Date: Thursday, January 29th, 2026
Time: 5:00 – 6:30pm Location: Smith Warehouse, Ahmadieh Family Lecture Hall, Bay 4; 114 S Buchanan Blvd, Durham, NC
In 1974, a twenty-year-old Black woman named Joan Little found herself facing the death penalty for killing a white guard who had tried to rape her in an eastern North Carolina prison. The folks who campaigned on Little’s behalf understood the webs of sexual violence, state violence, and racialized carcerality that ensnared her, and they linked her trial to other sites of existential concern for Black women’s—and everyone’s—liberation. Her August 1975 acquittal spoke to the power of their critique and the reach of their organizing. 2025 marks the fiftieth anniversary of this landmark case that still offers lessons in the struggle for justice. Join historian Christina Greene, Ph.D. ’96, and death penalty lawyer Shelagh Kenney to discuss what Joan Little tells us about gender, incarceration, and state violence then and now.
Christina Greene is professor of Afro-American studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and author of Free Joan Little: The Politics of Race, Sexual Violence, and Imprisonment; Shelagh Kenney, is Interim Director of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation. Adriane Lentz-Smith, Associate Professor of History and African & African American Studies at Duke University, will introduce and moderate the discussion.
In addition to the panel, an exhibition of items related to Joan Little, including one of her handwritten, illustrated poems, will be on display in Perkins Library during the month of January 2026.
Header image: “Abolish Women’s Prisons” photograph of protestors outside of the NC Correctional Institution for Women, The News and Observer – Raleigh Times, November 1974. Nancy Blood Papers, Box 3, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
The David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library is now accepting applications for the 2026 – 2027 Research Travel Grant Programs, offering awards of up to $1,500 to support research projects associated with the following collecting Centers, subject areas, and collection holdings:
Archive of Documentary Arts General Grant
Archive of Documentary Arts Sidney Gamble Travel Grant
Doris Duke Foundation Travel Grant
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick Travel Grant
Harry H. Harkins, Jr. T’73 Travel Grant
History of Medicine Collections
Human Rights Archive
John Hope Franklin Research Center for African and African American History
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 resources 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 14, 2026, 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 of staff involved with the travel grant program. This information session will be recorded and posted online afterwards. You can register for the session here.
Timeline
The deadline for application will be Friday, February 27, at 8:00 PM EST. Decisions will be announced by the end of April 2026 for travel during May 2026 – June 2027. Awards are paid as reimbursements for personal expenses after completion of the research visit(s).
The Corinthian Poster, 1974, Box 1, University Archives Poster Collection, Duke
Post contributed by Meredith Mobley, University Archives Intern for Student Engagement.
In February of 1974, the Duke Players, who were founded as an independent student theater group in 1931, brought to Durham the premiere of a new, world-class production: The Corinthian. The new play was based on the myth of Oedipus: the age-old tale of a man who murders his father and marries his mother. In the newspaper Durham Sun, Philip Lawrence, the author and director of the play, called it “a complete and new play” — instead of adapting Sophocles’ existing work, he aimed to create an entirely new work that prioritized the themes of the myth rather than the dialogue and directions provided by Sophocles millennia ago.
The play starred two professional Broadway actors, John Callum (Oedipus) and Laura Stuart (Jocasta), with a supporting cast made of local and student talent. News of the play’s premiere was met with much fanfare across the Triangle, but the Players worried as ticket sales failed to meet their expectations and opening night crept closer. But audiences flocked to the production, intrigued by the investment that Duke Administration had made by supporting external, professional talent. Local reviewers noted that a standing ovation was received on opening night, but they themselves were reluctant to give the same praise to the play. In The Chronicle on February 28, 1974, Sally Austen Tom made the evaluation that The Corinthian was a “fine production of a flawed play.” She added that “Its faults, however, do not make the original goals, to have a world premiere of a play at Duke, and to undertake a large Page production, any less exciting or any less laudable.”
