charis Books and More and Charis Circle records, Rubenstein Library.
One thing to know about one of Charis’s current co-owners, Sara Look, is that Sara has the longest history with Charis, is meticulous, and likes to be accurate! So, when we tried to narrow down the dates for when Butler visited Charis, this became a year-long question.
I promise I am going somewhere with this.
This is what we knew for sure: Sara had in her possession a copy of Kindred: The 25th Anniversary edition, signed to Charis and we had photographic evidence of Butler being present in the store, but no date on the photo. Even after a phone call to co-founder Linda Bryant no one could remember the year, let alone the exact date of when the photo was taken. So, we decided that it was in the early 2000s based on the signed book.
When Sara and I visited the archives at the end of August 2024, our goal was to find photos of the many people who have contributed their love and talents to Charis over the years. We wanted to reflect on the almost 50 years of programming that has made Charis one of the most important queer and feminist cultural institutions in the South, and we wanted to share these memories and images back with not only the staff but the community in the form of postcards as keepsakes at our 50th celebration in November 2024.
What we found was that and so much more! As we pored over the hundreds of program flyers we found one that dated Octavia E. Butler’s first visit in 1995 in celebration of her book Blood Child and Other Stories! Discovering the 1995 Blood Child program flyer was exciting because it answered our question about Butler’s first visit to Charis and reinforced our decision to use the quote from Parable of the Sower as our 50th anniversary theme. But it also amplified the story we wanted to tell about our 50th theme: “take root among the stars,” a quote which comes from Butler’s prescient novel Parable of the Sower.
“We chose this invocation from Butler because it dares us to change the world. It dares us to struggle through scarcity and collapse, to build community with the tools available to us, and to imagine a future that is only possible with our people alongside us” (From Charis Turns 50).
My visit to the archive reminded me that our past is very much connected to our future and that it is always a good time to riffle through old documents as we fortify ourselves for our tomorrow. This photo is now part of the Charis lore and, “you [really just] had to be there” to get it.
Please join us for our next Trent History of Medicine Event, a symposium celebrating Remarkable Stories of American Black Surgeons in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries.
Speakers include:
Jill L. Newmark, “Without Concealment, Without Compromise: Black Civil War Surgeons”
Margaret Humphreys, “Searching for Dr. Harris”
Todd L. Savitt, “Entering a ‘White’ Profession: African American Physicians in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries”
Jill L. Newmark is an independent historian and former Curator and Exhibition Specialist at the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health. She has curated numerous exhibitions and written several articles on African American medical personnel who served during the American Civil War.
Margaret Humphreys is the Josiah Charles Trent Distinguished Professor of the History of Medicine in the School of Medicine at Duke University, as well as Professor of History, Professor of Medicine, and affiliate with the Duke Global Health Institute. A specialist in the history of science and medicine, she has focused her research and publications primarily on infectious disease in the U.S. and the American south, as well as the history of medicine during the American Civil War.
Todd L. Savitt is an historian of medicine with a particular interest in African-American medical history. He is professor in the Department of Bioethics and Interdisciplinary Studies in the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University.
There is no registration required. The event will be recorded.
Sponsored by Duke University History Department, the Trent Center for Bioethics, Humanities & History of Medicine, and the History of Medicine Collections in the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Post contributed by Soroush Marouzi, Research Scholar at the Center for the History of Political Economy.
A loyal public servant of the U.S. government, a covert Soviet agent, the mastermind behind Colombia’s economic development, or the architect of policies that inflicted hardship on Colombian people? Lauchlin B. Currie (1902–1993) remains an enigmatic figure, with scholars and media outlets offering conflicting portrayals of his life and work. The majority of his professional papers were gifted by him to Duke and were one of the first economics collections acquired by the University, serving as a foundational piece of what would eventually become the Economists’ Papers Archive. Recently reprocessed with enhanced description, the Lauchlin B. Currie papers now offer new opportunities for historians seeking to deepen their understanding of his legacy.
Currie sitting outside with his family in Colombia in 1992.
