Photographer Kate Seston Matthews (1870-1956) was born in New Albany, Indiana, but she lived most of her life in rural Pewee Valley, Kentucky, a small community near Louisville. Matthews used this community and her friends and family as her subjects, but she is most well known today for her photographs depicting characters in the children’s book series, The Little Colonel. These stories were written by her neighbor, Annie Fellows Johnston. Matthews also loved to pose living pictures or tableaux vivants, whereby she captured on film a “water colored” view of her community and life in rural Kentucky. A patron has donated some of these original model prints depicting characters from the series to the Kentucky Library’s Photographic Archives. These materials are available for research Monday through Saturday (9-4) and may also be viewed at our online catalog, KenCAT.
Monthly Archives: March 2010
Kate Matthews and “The Little Colonel”
Filed under Events
Training School & College High Collection
Girls Basketball Team 1927
Founded as a teachers college in 1906, WKU soon found the need to have a training school located on campus. The first was located in the old Southern Normal Training School building. Upon moving to the Hill, the training school was moved to the original Potter Hall. Lastly, in 1925 the training school and high school moved into its own building, currently known as the Science and Technology Building.
University Archives holds about 10 cubic feet of records from the training school and high school. These include class rolls, catalogs, scrapbooks, photographs, basketball scorebooks, event programs, curriculum guides and cookbooks.
These materials are available for researchers in the Harrison-Baird Reading Room, Monday to Saturday 9 to 4. Check out KenCat to see digitized photographs. See also the new online exhibit in commemoration of the rededication of the Science & Technology Building.
Filed under Events, University Archives
Music Index Online
As if April 1st, 2010, WKU Libraries has access to the Music Index Online:
Published since 1949, The Music Index is the single most comprehensive annual Subject-Author Guide to Music Periodical Literature.
The editor-librarians at Harmonie Park Press have surveyed data from more than 875 music periodicalsfrom over 40 countries.
Produced in conjunction with the PRINT format, The Music Index ONLINE edition features over 1.5 million records. The searchable database is updated quarterly with about 100,000 new records added annually. Open URL support is available and Full Text Article Links are accessible to JSTOR Participants. We are pleased to announce that in 2009 The Music Index Online coverage will span from 1973 to the present.
Topics concerned with every aspect of the classical and popular world of music are thoroughly categorized and organized according to the framework of an internal Subject List which includes both Subject and Geographic headings. Covering all styles and genres of music, The Music Index duly cites book reviews, obituaries, new periodicals, and news and articles about music, musicians, and the music industry.
The longevity and dedication of our editorial and production staff has ensured a publication of unfailing high-quality. The thoroughness of indexing and subject heading research, along with our comprehensive coverage of the music field, makes The Music Index an invaluable resource for both the novice scholar and the experienced academician.
Click here to search Music Index Online. If you are off campus, you will need to log into our proxy server first. You can also access Music Index Online through our library webpage by going to TopCat and search “Music Index Online” or through EBSCOhost via our Databases Page.
Filed under Acquisitions, Latest News
Women’s History Month, Part IV
Margaret Morehead Hobson, 1890-1987
By the time Margaret Morehead Hobson (1890-1987) graduated from Bowling Green’s Potter College for Young Ladies in 1909, she had become known to her teachers and classmates for her artistic ability.
But over the next few years, Margaret had more practical things in mind as she searched for economic opportunity following the death of her father. In 1918, when Bowling Green became the center of a five-county oil boom, she schooled herself in the region’s geology, examined surveys, and established relationships with investors, petroleum scientists, and potential lessees. Eventually, she earned the rights to drill for oil in more than 14 Kentucky counties. Even as the oil boom subsided in the late 1920s, Margaret’s particular interest in the resources of Edmonson County put her into partnership with an association formed to secure national park status for Mammoth Cave. In exchange for drilling rights in the area, she obtained purchase options for the association covering some four thousand acres.
Besides her career in the oil industry, which lasted well past her eightieth birthday, Margaret was devoted to another traditionally masculine pursuit, fox-hunting. Still, her artistic ability and sense of style served her well. Maps she created for oil development projects became valuable resources for the Kentucky Geological Society. Margaret had also made it a rule to appear at every lease negotiation meticulously dressed and coiffed because, as this successful businesswoman put it, “first impressions are important.”
To download finding aids for collections at WKU’s Special Collections Library relating to the life and career of Margaret Morehead Hobson, click here and here.