The Corinthian Program, 1974, Box 1, University Archives Poster Collection
The Corinthian was the first time in Duke’s history that a world premiere was held on campus. Since then, student written plays, in addition to classics and emerging works, are given by the Players. The Duke Players, through their commitment to artistry and pursuit of good theater, helped to further establish the drama program at Duke, culminating in the formal establishment of the Department of Theater Studies in 2003.
The story of The Corinthian can be found in the scrapbook kept by the Duke Players during the 1973-1974 academic year. The scrapbook is located in Box 7 of the Duke Players records collection of the University Archives, housed in the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. More information about the Duke Players can be found in their collection guide. The University Archives relies on donations from student organizations to document and preserve the history of Duke University and the impact of its students. If you are interested in donating your organization’s records (physical or electronic) to the University Archives, follow this link to learn more.
Header Image: Duke Players Scrapbook, 1973-1974, Box 7, Duke Players Records
It is with profound sadness that we share that graphic artist, mask-puppet-and-banner maker, violinist, country dance teacher, and community activist Allan Troxler passed away on October 26, 2025.
Born and raised in Greensboro, Troxler became a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War and participated in civil rights organizing and campaigns. He also worked in Boston to preserve neighborhoods threatened by urban development. Later, Troxler moved to a communal farm in rural Oregon with his partner, noted gay activist Carl Wittman. While in Oregon, Allan and Carl helped to publish RFD, a magazine for gay men living in rural America.
Returning to North Carolina in 1979, Troxler and Wittman were actively involved in arts, dance, and cultural programs throughout the region. Both devotees of English Country Dance and leaders in a national dance movement, they started Sun Assembly, its weekly dances and New Year’s celebrations in Durham weaving an egalitarian community beyond gender binaries.
Troxler and Wittman were early members of the North Carolina Gay and Lesbian Health Project, which sought to improve access to medical care and information for the gay community, particularly as it endured the spread of HIV/AIDs in the early 1980s. They were vocal activists against homophobia and the criminalization of homosexuality. Over the years they helped organize a range of community projects and protests. Wittman died of AIDS in early 1986.
Papercut broadside by Allan Troxler. Allan Troxler Papers, 1800s-2024.
Troxler’s writings, dance, artwork, and activism continued through his life. His work appeared in Southern Exposure, RFD, and local features and press. He created Camas Swale, a series of “occasional pamphlets,” along with other zines and artwork by pseudonym E. Bunny. Troxler’s work frequently expressed political views, opposing anti-gay legislation, and promoting peace and inclusivity. Much of this artwork was distributed to local friends in his community network.
Troxler was honored as an LGBT Pioneer at the Executive Mansion by Governor Roy Cooper in June 2024 along with Mandy Carter as Carolinians who “for decades led the charge for acceptance and equality.” Troxler’s artwork and papers, along with Wittman’s, reside in the Rubenstein Library.
From Troxler’s writings: “Here we be, ears ringing as some of us grieve ancient companions just gone; others meting out pills; potions in portions! Through the window cicadas rattle their ancient benedictions: Life, death. Through the curtain Sister Heavenly Light blesses us all.”
Header Image: Allan Troxler. Portrait by Annie Segrest.
The History of Medicine Collections recently received the Thomas Bashore, M.D., Collection of Artifacts. Dr. Bashore is Professor Emeritus of Medicine at the Duke University Medical School, where he specialized in treatment of cardiovascular conditions and congenital heart disease. He first began collecting historic medical artifacts, such as mechanical devices relating to electrotherapy and cardiology, and expanded his collection to include fringe medical instruments and treatments.
Please join us on Wednesday, October 29, at 4:30 p.m. to celebrate the Thomas Bashore Collection. Dr. Bashore will provide remarks.
The United Nations considers intellectual freedom to be a basic human right through Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which asserts: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
Libraries in particular value intellectual freedom as part of their mission to provide and protect access to information and ideas. According to the American Library Association intellectual freedom is an integral component of a democratic society, protecting an individual’s right to access, explore, consider, and express ideas and information as the basis for a self-governing, well-informed citizenry. Yet there is an intensification of threats to intellectual freedom across the United States, with pressure on curriculum and research, book and program challenges, and censorship attempts continuing to reach unprecedented levels.
