Author Archives: Lynn Niedermeier

by | March 25, 2011 · 8:28 am

“Ivan the Terrible”

Ivan Wilson and his watercolor of Helm Library

Ivan Wilson and his watercolor of the Physical Education Building (now Helm Library)

“I am 5 ft. 4-1/2 inches high, and weigh 125 lbs.–sometimes,” Ivan Wilson confessed in 1955.  This quiet, gentle watercolorist, who nevertheless was fond of calling himself “Ivan the Terrible,” served from 1920-1946 as head of WKU’s art department and remained on the faculty until his retirement in 1958.

A collection of Ivan Wilson’s papers documenting his professional and personal life is now available at WKU’s Special Collections Library.  Containing more than 800 items, it includes correspondence, sketches, travel journals, and clippings relating to Wilson’s exhibits.  Once reluctant to show or sell his artwork, Wilson eventually exhibited in numerous universities, museums and galleries including the Nelson-Atkins in Kansas City and the Raymond Duncan Gallery in Paris, France.

Interesting items in the collection include Wilson’s diary, which he kept in 1918-1919 as a 103-pound army recruit at Camp Zachary Taylor; his impassioned letters about art written to the president of the American Watercolor Society; his letters to a former student, Chicago architect Edward Austin Duckett, who helped him sell his paintings; and a tribute to his Irish setter “Poody” that will bring tears to the eyes of all dog lovers.  An avid naturalist, Wilson spent long hours gardening, hiking and fishing with WKU English professor John H. Clagett, and pursued hobbies as diverse as etymology, piano and the study of snakes.  Professionally, he experienced the trials of many a faculty member: campaigning for more resources for his department, trying to motivate a student athlete, and coping with the dislocations of life after retirement.

A finding aid for the Ivan Wilson Collection can be downloaded here.  For more on art and artists in the collections of the Special Collections Library, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | March 17, 2011 · 10:56 am

Van Meter Diary Describes Flight from Bowling Green

Harper's Weekly depicted the scene after departing Confederates destroyed bridges across the Barren River at Bowling Green, February 1862. (Kentucky Library & Museum)

Harper’s Weekly depicted the scene after departing Confederates destroyed bridges across the Barren River at Bowling Green, February 1862. (Kentucky Library & Museum)

As a large force of Union troops prepared to drive the Confederates from Bowling Green in February 1862, one of the town’s residents confided her anguish to her diary.  Virginia native Mary Elizabeth Van Meter (1828-1893), the daughter-in-law of Jacob and Martha Van Meter, was a Southern loyalist who decided that she and her family had to seek safety by evacuating along with the soldiers.  A typescript of Mary’s diary at WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections vividly documents her flight from Bowling Green, her travels through Kentucky and Tennessee, and her eventual return home.

Gathering a few belongings, Mary and her family left Bowling Green amid the boom of cannon, “our troops . . . having waited long enough to burn both bridges, some mills, the railroad depot, and other houses containing military stores.”  Near Columbia, they find refuge with a friend who had once invited them to stay “if ever we were driven from our home by the vile Yankees.”  She rails at “would-be King Lincoln” when she hears that a relative has died in a Federal prison.  Throughout her odyssey, Mary anxiously follows news of every battle, her spirits rising and falling with the fortunes of the South.  A year after departing, she finally returns to Bowling Green, but not before enduring a boat trip with some soldiers wearing the “hateful blue coats.”  Although her home has survived, Mary finds the rest of the town, and her world, changed forever.  “I now sit by my window all day,” she wrote, “and scarcely recognize a familiar face.”