Currie was born in Canada, studied at the London School of Economics, and earned a PhD from Harvard University in 1931 before working at the U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve. He was appointed as a special advisor on economic affairs to the White House in 1939 and stayed there until the end of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. Throughout his prosperous career in the United States, Currie played a significant role in shaping and implementing fiscal, monetary, and foreign policies. Accusations of Soviet espionage later marred his career, but he was never charged with a crime and maintained his innocence. After his time in the U.S., Currie began a decades-long relationship with Colombia. He developed a deep affection for the country: he married and raised a family with a Colombian woman, tried his hand at cattle ranching, and obtained citizenship. He advised two Presidential administrations and held significant policy roles, including the head of the World Bank’s first mission to Colombia. He was honored with Colombia’s highest peacetime award, the Order of Boyacá, one day before his death in 1993.
A photograph from the collection of an urban scale model.
The Lauchlin B. Currie papers document Currie’s professional life through his correspondence, writings and speeches, published material and clippings (in English and Spanish), and subject files. It highlights his work on topics such as economic growth, development, urban housing, and fiscal and monetary policy, with the bulk underscoring his contributions as an economic advisor, particularly in Colombia and to a lesser extent in the United States. This collection also documents Currie’s work with institutions such as the Colombian National Planning Council, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the White House, and the Federal Reserve. It also includes a large set of printed material written by Currie and other scholars, his notes and annotations on writings by other economists, and correspondence with other economists and politicians.
Notable materials in the collection include documents related to Currie’s trips to and involvement with China during World War II on behalf of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration, his economic plan for Colombia’s government (known as Operación Colombia), his creation of the Colombian housing finance system (known as UPAC), and rich correspondence with his biographer Roger Sandilands and prominent Colombian politicians like former Minister of the Interior Arenas Bonilla.
Certificate of Award to Currie, signed by Chiang Chung-Cheng, the President of the National Government of the Republic of China.
A distinctive feature of this collection is the extensive set of numbered folders, primarily focused on Currie’s work as an economic advisor in Colombia. They were meticulously indexed by Colombian economist Elba Cánfora Argandoña, who supposedly microfilmed them before they left the country. Unfortunately, no complete index or any microfilm was ever sent prior to her passing in 2023, and further investigation in 2024 by Nestor Lovera Nieto, a part-time Research Scholar for the Economists’ Papers Archive and Visiting Scholar at the Center for the History of Political Economy, did not yield any results beyond a small collection at the Colombian central bank. To aid researchers in navigating this challenging series, Nestor described the contents of each file—one of the many valuable contributions he made to the reprocessing of this collection.
An example of Argandoña’s index and notes on a small range of the numbered folders.
This collection not only enhances our understanding of Currie’s life and work, but also provides valuable insights into Colombian economic history, as seen through the lens of his work and experiences. New portrayals of Currie and the economies he engaged with will undoubtedly emerge from the work of scholars delving into this rich collection.
Post contributed by Tessel Veneboer, Ph.D. candidate, Department of Literary Studies, Ghent University.
Veneboer received a Mary Lily Research Travel Grant, 2023-2024. This piece is excerpted and adapted from Veneboer’s longer piece “Bad Sex,” published in Extra Intra Reader 3: Swallowed Like a Whole, which was edited by Rosie Haward, Clémence Lollia Hilaire and Harriet Foyster, (Gerrit Rietveld Academie & Sandberg Instituut, 2024).
As part of my doctoral research, I spent four weeks at Duke University studying the Kathy Acker Papers and other collections at the Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History & Culture. I work on the relationship between sex and literary form. In particular, the question of the optimism-pessimism divide among feminists about the givenness of the sexual imagery under patriarchy: the pornographic imagination. After sharing my interests with Kelly Wooten, archivist at the Sallie Bingham Center, she suggested I look at the archives of several anti-pornography activists including Dorothy “Cookie” Teer. This diversion from the Acker papers went on to consume much of my research time as I became more and more absorbed in the anti-pornography materials.