This year’s Janie K. Long Speaker Series program will focus on the impact of challenges to intellectual freedom on higher education and the steps we can take to support students, faculty, staff, and other members of our community. We will also honor Duke Alumnus Harry H. Harkins Jr, T’73 longtime supporter of LGBTQ+ library collections, scholars, and this event series.
Speakers: Robin Koshelev, Duke undergraduate researcher, Dr. Janie K. Long, Duke faculty emerita, Dr. Joseph Salem, University Librarian, Dr. Pete Sigal, Department of History; moderated by author, journalist, and Duke alumnus Steven Petrow.
Sponsored by: Duke University Libraries, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke Department of History, and the Duke Program for Scholars and Publics.
The Rubenstein Library mourns the loss of Terry Allan Murray, who passed away on August 7, 2025. Terry was born in Durham, where he would reside his entire life alongside his brother, Edwin. Terry was from a family with strong Duke connections. His father, Lee H. Murray, worked at Duke, and his uncle was famed football coach Wallace Wade. Terry and his brother Edwin both attended Duke in the 1970s.
Terry and Edwin began collecting comic books as boys in the 1950s and eventually assembled one of the largest archival comics collections in the United States, including more than 57,000 comic books. In time this grew to include thousands of fanzines, comic strips, original comic art, pulp magazines, card sets, science fiction, as well as role-playing and board games. In 2002, they donated the major portion of their collection to the Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, and they have continued to make additions in the years since.
Terry was a dedicated collector and brought a methodological focus to his work. Armed with reference books, reviews, and annual top 10 lists, he was intentional about his collecting. At the same time, Terry never lost sight of why comics are fun. He was as much a reader interested in authors, characters, and stories, and would often collect related materials across different genres, from comics to games to fiction. In 1999, McFarland published Terry’s Science Fiction Magazine Story Index, 1926 – 1995, the result of many years of work. In the introduction, Terry writes about how this came out of his own interests in science fiction and how he hoped that this work would serve as a tool for readers, collectors, and scholars.
Terry, at one of the mini-cons hosted at his home in Durham
In addition to being an avid reader of comic books and science fiction, Terry was also a dedicated fan. In 1968, he and Edwin began hosting the Durham mini-cons – likely the earliest fan conventions in North Carolina. Their personal papers in the Rubenstein Library include photographs of these events held at their Durham home, as well as issues of their fanzine Vertigo. Sharing collections and bringing fans together were part of Terry’s ongoing interests.
At the Rubenstein Library, the Edwin and Terry Murray collections remain popular with researchers and students. Recent classes that have used parts of the collection have included: “Games and Culture,” “Cold War America,” “US History in Fact and Fiction,” and “Fantasy: The Borders of Genre, Medium, and Culture.” Some of their comics are currently on display as part of the library exhibit American Indians Go Graphic, exploring comic books and graphic novels by and about Native Americans. We are grateful for our long collaboration with Terry and for the legacy that he leaves. His collections will continue to be shared and bring people together.
Terry Murray was a loving son and a devoted brother and friend. He is survived by his brother, Edwin.
The 2025 Human Rights Digital Storytelling Award, presented by the Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Duke University, has been awarded to the podcast Inside Kabul.
Produced and originally broadcast by FRANCE INTER (French Public Radio) Inside Kabul was created and directed by Caroline Gillet in collaboration with Marwa and Raha. Inside Kabul tells the story of two young friends whose lives were upended when the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in the summer of 2021. As they faced an increasingly dangerous present and an uncertain future, Raha and Marwa exchanged and recorded hundreds of voice notes via WhatsApp with Gillet, a noted French journalist.
These recordings became the heart of the podcast, offering a raw, intimate, and immediate documentation of displacement. As the podcast describes:
“What emerges is a raw and incredibly intimate chronicle of two young women coming of age amidst the collapse of the world they had known. While Raha has chosen to stay in Kabul and is confronted with the violence of the new regime, Marwa has left and finds herself locked up in a refugee camp in Abu Dhabi.”