Click here to download a finding aid for Mary’s diary, which is part of the Hobson Family Papers at the Department of Library Special Collections.  For more on the Van Meter and Hobson families, and Bowling Green during the Civil War, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | March 3, 2011 · 10:40 am

New Book Uses Special Collections Resources

Cale Young Rice & Alice Hegan Rice dine in Japan, 1905 (Ky. Library & Museum photo)

Cale Young Rice & Alice Hegan Rice dine in Japan, 1905 (Kentucky Library & Museum)

The Rice Collection of letters, scrapbooks and photos at WKU’s Special Collections Library has been extensively used in the research and writing of a new book about Shelbyville native and author Alice Hegan Rice (1870-1942).  In Beyond the Cabbage Patch: The Literary World of Alice Hegan Rice (Butler Books, 2010), Mary Boewe chronicles the life and times of Alice and her husband, poet and dramatist Cale Young Rice.  As Boewe shows, Alice Hegan Rice’s novel Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch–a 1901 bestseller that became an “industry” in the manner of Harry Potter–was only one achievement in a life that encompassed authorship of more than two dozen books, exotic travel, and acquaintance with a wide circle of public and literary figures such as Mark Twain, Theodore Roosevelt, Richard Watson Gilder, Ida Tarbell, Edith Wharton and Henry Watterson.

After a trip to Japan in 1905, Cale Young Rice included his impressions of the country in a poetic collection he published as Plays and Lyrics.  In a letter that is part of the Rice Collection, Cale’s fellow poet Madison Cawein praised his Japanese poems as truly representative of “the mystic spirit of the East.”  Cale’s travels and partnership with Alice were essential to his work; not only did the couple collaborate professionally, but Alice was unwavering in her support of his solo literary efforts.  As Boewe notes, the creator of Mrs. Wiggs–one of the great literary phenomena of the early 20th century–loyally contrasted her “potboilers” with her husband’s “true” artistry.

A finding aid for the Rice Collection at the Special Collections Library can be downloaded here.

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by | February 23, 2011 · 1:17 pm

Help Wanted

Author George Britt obeys a request to donate to the Kentucky Library

Author George Britt obeys a request to donate to the Kentucky Library

Since it opened in the 1930s, WKU’s Special Collections Library (formerly the Kentucky Library) has drawn inquiries about its collections from authors, historians, collectors and genealogists near and far.  Before Google searches, digital text or e-mail, library staff members Elizabeth Coombs, Mary Leiper Moore and director Julia Neal corresponded with both scholars and amateurs seeking to research their books and articles, locate a rare publication, or fill a gap in family genealogy.  In their replies, the librarians never passed up the opportunity to obtain a copy of the author’s latest work or a pledge to donate his/her personal papers.

A collection of this correspondence, now available at the Special Collections Library, dates from the 1930s to the 1970s and includes letters from authors such as Thomas D. Clark, Anne Pence Davis, Janice Holt Giles, Jesse Stuart and Joy Bale.

Sometimes the authors are interested merely in locating an elusive source; at other times, they write at greater length about their work and that of others.  “At present I am spending most of my time in collecting old drafts and photographing old coverlets,” wrote Kentucky master weaver Louisa Tate Bousman (“Lou Tate”).  “Do you have in your collection of Kentuckiana any manuscript account book or diary of some planter or farmer in which is enumerated the different expenditures in connection with the slaves?” asked J. Winston Coleman, Jr.  Responding to a request for her papers, Joy Bale admitted that she never kept drafts of her poems because “I am so glad when a poem of mine finally reaches what I consider MY best that I joyously tear up all beginnings.”  Writing from the University of Kentucky, James Thomas Cotton Noe asked for guidance in “the task of building a Kentucky collection for our library.”

A finding aid for the Authors Correspondence Collection can be downloaded here.  For other resources on authors in Kentucky and elsewhere, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | February 10, 2011 · 4:40 pm

St. Columba Academy

St. Columba Academy and Georgia Johnson's report card

St. Columba Academy and Georgia Johnson’s report card

The current observance of St. Joseph School’s 100th anniversary invites a look back even farther to the beginnings of Catholic education in Bowling Green.  In the late 1850s, Father Joseph deVries appealed to the Sisters of Charity in Bardstown to send teachers for a school to serve his Catholic constituents.  In 1863, despite the upheaval of the Civil War, he got his wish.  Sister Constantia Robinson and 3 other nuns set up shop in a rented building that had been variously occupied by Union and Confederate troops, and St. Columba Academy was born.