Flipping through newspaper clippings, personal correspondence, logistics for conferences and teach-ins, drafts of lectures and manifestos in the Teer Papers, I began to see that disagreements among feminists over the role of pornography, sexual violence, and censorship are not only part of a dispute about what feminists want or should want from sex, but contain perhaps a more fundamental disagreement: the definition of “sex” itself. Is sexuality simply an activity that should and can be reimagined by feminists or should we analyse sex as part of human nature, that is: as subjectivity itself? And if the latter, can there be any authenticity of sexual desire for women in a patriarchal society?
Among the anti-porn materials in the archive, I found an extensively annotated draft of a paper titled ”Sex Resistance in Heterosexual Arrangements.” A manifesto of sorts, the paper was authored by the Southern Women’s Writing Collective, alternatively known as Women Against Sex (WAS). The WAS group was closely affiliated with Women Against Pornography (WAP) who were active in New York City, under the wings of Andrea Dworkin and Catherine McKinnon. The WAS group met WAP in 1987 at the “Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism” conference at New York University, where WAS presented their manifesto for the first time.
“The Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism: A Full Day Conference” poster (1987), Dorothy “Cookie” Teer Papers, Rubenstein Library.
The advertising poster of the conference asks: “Who are the sexual liberals? What are they doing to feminism? Why do they defend pornography? What do they mean by ‘freedom’?” In the manifesto, the WAS members make a case against the pro-sex attitude that aims to rethink and reclaim female sexuality by emphasising the multiplicity of pleasures. To simply change the representation of sexuality does not resolve the association of sex with subordination for the WAS group. For them, sex-positive feminism follows a patriarchial logic that naturalises sexuality as an animalistic force and thus can keep women “under the spell” of sexuality. Women Against Sex asks: what if we resist compulsory sexuality?
The conference materials in the archive contain many drafts and internal disagreements over the WAS manifesto, but the rationale is clear: the only function of sex is the subordination of women and therefore “the practice of sexuality” must be resisted. This “sex resistance” movement aligns with Valerie Solanas’s proposal in the S.C.U.M. manifesto to create an “unwork force” of women who will take on jobs in order not to work at the job, to work slowly, or to get fired. To engage in ‘”sex resistance” is to refuse the idea that woman is, before all else, a sexual being who must realise the potential to enjoy sex. In the manifesto WAS proposes two alternatives: feminist celibacy and “deconstructive lesbianism.” They emphasize the difference between religious celibacy–the “vow”–and celibacy as politicized by feminist thought:
She resists on three fronts: she resists all male-constructed sexual needs, she resists the misnaming of her act as prudery and she especially resists the patriarchy’s attempt to make its work of subordinating women easier by consensually constructing her desire in its own oppressive image.[i]
WAS adds that, historically, women have long been practising deconstructive lesbianism and radical celibacy. For example, when a woman temporarily abstains from sex after sexual assault or when women live together without being sexually involved. This sex resistance paper thus argues that feminist celibacy is not new but that this type of abstinence has not been politicised as sabotage.
In a letter to Women Against Pornography, a WAS member explains that the disturbing nature of sex–-what they call woman’s “self-annihilation” as the social paradigm of our sexuality–-is in fact the definition of sex: if it doesn’t subordinate women it’s not sex. This claim is strangely close to queer theorist Leo Bersani’s proposal in “Is the Rectum a Grave?” (1987) that sexuality destabilizes any coherent sense of self as the boundaries between self and other are disturbed. Both Dworkin and Bersani refuse to romanticise sex and, as such, denaturalise sex.
The argument for radical celibacy in the “Sex resistance in heterosexual arrangements” article was ambivalently received at the 1987 conference hosted by Women Against Pornography in New York City. WAP member Dorchen Leidholdt, for example, writes to WAS that she fears the sex resistance proposal would undermine the credibility of the anti-pornography movement as a whole. Andrea Dworkin, however, was intrigued by the politicized celibacy which she found “more radical” than her own proposal to ban all pornography. Only without compulsory heterosexuality, it would be possible to restore, make whole again, what Dworkin calls the ”compromised metaphysical privacy” of woman.