According to Caroline Gillet:
“Raha and Marwa showed immense courage when they accepted to document their lives under Taliban rule and leaving into exile. Their voice diaries are a powerful testimony of how life changed both for those who chose to leave and those who had to stay after the dramatic events of August 2021. New technologies can sometimes create unexpected proximity, and many people in Europe and in the States told me how close they felt to Raha and Marwa after hearing them. I’m very thankful that through this award, more people can get to know them and the terrible suffering of Afghan women under the terrorist rule of the Taliban.”
Patrick Stawski, Human Rights Archivist at Duke, said:
“Inside Kabul powerfully shows how audio technologies can serve to document, connect, and hope. We are intimately connected to Raha and Marwa’s stories through their voices and the sonic elements of their journey: falling rain at a refugee camp, the crinkle of a food ration wrapper, the sounds of a Taliban security checkpoint.”
Caitlin Margaret Kelly, Curator for the Archive of Documentary Arts, added:
“Being immersed in Raha and Marwa’s unedited audio diaries is to be invited into their lives in ways that bypass the usual narrative arc. In listening to the recordings, our pace is set by the two young women, and our view of unfolding events is powerfully constructed through their experiences.”
Image from Inside Kaboul animated short, by Luciano Lepinay based on works by Kubra Khademi.
In addition to the podcast, Caroline, Marwa, and Raha continue to use the audio diaries to tell their evolving story of displacement and rebuilding. A second season of the show, titled Outside Kabul, is now available in English on France Inter’s YouTube channel. In 2023, they partnered with Denis Walgenwitz to produce an animated short also titled Inside Kabul and are now working on an animated adaption of Outside Kabul. In 2025, they collaborated with Afghan performance artist Kubra Khademi to produce One’s Own Room: Inside Kabul, an immersive installation presented at the 2025 Festival d’Avignon.
Marwa, one of the three collaborators behind Inside Kabul, said:
“I began exchanging with Caroline and recording sound notes with the hope of being a voice for the people of Afghanistan—especially for women like myself who were deprived of their freedom and rights after the Taliban took over the country in August 2021. Today, Inside Kabul is part of my identity as an advocate for our rights. It is our way of resisting—of standing against this regime and the erasure of Afghan women, and against the gender apartheid in Afghanistan. This award is deeply meaningful to me, as it ensures that our voices will be preserved and accessible to researchers who can shed light on the reality of women’s lives under the Taliban’s terrorist regime.”
The Rubenstein Library’s Human Rights Digital Storytelling Award is co-sponsored by the Human Rights Archive and the Archive of Documentary Arts. It supports outstanding documentary artists and activists exploring themes of human rights and social justice. The award aims to expand the library’s digital documentary holdings while ensuring long-term preservation and access.
The award honors projects that transcend simple information sharing. It celebrates digital storytellers who create deeply contextualized, multi-sensory works that may include still images, moving images, oral histories, soundscapes, and documentary writing.
Winners receive $3,500 and are invited to present their work at Duke University, where they collaborate with archivists to preserve their materials.
The David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library has a longstanding commitment to human rights and the documentary arts. Its collections represent the work of global creators and document the power of documentary to inspire action and transform the world.
The Rubenstein Library experienced a deep loss on August 6, 2025, when author and activist Sallie Bingham passed. Enormously thoughtful and kind, Bingham was steadfastly dedicated to the groups and causes she cared about, especially women and girls, LGBTQIA communities, artists and writers, land conservation, and special collections and cultural heritage work. A renowned author, playwright, poet, teacher, and feminist activist, Bingham was deeply committed to the power of the written word and the importance of creating organizations that address social issues and promote well-being. Her death was marked by tributes in the New York Times, the Louisville Courier-Journal, and other news outlets.
Sallie Bingham giving a talk in 2009, in the Duke Libraries. Bingham visited the Libraries often to engage with our communities. Photo credit: Eleanor Mills.