In 1869, St. Columba moved to a new home in the 1100 block of Center Street, where it accepted day and boarding students.  The curriculum was rigorous but, in accordance with custom, female students were offered “ornamental” subjects like embroidery, painting and piano alongside their studies in algebra, history, philosophy, botany and literature.

In 1910, the pastor of St. Joseph Church purchased a lot at Church and Nugent streets and put the sisters in charge of the new St. Joseph Parochial School.  Accordingly, St. Columba held its last commencement on June 14, 1911.  The old school on Center Street was sold to the city board of education and became home to Bowling Green High School and later the junior high.

WKU’s Special Collections Library holds a class register for St. Columba Academy covering (with a few gaps) 1887-1911, when the school enrolled about 140 children each year.  Turn past the final page, however, and the enrollment register for St. Joseph’s begins, running from 1911-1936–a testament to the continuity of Catholic education in Bowling Green.

A finding aid for the St. Columba Academy/St. Joseph School register can be downloaded here.  For more resources on the educational history of Bowling Green, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | February 3, 2011 · 11:55 am

Mammoth Cave National Park Association Collection Now Available

Mammoth Cave National Park Association membership form

Mammoth Cave National Park Association membership form

For those interested in the history of the conception, organization and operation of Mammoth Cave National Park, WKU’s Special Collections Library offers two important collections of primary source material: the Max B. Nahm Collection, about which we have previously blogged, and the Mammoth Cave National Park Association (MCNPA) Collection.

Incorporated in 1925 for the purpose of persuading Congress to pass enabling legislation for a national park at Mammoth Cave, the MCNPA worked closely with the Kentucky National Park Commission to acquire the minimum acreage needed for the park and to raise funds for project expenses.  Prior to 1941, the MCNPA was concerned with managing the caves and associated hotels, building roads and infrastructure, fending off opposition to the project, and convincing politicians at the state and federal level to remain committed to the goal of a national park.  After some 48,000 acres were assembled and the National Park Service took over the park in 1941, the MCNPA assumed a new role as a non-profit advocacy group, providing input on environmental, educational, and preservation issues affecting Mammoth Cave.

The Mammoth Cave National Park Association Collection at WKU’s Special Collections Library includes meeting minutes, correspondence, reports, advertisements, and clippings covering most of the MCNPA’s history.  A detailed finding aid for the collection can be downloaded here.  For other resources on Mammoth Cave, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | January 28, 2011 · 9:38 am

A First Responder

West Kentucky Coal Company letter, 1927

West Kentucky Coal Company letterhead, 1927

On August 4, 1917, an early-morning explosion at the West Kentucky Coal Company’s Mine No. 7, near the city of Clay in Webster County, killed 62 miners.  It was the worst accident in more than 20 years, but James W. Meyers was lucky enough to be pulled out alive.  Meyers’ luck ran out, however, on August 3, 1927, one day before the tenth anniversary of the tragedy, when another explosion rocked Mine No. 7 and he was counted among the 15 dead.

A fellow worker, Earl Hamby of Earlington, responded to the call for volunteers to help with the rescue and recovery mission, and the letter of thanks he received from the company is part of the collections of WKU’s Special Collections Library.  “There was no scarcity of men who were ready to risk their lives,” wrote vice president Thomas E. Jenkins to Hamby.  “Your name is numbered in this list.”  Then he made an observation that has been sustained countless times since, in any number of circumstances: “Every disaster which takes a toll of human life brings forth its heroes.”

A finding aid for Jenkins’ letter to Earl Hamby can be downloaded here.  For more resources at the Special Collections Library relating to coal and coal mining, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | January 20, 2011 · 2:31 pm

Allan M. Trout Collection Now Available

Allan M. Trout, 1903-1972

Allan M. Trout, 1903-1972

Allan M. Trout’s career as a political reporter for the Louisville Courier-Journal spanned more than 38 years.  Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1931, he also received the Governor’s Medallion for distinguished public service through journalism in 1959 and 1966.