[i] Southern Women’s Writing Collective (Women Against Sex), ‘Sex Resistance in Heterosexual Arrangements’, Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism, New York & London, Teachers College Press, 1990.
Archive of Documentary Arts Sidney Gamble Travel Grants
Doris Duke Foundation Research Travel Grants
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick Travel Grants
History of Medicine Collections
Human Rights Archive
John Hope Franklin Research Center for African and African American History and Culture
John W. Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising & Marketing History
Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture (Mary Lily Research Grants)
Anyone whose research would be supported by sources from the Rubenstein Library’s research centers is eligible to apply. We encourage applications from students at any level of education; faculty and teachers; visual and performing artists; writers; filmmakers; public historians; and independent researchers.
For assistance determining the eligibility of your project, please contact AskRL@duke.edu with the subject line “Travel Grants.”
Eligibility
Applicants must reside beyond a 100-mile radius of Durham, N.C., and may not be current Duke students or employees.
Information Session
An online information session will be held Wednesday, January 15, 2025, 2-3 pm EST. This program will review application requirements, offer tips for creating a successful application, and include an opportunity for attendees to ask questions. This program will be recorded and posted online afterwards. Register for the session here.
Timeline
The deadline for applications will be Friday, February 28, 2025, at 6:00 pm EST.
Decisions will be announced by the end of April 2025 for travel during May 2025-June 2026. Awards are paid as reimbursement after completion of the research visit(s).
An archive like that at Duke University can be approached from numerous angles. Professors might partner with the Rubenstein Library to encourage student engagement with materials that are relevant to their courses. Students might flock to the reading room to fulfill requirements for a paper. Researchers from across the world might visit the Rubenstein’s collections to identify sources that pertain to their independent studies. There is also the possibility that people might visit the reading room out of pure curiosity, stumbling in search of rare books, letters, and artifacts that are simply “cool” to them. I found myself in this category while perusing the catalog for a topic that could be reflected well in an exhibit, and I was pleased to see how a streak of curiosity can lead down a rabbit hole of literary exploration.
Beginning my quest by analyzing works celebrating an anniversary year, I found myself in the middle of a pastoral tale full of drama, love, and a surprising amount of sheep, as known as Thomas Hardy’s fourth novel, Far from the Madding Crowd.
Far from the Madding Crowd as it appeared in January 1874 for Cornhill readers.
In January 1874, Thomas Hardy obliged Sir Leslie Stephen, editor of Cornhill Magazine, by publishing his novel serially for Cornhill readers to enjoy. Describing his work as a story involving “a young woman-farmer, a shepherd, and a sergeant of cavalry,” Hardy set forth on a yearlong adventure of watching the public and critics receive his novel before him (Hardy 1928, 125). Later that year on November 23, 1874, Hardy saw the publication of his work in its entire form. While reading the novel, which is an experience in and of itself, is where some people end their journey down this Victorian English path, the Rubenstein’s holdings allow for a much deeper dive of Hardy’s process to and through publication, from an exploration of his title to the aftermath of the story in his wake.
While we can give Hardy credit for the storyline and characters that emerge in his novel, the title must be attributed to another prominent figure in English poetry, Thomas Gray. Hardy’s use of Far from the Madding Crowd is a direct reference to Gray’s 1751 poem, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, where Gray writes:
“Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray;
Along the cool sequester’d vale of life
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.”
The Rubenstein is home to various versions of Gray’s poem, many of which include illustrations to accompany the famous line later used in Hardy’s title. An 1850 edition includes illustrations by R. S. Gilbert, depicting two adults and two children in their home, with one woman gazing into the distance while the other helps a child to read. An 1861 edition includes an image, created by E.V.B. and engraved by William Meason, depicting angels in their robes. An 1887 edition includes illustrations by Alfred Woodruff, centering the focus on a cemetery, with plants overtaking the emerging gravestones on the stanza’s partnering page. An 1899 edition pictures a cottage set off from a path, surrounded by the sky and vegetation. While Gray’s poem was published nearly a century before Hardy’s birth, the Rubenstein’s holdings create the space to imagine how Hardy may have seen the poem for the first time, and how its presentation led him to use one of Gray’s lines as the title for his work.
