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John Glenn, 1921-2016

“You couldn’t pay that officer too much attention,” said Bowling Green’s Martha Potter, when Lt. Col. John H. Glenn, Jr., became the third American to go into space (after Alan Shepard and Virgil “Gus” Grissom) and the first to orbit the earth.  One of the original “Mercury Seven” astronauts, Glenn circled the earth three times during his five-hour flight on February 20, 1962.

Project Mercury commemorative stamp (Frank Chelf Collection)

Project Mercury commemorative stamp (Frank Chelf Collection)

Like all Americans, Martha was transfixed, even though numerous delays had postponed the flight.  “I got [up] at five o’clock the first morning [January 27] he was to make his trip,” she wrote her children.  “The TV was working fine and I saw him get in his capsule and was still watching when he came out.”  On the day of the successful launch, she had invited some friends over to play cards, but the group quickly turned to the unfolding event.  Martha “lived at the TV” until late evening and in the days afterward, when Glenn was feted with a ticker-tape parade.

In Washington, Kentucky Congressman Frank Chelf joined the chorus of praise for Glenn.  On February 26, he introduced a bill to award Glenn and his fellow Mercury Seven astronauts the Congressional Medal of Honor plus a bonus of two years’ salary.  A version of his idea became law in 1969, when Congress authorized the Congressional Space Medal of Honor for astronauts who distinguished themselves in the space program.

In recognition of the many contributors to the milestone, Chelf’s bill also provided $5,000 to each of the scientists, engineers and technicians associated with the mission.  Glenn himself was the first to credit the “team effort of many, many thousands of people” behind Project Mercury.  A thank-you letter written on his behalf to Bowling Green native Lillie Mae Carter and her first-grade pupils in Toledo, Ohio put his pioneering feat in perspective: “Many things were learned from this and from the earlier flights of Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom,” it noted.  “Each flight is a stepping-stone in our ever-expanding manned space flight research program.”

Click on the links to access finding aids for these collections featuring the late John Glenn in the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives section of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections.  For more collections, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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Land of Contrasts

Iceland 5 krona banknote (Frank Chelf Collection)

Iceland 5 krona banknote (Frank Chelf Collection)

June 17 marks the official anniversary of the 1944 founding of Iceland as a republic independent of Denmark.  Two Kentuckians had the opportunity to experience this nation of “extreme contrasts” (to quote its web site) both before and after its independence, and their impressions are recorded in the collections of the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives section of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections.

In January 1942, Hopkins County native Jim Wooton, then serving in the U.S. Army, was ordered to Iceland to help staff a transfer station for troops and equipment being sent to England.  He and 1,200 other men experienced a rough, late-winter crossing in a 300-foot United Fruit Company “banana boat,” but arrived in Reykjavik unmolested by German U-boats.  Hunkered down with his fellow soldiers in reinforced Quonset huts, Wooton vividly recalled the howling winds that gusted as high as 120 miles per hour.  He returned from his 9-month tour of duty understanding the reason for the island nation’s high literacy rate: “everyone stays home and reads.”

In August 1977, Bowling Green’s Clara Hines, the widow of cake mix magnate Duncan Hines, visited Iceland as part of a tour of several Nordic countries.  Her experience, needless to say, was starkly different from Wooton’s.  The intrepid 73-year-old hopscotched around the island by bus and small plane, viewing lakes, forests, lava formations, natural hot springs and waterfalls as well as picturesque villages.  The weather was warm and sunny most of the time–she only found the wind “very cold” on the walk from her hotel to the airport.  She spent her krona on a souvenir doll and a figure of the god Thor fashioned from lava, and pronounced herself tired but exhilarated by the sights in this “fantastic country.”

Click on the links to access finding aids for Jim Wooton’s and Clara Hines’s impressions of Iceland.  For more accounts of travels by Kentuckians, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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Gethsemani Magnificat

Fondation de Gethsemani coverIn his address to Congress on September 24, Pope Francis gave special recognition to four individuals who “shaped fundamental values which will endure forever in the spirit of the American people.”  One was the Cistercian monk Thomas Merton, “a man of prayer, a thinker who challenged the certitudes of his time and opened new horizons for souls and for the Church.”

Born in France, Merton (1915-1968) converted to Catholicism as a youth.  In 1941, he entered the Abbey of Gethsemani, a monastic community founded in 1848 near Bardstown, Kentucky, and spent the next 27 years of his life in contemplation (which included a controversial exploration of Asian religion), social activism, and writing.

Crucifix presented to Frank Chelf, 1954

Crucifix presented to Frank Chelf, 1954

The Manuscripts & Folklife Archives collections of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections hold materials relating to the Abbey of Gethsemani, such as a small olive wood crucifix presented to Congressman Frank Chelf in 1954.  Also included are materials collected by WKU faculty member Marjorie Clagett.  As part of her lifelong interest in the French in Kentucky, she researched their Catholic institutions, and in 1949 wrote a paper on the centennial of the Abbey.  She also collected articles, brochures, and a photo essay commemorating the anniversary.

