WKU Libraries celebrated Halloween with a potluck party on October 31, 2011 in Cravens 111. Crystal Bowling, Senior Catalog Assistant from the Department of Library Technical Services, won the first prize for her costume in the costume contest during the party. Many left happily with a door prize donated by the Libraries’ employees. Glenda White and Jan Renusch from the Dean’s Office led volunteers in organizing the party.
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1908 postcard to Ruth Hines Temple; 1926 party invitation to Hansford Hale
In 1908, nine-year-old Warren County native Ruth Hines Temple received a colorful Halloween postcard from her aunt. More than a decade later, she still observed the scary season as a student at Randolph-Macon College. There, she wrote her mother in 1921, seniors paraded solemnly in cap and gown carrying jack-o-lanterns made for them by the sophomores. The next year, students paid 15 cents to gain admission to a full-fledged Halloween carnival in the gym, complete with side shows, music and food.
In the 1940s, before she moved to Bowling Green, Regina Newell experienced Halloween as a child in Coaldale, Pennsylvania. She recalled knocking on doors in costume, prepared to deliver a little song, dance or recitation if she was asked, and of the older folks trying hard to guess the identity of each masked trick-or-treater. Her school parties featured apple-bobbing and candy corn (“witches teeth”). When Regina was eight, her family moved to California, where Halloween customs were somewhat different: trick-or-treaters got grapes instead of apples and wore makeup instead of masks, even though performing for their candy was no longer expected.
The stories of Ruth Hines Temple, Regina Newell and others are part of the collections of WKU’s Special Collections Library. Click on the names to download collection finding aids. In addition, our folklife collections include lots of projects about ghosts, haunts, superstitions and the paranormal; or, you can read about ghostly happenings right here in Bowling Green and on the Hill. For further information, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.
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One of Dr. Brian Coutts’ recent donations to WKU Libraries is the stunning two-volume set, The Story of Underwear. Volume 1 is The Story of Men’s Underwear by Shaun Cole; Volume 2 is The Story of Women’s Underwear by Muriel Barbier and Shazia Boucher. Both books are heavily illustrated with photographs of vintage and modern examples of useful and decorative underclothes, while a scholarly text explains the history and significance of the garments.
The Story of Underwear was listed in Library Journal’s “Best Reference 2010 Resources”.
A featured book review (by Brian Coutts and Therese Duzinkiewicz Baker) about the set was published in the Bowling Green Daily News, Sunday, July 31, 2011. The books are shelved in the VPAL , call number VPAL REF GT2073 .S76x 2010.
– Therese D. Baker
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Six images and Ed Givens play by play of the WKU – University of Michigan 1966 NCAA game are now available online. Cazzie Russell & Greg Smith go for the ball and in the end the official calls a foul on Smith. With only 11 seconds remaining, Russell sinks both free throws to take Michigan to a heartbreaking 80-79 victory over the Hilltoppers. Were you at the game? Do you have a memory to share about it?
These images and many others are available in WKU Archives and through KenCat.
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Today Grand Rapids Michigan Native Liz Snavely aka LVNMUZIQ played her lyrical, thoughtful brand of modern urban folk music. Her voice reminiscent of Natalie Merchant, Liz wove a complex melodic enchantment over the crowd at Java City to the delight of everyone.
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Lowell Harrison as soldier and teacher
When Russell County native and retired WKU history professor Lowell H. Harrison died on October 12, he left behind a distinguished record of teaching and scholarship, having written or edited some 15 books, published more than 100 articles and authored hundreds of book reviews. Like many WKU faculty, staff and students, he also left behind an honorable record of military service. During World War II, Harrison trained at Fort Knox, Kentucky and Camp Carson, Colorado, and served overseas as a combat engineer with the 104th Division.
In common with many of his fellow WKU students, Harrison kept up a wartime correspondence with classmates and teachers back on the Hill. His letters, saved by their recipients and now housed in several collections in WKU’s Special Collections Library, show that the rigors of military service never dampened his dry wit or dulled his intellectual curiosity. In August 1944, Harrison sent student Dorthie Hall a photograph of himself in combat-ready pose with the identification, “I’m the one supported by the rifle.” In language that hinted at the narrative skill he would display as a historian, he also told Dorthie about his visit to the Colorado town of Cripple Creek. “The hills are dotted with dark tunnels which belched impossibly rich gold ore only a half century ago,” he wrote. “The town boomed, and the world’s greatest poker game saw stakes totaling over a million.” Eventually, “the flow of ore became a thin trickle as the source vanished.” Residents departed, and “as the years fled by, the drifts of winter snow slipped through more and more open doors and gaping windows,” leaving the town to reinvent itself and “cater to the tourist trade, undisturbed by the ghosts of old prospectors who pick away at promising formations at the ghost town of Cripple Creek.”
Read Lowell Harrison’s World War II letters in the Dorthie A. Hall Collection, the Frances Richards Collection, and the Gabrielle Robertson Collection at WKU’s Special Collections Library. Click on the collection names to download finding aids. To find more collections of war letters (from the Civil War through Iraq and Afghanistan), search TopScholar and KenCat.
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The Spirit Masters have been around for awhile and will be celebrating their 30th anniversary this weekend.
WKU Archives holds several composite photographs of the group such as this one. The 1991-92 photos are special as the Spirit Masters signed them with well wishes for Elizabeth Esters and WKU President Thomas Meredith. This image and and notes are now available for viewing on TopScholar.
WKU Archives also hold UA12/2/16 Spirit Masters records. Mentions of the group are also found in UA4/2 Academic Budgets & Administration and UA12/2/20 Phi Delta Theta records. These records are available for researchers to use in the Harrison-Baird Research Room Monday – Saturday 9 – 4.
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Keith Hurt and Paul Hatchett, musicians from Glasgow, KY thrilled the audience at Java City with their original music and their unique arrangements of familiar rock tunes.
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This month’s Far Away Places series featured Angene Wilson, emeritus Professor of Education at University of Kentucky, and Jack Wilson, retired director of the Division of Water for the state of Kentucky on the evening of October 20, 2011 at Barnes & Noble in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
The couple talked about their service as the first Peace Corps volunteers in the 60’s as well as the stories of other volunteers that they wrote into their book “Voices from the Peace Corps: Fifty Years of Kentucky Volunteers.” They signed their book at the end of the event.
Photo Album | Audio | Podcast
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