Illustrations from two editions of Thomas Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, 1899 (left) and 1861 (right).
Jumping further down the rabbit hole of this investigation, I then pulled two books by Florence Emily Hardy, Hardy’s second wife, with the hope of learning more about the historical context surrounding Hardy’s process of creating and publishing Far from the Madding Crowd. The first of the two books, The Early Life of Thomas Hardy, which covers his life from 1840 to 1891, is where the drama began to unfold. While published under Florence Hardy’s name with an understanding that Hardy himself contributed much of the work, the reception of this book has been contested by some scholars in the field. Some believe that Florence altered much of the text from its original form, a topic covered thoroughly by Michael Millgate in The Life and Work of Thomas Hardy, which was published with Hardy’s name after Millgate edited the work to resemble Hardy’s final version. Other scholars in the field have responded to this controversy, such as Tim Dolin in the 2007 article, “The Early Life and Later Years of Thomas Hardy: An Argument for a New Edition,” calling for Florence Hardy’s text to be reinstated as a credible account. Regardless of the criticism for Florence Hardy’s Early Life, the work presents additional information on Hardy’s writing practices as his novel continued to be published serially in Cornhill.
“So Hardy went on writing Far from the Madding Crowd—sometimes indoors, sometimes out—when he would occasionally find himself without a scrap of paper at the very moment that he felt volumes. In such circumstances he would use large dead leaves, white chips left by the wood-cutters, or pieces of stone or slate that came to hand. He used to say that when he carried a pocket-book his mind was barren as the Sahara” (Hardy 1928, 127).
Florence Emily Hardy’s 1928 publications on the life of her husband, Thomas Hardy.
Duke University is also home to additional texts that provide understanding to the world that Hardy lived in and how it was brought to life on the page. One book in particular, Hardy’s Wessex by Hermann Lea, showcases the real places that served as inspiration for Hardy’s setting, including images to better understand the farmland and lifestyle in Far from the Madding Crowd.
Hermann Lea’s descriptive work on Thomas Hardy’s Wessex, published in 1913, reprinted in 1928.
The Rubenstein also houses a few of Hardy’s papers in their archive. While they do not speak directly to this novel’s anniversary, they include some of Hardy’s correspondence and an etching of him completed by William Strang, an artist and printmaker who worked with other notable figures like Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Now 150 years old, Far from the Madding Crowd is a story that continues to see itself adapted and discussed. You may have read it in an English course, watched it unfold on-screen, or never heard of the sheep-filled tale before now. No matter the case, Duke Libraries has just enough copies for you to join the fun of guessing who Bathsheba Everdene will marry in the end!
Interested in reading more on the topic of Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd? “Far from the Madding Crowd at 150: Seven Reflections” includes writings from a group of Victorian scholars, all focusing on a different aspect of the text and bringing forth their unique perspectives on Hardy’s work.
Works Cited
Gray, Thomas. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard. London: Printed for the Guild of Women-Binders, 61 Charing Cross Road, W.C., 1899. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
Hardy, Florence E. The Early Life of Thomas Hardy, 1840-1891. New York, The Macmillan Company, 1928. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
Last month in October we observed both American Archives Month and Informational Literacy Awareness Month. Within the proclamation, President Obama acknowledges the challenges that everyday citizens face as the amount of information we receive and process on a regular basis has increased exponentially over the years. He encourages us to “recognize the important role information plays in our daily lives, and appreciate the need for a greater understanding of its impact.”
Read President Obama’s National Information Literacy Awareness Month Proclamation Here [https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2009-10-07/pdf/E9-24290.pdf]
And who better to highlight in this blog post than those who continually care for the information literacy of others than the librarians within the Behind the Veil Collection.