The Abbey’s centennial brought renewed attention to Thomas Merton, who published his autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, that same year.  In a review of the book, Life magazine found Merton still searching for the peace he desired.  Despite the contemplative atmosphere of the monastery, he said, with farming, maintenance and other chores, there was still “too much movement, too much to do.”  Nevertheless, he concluded, “Anybody who runs away from a place like this is crazy.”

Crowds gather for the Gethsemani centennial, 1948

Crowds gather for the Gethsemani centennial, 1948

Click on the links to access finding aids for these collections.  For more on religious orders, including our extensive collections of Kentucky church records, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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Political Survivors

Since the Cold War, a feature of the annual State of the Union message is the “designated survivor” status given to a member of the U.S. government.  Should a catastrophic event wipe out the Capitol and everyone inside during the President’s speech, continuity of government would rest in the hands of this individual, who watches the proceedings from a secure, Secret Service-protected location.  This year’s “designated survivor” was Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx.

In 1966, giving his farewell speech after 22 years in Congress, Kentucky representative Frank Chelf remembered an event that, if not catastrophic, surely rattled the halls of that institution.  On March 1, 1954, four Puerto Ricans demanding independence from the United States fired pistols from the gallery of the House at members of the 83rd Congress.  “When the sound of the last shot was history,” said Chelf, “five of our colleagues were lying bleeding on the floor of this chamber.”  Having just left for a doctor’s appointment, Chelf concluded that the engagement saved his life because “the seat that I had just vacated minutes before, had been completely riddled by two bullets.  It just wasn’t my time to go.”  The same, fortunately, held true of the five shooting victims, all of whom survived.

Departing Congressman Frank Chelf passes the torch to William H. Natcher, 1966

Departing Congressman Frank Chelf passes the torch to William H. Natcher, 1966

Frank Chelf’s farewell speech to Congress is part of the Frank Chelf Collection in the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives holdings of WKU’s Special Collections Library.  Click here to access a finding aid.  For more political collections, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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“Permit Safely and Freely to Pass”

George Crawford's 1807 passport

George Crawford’s 1807 passport

For most of us, our most-deplored photo (next to our driver’s license) is the one on our passport.  But it wasn’t until late 1914 that Americans were required to include a photographic likeness with their passport applications.

Earlier passports might simply state the holder’s name, as did the 1807 passport of George Crawford, signed by New York mayor DeWitt Clinton.  Or the document might give notice of the age and physical attributes of its bearer.  For example, the 1863 diplomatic passport of Bowling Green lawyer Warner L. Underwood described his high forehead, blue eyes, prominent nose, “ordinary” mouth and chin, round face, and “florid” complexion.  George Harris’s August 1914 passport was for a man with a medium forehead, large nose, dark complexion, and dimpled chin.  Although it included her photo, the 1919 passport of WKU teacher Elizabeth Woods also noted her medium nose and mouth, round chin, and oval face.  Like Underwood’s, her passport was not the pocket-sized book we use today, although at 8X12 inches it could be folded in quarters and kept in a cardboard cover, like that of Grayson County merchant Willis Green.

Willis Green's 1923 passport

Willis Green’s 1923 passport

What gives modern passport photos their charm, of course, is that mug-shot quality (a “neutral facial expression and both eyes open” is the rule).  But earlier specimens weren’t quite so uniformly dreadful.  From the flapper-era glory of Ruth Hines Temple’s 1926 photo, to the Cold War-era gaze on Congressman Frank Chelf’s 1959 passport (“not valid” for travel in Hungary, Cuba, etc.), these photos allowed a little of the bearer’s personality to shine through.

Click on the links to access finding aids for the collections containing the passports of these traveling Kentuckians, part of the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives holdings of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections.  For more, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

Ruth Hines Temple; Frank Chelf

Ruth Hines Temple; Frank Chelf

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Battle of the Flags

Panama Canal LogoAlmost from the beginning, the 1903 treaty granting the United States perpetual rights to a 10-mile strip across the Isthmus of Panama for canal construction became a political problem.  By the late 1950s, Panamanian grievances against the U.S. over the Canal Zone were well defined:  insufficient payments for its use, wage and employment discrimination against Panamanian workers, and nationalist resentment over American control of the territory itself.  A particularly sensitive question, one with enormous symbolic significance, was whether the Panamanian flag should be flown alongside the Stars and Stripes in the Canal Zone.

As Panama observed the anniversary of its independence, on November 3, 1959 some 2,000 student demonstrators attempted to enter the Canal Zone to raise the flag of their country.  Tensions quickly escalated.  The students threw rocks at Canal Zone police, who responded with fire hoses and tear gas.  Finally, the Governor of the Canal Zone, Major General William E. Potter, frustrated by the lukewarm response of the Panamanian authorities, called in U.S. troops to quell the violence.