Filed under Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
WKU Favorite Professor(s)
Who do you remember most? Which one was your favorite? Why?
We’re taking nominations . . . check out the Favorite Professor website and add your thoughts.
Send you nominee to archives@wku.edu
- Carol Crowe-Carraco
Filed under Events, University Archives
Spring Food Drive at WKU Libraries
Win-win opportunity for WKU students and Bowling Green/Warren County community!
Beginning Monday, March 22, WKU Libraries will accept food donations for a local food pantry in exchange for overdue library fines. For every food item brought to Cravens 4th floor, we will forgive $1 of the student’s fines up to $10. Recommended foods to bring are canned fruits or vegetables, hearty soups like chili or beef stew, peanut butter, bagged beans, crackers, pastas. Food may be taken to any WKU library location. However, to have fees forgiven, food must be brought to the 4th floor of Cravens Library.
Filed under Events
Dictionary of Irish Biography Online
The library has acquired a subscription to the Dictionary of Irish Biography online!
The Dictionary of Irish Biography is a collaborative project between Cambridge University Press and the Royal Irish Academy, available in print and online, involving 700 contributors and spanning 9,000 lives. The Dictionary is the indispensable reference work for Ireland. It includes the lives of Irish men and women who made a significant contribution in Ireland and abroad, as well as those born overseas who had noteworthy careers in Ireland from James Ussher to James Joyce, St Patrick to Patrick Pearse, St Brigit to Maud Gonne MacBride, Shane O’Neil to Eamon de Valera, Edward Carson to Bobby Sands. The Dictionary will put their lives into every major library in the world and on the shelves of scholars, journalists, teachers, broadcasters, diplomats and general readers. It will be especially important in helping to sustain Irish studies courses in universities throughout the world. ~DIB
To access the subscription from WKU, go to http://dib.cambridge.org/. From the homepage go to “Browse” or “Advanced Search” to find what you want. No need to log in!* This is a great resource for historians, English Literature majors, and anyone who deals with important Irish citizens and issues of the past and present.
*If you are off campus, you will first have to log into the Proxy server. Look up “Dictionary of Irish Biography” in TopCat through WKU’s library homepage. There is a link to The Dictionary of Irish Biography when you click the catalog entry.
Filed under Acquisitions, Latest News
Zephyrus
In Greek mythology, the Anemoi were the wind gods. Zephyrus was the west wind and bringer of light spring and early summer breezes.
1969 Cover
At WKU, Zephyrus is the fine arts magazine published annually by the English department. It features art, poetry and short stories created and written by students. University Archives holds the full run of this magazine which first appeared in 1969. We are in the process of digitizing every issue for publication on TopScholar. Originals are available for researchers in University Archives UA68/6/1.
Filed under Events, University Archives
Women’s History Month, Part III
Rachel Eddington letter, 1858
“This is not the Country that was recommended to me,” mourned Rachel Eddington. Rachel, her husband Sandy, and their seven children had been the property of Charlotte Belt, an Ohio County, Kentucky widow. In 1857, however, the family found themselves in Liberia, the subjects of a decades-old movement to free American slaves and recolonize them in Africa. After her emancipation, we might have known nothing more of Rachel, but she was determined to hold Mrs. Belt to a promise to correspond with her. The result was a unique and heartbreaking story that is preserved in WKU’s Special Collections Library.
Rachel had much to tell her former mistress, as she and her family quickly fell on hard times in Liberia. Like many newcomers, they became ill with fever and suffered from skin wounds that would not heal. They had no horses or cattle, and insufficient land and implements for farming. They were chronically short of work and food. Over the next several years, Rachel sent letters to Charlotte Belt and Charlotte’s brother, Henry Stevens, pleading for everything from meat, lard and butter to thread, soap, candles and nails. Her situation became even more dire when her husband, making a return visit to America, abandoned her, then three of her children died. “I want to come back to my old home for this is a poor place,” she declared; still, she expressed her resolve to do all she could to provide for her family. Here, unfortunately, after six years, is where the fate of Rachel Eddington is lost to history.
Click here for a finding aid, scans and typescripts of Rachel’s letters.
Filed under Manuscripts & Folklife Archives
US Bank Art Show higlighted on WBKO’s “A View from the Hill”
Tonight (March 18) on WBKO at both 5 pm and 10 pm, Amy DeCesare will be featuring our US Bank art show in her “View from the Hill” segment. Be sure to watch our program being highlighted.
Filed under Events