_____________
When using the occupation filter, you will find that there are a total of thirty-four librarians within the collection. One of them an archivist [link to the last blog post], others are also classified as teachers, a lawyer, and even a school librarian. Most of the oral histories belonging to these chief information officers can be found under the North Carolina location tag, with Louisiana coming in as a close second. You may find when searching through these librarians (as well as other parts of the collection) that some of these librarians cannot be accessed, such as Joan Coco’s interview and Carnell Clay, but don’t worry! You can always submit a request to receive a digital copy of the file and if you need some help submitting the request you can contact rlrepro@duke.edu.
There is much to be learned from the librarians within the collection. Much like the archivists, there are not many people that know specifically what librarians do. We often imagine them within libraries, finding and placing books on a shelf, but the interviews within the collection tell us more. Listeners learn not only about the different task that librarians did a various job, the condition of public schools during the time of segregation, and their lives outside of librarianship.
For example, Georgia Sutton who was born in New Bern, North Carolina in 1929 became what was known as a teacher librarian. She attended North Carolina College in Durham (later known as North Carolina Central) because it was one of the only Black colleges that offered a degree in Library Science. This was also the case for Arabelle Bryant who grew up in a small neighborhood not far from Rocky Mount, North Carolina. Bullock explains that when she attended the school in the early 40s, that the Library Science degree was only offered as a minor and thus those who wanted to graduate with it had to choose another major.
Part 1 43:35 “…I majored in Mathematics and minored in Library Science, which was kind of an odd combination because usually it was English or Social Studies or something like that as a major, but I didn’t want either one of those. What I really wanted to do was—my sister was a Home Economics teacher and I wanted to major in Home Economics and minor Library Science, but you couldn’t do that. So, I had to choose. I chose Mathematics. So, my major was really in mathematics. And later they did eventually break up to a full library science program. So I had to go back summers and get my degree in Library Science” (Arabelle Bulluck Bryant)
Condescendingly, after graduating Bryant went to New Bern to work within the school system and Sutton landed her first job in Quitman, Georgia. Instead of going back home, Sutton decided to go to Georgia because they paid year-round, versus in North Carolina where they only paid 9 months out of the year.
Sutton and Bryant both speak about the conditions of public schools during their tenure as teacher librarians. Bryant in New Bern mentions that the newspapers were “all showing how bad the white schools were, old, run-down toilets and things… And so, you know if the whites were like that, imagine what the Black schools were like.” She began teaching at West Street, the only public school as a librarian and math teacher, teaching only math during her first year. She did not work in the library until the current librarian left the school a year later. This is because in North Carolina, as well as all over the south, many schools did not hire full time librarians. Sutton, who also taught math was working during the time of the Brown vs. Board of Education decision. And while she could not remember her feelings toward the decision, she did look forward to Black students being “exposed to all the things that White children were exposed to because under segregation, especially in the South, there was a tremendous difference in how the schools were set up or the materials that were used or given.” Sutton would also teach world history and social studies, speaking to the challenges of being able to teach her children history that pertained to their own heritage. When Rhonda Mawhood, one of the interviewers asked Georgia Sutton whether she was able to teach her students Black history, Sutton answered bluntly:
Part 38:54 “The only way you were going to would do that, you’d have to sneak that in Now. It was just never included in textbooks. Some teachers did it. It was a part of their curriculum but not of the schools… I do know something about my cultural heritage and whatever. But the children today know very little. I will tell you why. For one thing, the White teachers are not knowledgeable of African-American history and they don’t want to be. The majority of them could care less about a Black child’s heritage and he’s being cheated. I feel very strongly about that.” (Georgia Sutton)
And while there are a lot of similarities between the two librarians, one component that sticks out from Sutton’s interview, that was not found in Bryant’s was her mentioning the reason she wanted to become a librarian.