But Allan Trout had a parallel journalistic career as the author of “Greetings,” a daily column of humor, folklore and “barnyard science” that debuted in the Courier-Journal on January 2, 1939.  Before long, readers all over Kentucky and southern Indiana were sharing their own stories with Trout and addressing him like an old friend.  The first book of collected “Greetings” columns, published in 1947, sold 10,000 copies in two weeks.

When Trout announced his intention to retire at the end of 1967, “Greetings” fans were bereaved.  “Not being able to start the paper with ‘G’ will never be the same, wrote one.  Another counted himself among the “old timers who have read after you these many years” on subjects as perplexing as “skunks and why these varmints invaded this part of Kentucky west of the Tennessee river, the luck of buck-eyes, the protection from evil given by carrying the left hind foot of a Jack rabbit in your pocket, the curative value of a pod of asafetida worn about the neck, [and] why the cock crows at midnight.”

After Trout’s retirement, he gave his collection of papers and artifacts to WKU’s Special Collections Library.  Included were correspondence, speeches, photos, books and curious historical items he had acquired over his long and unique career.

A finding aid for the manuscript portion of the Allan M. Trout Collection can be downloaded here.

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by | January 13, 2011 · 11:30 am

Her “Great American King and Queen”

Ronald and Nancy Reagan

Ronald and Nancy Reagan

As we approach the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s birth (February 6), we can be sure that authors and pundits will continue to weigh in on the legacy of the nation’s 40th president.  Thousands of books–from Where’s the Rest of Me?  The Ronald Reagan Story (1965) to dozens of new volumes awaiting release in 2011–offer perspectives, both positive and negative, on Reagan and his political career.

Ronald Reagan has also inspired local authors.  WKU’s Special Collections Library holds a biography of Reagan written by Logan County native Betty Kathleen Hall (1908-1995).  Presented in the form of a narrative poem, the 184-page composition covers Reagan’s life from his youth (He was a lifeguard in the depression days / and he hitchhiked from town to town, / looking for radio work or, just anything–/ honest or honorable that could be found) to his and First Lady Nancy Reagan’s last days in the White House (Then suddenly, a commotion attracts us, / there’s a bustle of vigor and vim, / as we join all Americans and shout / “Good-bye!  Good-bye!” to them.)  Hall takes on the issues, personalities and controversies of the Reagan years, in every instance maintaining a thorough lack of sympathy for the President’s critics.

A finding aid for the Betty Kathleen Hall Collection can be downloaded here.  For other resources on Ronald Reagan at the Special Collections Library, search TopScholar and KenCat.

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by | January 5, 2011 · 2:37 pm

“Je suis aviateur americain”

World War II blood chit

World War II blood chit

I am an American aviator.  My plane is destroyed.  I cannot speak your language.  I am an enemy of the Japanese.  Be so kind as to protect me, treat me and take me to the closest allied military office.  The government of my country will reward you.

They were called “escape flags” or “blood chits.”  Made of silk, about the size of a handkerchief, they reproduced the message above in several languages including French, Thai, Korean and Japanese.  During World War II, pilots shot down in foreign territory used the flags to identify themselves and obtain help from the local population.  If the pilot failed to survive, the serial number on the flag could offer a clue as to his fate.

WKU’s Special Collections Library holds two such escape flags in the collection of Warren County native and U. S. Navy veteran Cecil Murray Elrod (1923-2002).  The first is pictured at left, while the second shows the flag of Nationalist China.  Issued to pilots in the China-Burma-India theatre, it included a request in Chinese to shelter and protect the bearer, a “foreign person” who has “come to China to help in the war effort.”

A finding aid for the Cecil Murray Elrod Collection can be downloaded here.

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