When the Panamanians criticized Governor Potter’s actions, Kentucky Congressman Frank Chelf was livid, and wrote to President Dwight D. Eisenhower deploring the calls for Potter’s resignation.  Having recently visited the Canal Zone and met “real” Panamanians who had nothing but admiration for the U.S., he believed the riots to be a cynical move by Communist-inspired opportunists.  No doubt referring to presidential candidate Aquilino Boyd, a leader of the “flag invasion,” Chelf accused “free-loading politicians” of casting their lot with “flea-bitten, cheap Communist demagogues” in order to poison public opinion against the U.S. and gain votes on election day.  Meanwhile, America’s long friendship with Panama went unrecognized.  “We gave them more than a just trade for the original Canal Zone by and through a fair and honorable treaty,” Chelf wrote Eisenhower.  “We ended yellow fever, completed the job the French had left undone and started the ships moving.”  With Canal Zone operations pumping some $180 million annually into Panama’s economy, seeing his country portrayed as the “big bad wolf” was a bitter pill for Chelf to swallow.  Nevertheless, in September 1960 Eisenhower authorized the flying of both the Panamanian and U.S. flags in the Canal Zone.

Frank Chelf (in checked shirt) and Mrs. Chelf visit federal judge and fellow Kentuckian Guthrie F. Crowe and Mrs. Crowe in Panama, 1959

Frank Chelf (in checked shirt) and Mrs. Chelf visit federal judge and fellow Kentuckian Guthrie F. Crowe and Mrs. Crowe in Panama, 1959

The Frank Chelf Collection in the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives section of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections includes his letter to President Eisenhower and is one of our featured collections as we observe the Panama Canal Centennial this month.

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“V” for Victory

Winston Churchill; signing pen for his honorary U.S. citizenship proclamation

Winston Churchill; signing pen for his honorary U.S. citizenship proclamation

It first appeared in Nazi-occupied Europe, then took hold in Great Britain.  Promoted by the BBC, the “V for Victory” campaign of World War II featured the letter “V” defiantly chalked on walls, sidewalks, streetcars and other public places, and its Morse code equivalent, three dots and a dash, musically rendered in the first four notes of Beethoven’s Fifth.  But its most iconic manifestation was the two-fingered sign unforgettably employed by Prime Minister Winston Churchill.  “The V sign is the symbol of the unconquerable will of the occupied territories and a portent of the fate awaiting Nazi tyranny,” Churchill declared in a special message broadcast on July 19, 1941.

In 1963, Kentucky Congressman Frank Chelf took the floor of the House of Representatives as a co-sponsor of legislation to make the British leader an honorary U.S. citizen.  The son of an American mother, Churchill already commanded the deep affection of Chelf and his countrymen, but more importantly, Chelf declared, “as long as any of us shall live we shall carry the memory of the resolute, valiant Churchill . . . always holding his hand aloft, with his fingers forming his famous V-for-victory sign, standing as a shining symbol of hope and man’s determination to remain free.”

A week after Chelf’s speech, Churchill wrote a letter thanking him “for the very agreeable things you say about me and for the graceful way you expressed them.”  On April 9, 1963, when President John F. Kennedy signed the proclamation conferring citizenship on Churchill, Chelf received the signing pen as a souvenir.

The papers of Frank Chelf, which include his work for Churchill’s honorary citizenship, are part of the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives collections of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections.  Click here to access a finding aid.  For more political collections, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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Tobacco Diplomacy

Frank Chelf (second from right) and colleagues at The Hague, 1951

Frank Chelf (second from right) and colleagues at The Hague, 1951

It’s a battered pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes, with a few of them still inside, their innards having dried up and fallen out long ago.  But, like the letters, photos and other papers of Congressman Frank Chelf housed in the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives collections of WKU’s Special Collections Library, it tells a story.  Chelf himself thought it worthwhile to inscribe the pack of smokes with the notation that a queen had partaken of its contents.

During his 22 years representing Kentucky’s Fourth District in the U.S. House of Representatives, Frank L. Chelf (1907-1982) found himself in the heart of Cold War politics.  In 1951, he and other members of the House Judiciary Committee took a month-long trip overseas to investigate the problems created by thousands of refugees fleeing Soviet-dominated countries for Western Europe.  While visiting The Hague, Chelf and his colleagues met with Queen Juliana of the Netherlands, who had taken a particular interest in the issue.  During World War II, Juliana herself had been forced to leave her country to live in Canada.

Expecting to take only 30 minutes of the Queen’s time, the group found her willing to talk for some two hours.  Finally, Pennsylvania Representative Francis E. Walter got to his feet as if to take his leave.  Inadvertently, he committed a diplomatic faux pas, for it was Juliana’s prerogative to decide when the meeting would end.  But Chelf jumped in to smooth any ruffled feathers.  He assured the Queen, who he knew understood American slang, that they didn’t want to “wear out their welcome.”  And perhaps, his willingness to share a couple of cigarettes from his pack of Lucky Strikes had helped, too.

Click here to access a finding aid for the Frank Chelf Collection.  The Manuscripts & Folklife Archives section of WKU’s Special Collections Library holds many other collections relating to Kentucky politics and politicians.  For more information, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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