Part 2 34:24: “You must remember there were not many avenues open to us. Teaching was one of them. In fact, it was the main one. As I told you, it was prestigious to be a teacher in the community. You were looked up to. Then too, to tell you the truth, I really liked children. I always have liked to read, and that’s why I went into library science. It was that book thing that got me involved in that, and I still read a great deal” (Georgia Sutton)
Similarly, Sandra Moye Wilson [Sandra Wilson interview record, 1994 June 09 / Behind the Veil / Duke Digital Repository, a Durham native born in 1945, spoke about her love for books and the joy that she found at the library. While she does not plainly state this is what led her into the librarianship, she does state that she knew she was an adult at the age of 10 because “I could take my other brothers and sister and walk them to the library by myself.” Wilson was listed as a librarian but does not talk much about her career. Yet, she does mention that she was active in the NAACP at an early age, helping with voter registration and protests.
Anne McKay Ducan [Anne Duncan interview recording, 1993 June 02 / Behind the Veil / Duke Digital Repository] also has a shorter interview and mentions she too participated in organizations outside of her profession. She was a member of Delta Sigma Theta and a part of the Hampton Alumni Association. She graduated from Hampton University in 1934, double majoring in English, after attending a high school in Fayetteville, North Carolina where she was born.
2:46 “Hampton was a beacon during that time. There seemed to be two choices among the young people who grew up in Fayetteville, Howard University and Hampton Institute. And if you didn’t make it to either one of those, then you were more than apt to remain at home and go Fayetteville State. It was called State Normal then. It’s now Fayetteville University.” (Anne Mackay Ducan)
Ducan would attend college at the age of fifteen, graduating at the age of nineteen. She worked as a teacher for about ten years and then obtained another bachelor’s degree, this time in Library Science from Atlanta. Within her career she would serve as a librarian at the Avery Institute in Charleston, SC and then receive her Master’s in Library Science from Catholic University in Washington. She would work at North Carolina Central’s law library for 25 years, where she enjoyed her occupation the most.
Sadie Hughley slides: On the steps of Stanford Warren Library (segregated), Durham, N.C.: Mrs. Hughley, left rear, Mrs. Merrick, right rear, 1940s [https://repository.duke.edu/dc/behindtheveil/btvst007021001
She began working at the Standofrd Warren Library in the mid-40s and from her interview you can tell that she truly enjoyed her time there. She recalled that there was a public school that was down the block from library, but it was important that they as librarians reached the parents first in order to get to the children, a common sentiment within many of these interviews that involve education.
Part 2 22:40 “But the children would come from school and the parents who were interested in helping their children, they knew that the library was the first stopping place. And we did a library, very, very wonderful things with the children…: I would take them in and develop programs for the children there— Then we decided that we should give the Children’s Library a name. And I put on a contest of the children to come up with things that they would like for their library to be. And one little girl came up with Key Corner, which was perfect. And she won first prize. So, it’s still the children’s library there for the children’s room. It’s called Key Corner.”
A group of children gather around a librarian at the desk in the Key Korner. [https://durhamcountylibrary.org/exhibits/slw/archive/sw252.php]
She would continue working at the Stanford Warren Library for eleven years and then transition over to North Carolina Central, gaining her master’s degree in Library Science at the institution and working there for twenty-one years. She would work at the library within administration but mentions that she really enjoyed working with the children at the public library.
Part 2 19:57 “I enjoyed working with children very much. I really did. But I liked books and it meant that getting into more academic part of it was good for me.”
Hughley would work at North Carolina Central for twenty-one years. In that time, she would serve as the President of the Durham Library Association, serve on the National Board of Women’s International, she was a member of the Democratic National Committee and an honorary board member of the United Nations board of directors for the Orange Counties.
These are just a few of the librarians whose impactful stories can be found within the Behind the Veil Collection. Their legacies have shaped the history of Black librarianship and also serve as inspiration for future and present-day librarians. Here at the John Hope Franklin Research Center, we encourage you to delve deeper into this rich collection, where each narrative reflects a journey of resilience and historical relevance!
Sadie Hughley, seated at her desk, assists a young boy in checking out books. [https://durhamcountylibrary.org/exhibits/slw/archive/sw245.php]
Dispatches from the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Duke University