Bingham published her first short story in The New Yorker in 1959 and went on to write numerous novels, short story collections, memoirs, and plays. Her fiction often explored the inner lives of women, the weight of family legacy, and the constraints of Southern tradition. With clarity and courage, she brought attention to the power dynamics of gender and class, always centering women’s experiences. Bingham has been praised by critics for her “beautiful language,” “poetic ear” and “precise and observant eye.” In addition to her work as a writer, Bingham worked as a book editor for The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Kentucky, a director of the National Book Critics Circle, and a longtime contributor to the Women’s Project & Productions theater company in New York.
In 1985, Bingham founded the Kentucky Foundation for Women, a groundbreaking organization that promotes positive social change by supporting varied feminist expression in the arts. Bingham’s commitment to preserving and uplifting women’s voices also led to the creation of a women’s history archive at Duke University. In 1988 she endowed a position in what is now known as the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library to coordinate acquisitions, cataloguing, reference, and outreach activities related to materials documenting women and gender. What started out as the work of a single archivist grew into a permanently endowed center within the library, which in 1999 was formally named the Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture in her honor. Since then, the Bingham Center has grown into one of the foremost repositories of its kind, dedicated to acquiring, preserving, and providing access to published and unpublished materials that reflect the public and private lives of women throughout history.
We are deeply grateful for Sallie Bingham’s generous support and gracious care, and we offer our sincere condolences to her many friends and family. As we mourn her loss, we also celebrate her remarkable life spent in service of truth, community building, and the creative spirit. We are proud to bear her name and carry on the important work she started so many years ago. In one of her last social media posts Bingham declared that “Our wisdom outlasts kingdoms and democracies and tyrannies. It is for all places, all people, and all times.”
Post contributed by Ama Kyereme, Curatorial Intern for the Archive of Documentary Arts (24-25) and curator of “Movement and Memory Through the Lens of Danny Lyon.” The exhibit is on display in the Rubenstein Library Photography Gallery through November 2, 2025.
In 1962, Danny Lyon, then a college student at university of Chicago, hitchhiked from Chicago to Cairo, Illinois, to document segregation to document segregation, and to join the Civil Rights Movement. Brought in by James Forman to work as the first staff photographer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Lyon traveled across the U.S. South documenting the conditions that initially prompted him to action. Armed with his camera, he made his way into spaces that his Black colleagues typically couldn’t go. From the Leesburg Stockade in Virginia to the Toddle House diner sit-in in Atlanta, the photographs Lyon made captured the ethos of the civil rights era. Facing hostile police and armed guards wielding bayonets, Lyon often placed himself in the middle of action to represent in photographs what he was experiencing.
Peaceful protests are foundational to the Civil Rights Movement, but violence is inextricable to the Movement’s history. That violence, both visible and invisible, is on full display in several photographs selected for this exhibition, from protests arrests to the funeral for the girls bombed in Birmingham, AL. While Lyon did not hold back from documenting the volatility of the revolution as he witnessed it, he focused his camera on capturing the Movement as it was to him and those around him. He directed the camera just as much towards moments of stillness, depicting the reality of the Movement within the image, as well as between and beyond the frame. He made evidence of organizing, protesting, rest, grief, and celebration, all equally deliberate actions towards an investment in an imagined future. Many of the images Danny created during this period became synonymous with SNCC and the Civil Rights Movement, and through their circulation were key in bringing about social and political change. The images of the young girls imprisoned in the Leesburg Stockade in Virginia were critical in making the public aware of the condition these girls were in, and ultimately led to their release. In this way, there is a cycle of action that Danny’s photographs take part in. Danny’s impulse to follow the action leads him to take photographs, and in turn he takes action through the intervention of taking a photograph. The photograph then goes on to act as a catalyst for other social and political action based on the content of the image. In addition to the iconic and spectacular images of the era, this exhibit includes images that provide a more comprehensive narrative of SNCC activism, through depictions of the South as a geographic hub, the role of women and youth, and the involvement of the church and religion as equally critical parts of the Civil Rights Movement.
