Association News
Association News
Jo Jackson, Chair of the Membership Committee, reported that the LAMA membership has increased from 66 members last year to a current total of 93--and other individuals have promised to join or expressed interest in the organization. The Membership Committee sent out over two- hundred letters last year. While pleased with the response, Jo urges individual LAMA members and repositories to continue to promote membership in LAMA.
Planning for LAMA's Directory of Archives in Louisiana continues. The goal of the directory is to provide archivists and researchers with a comprehensive guide to archival resources available state-wide.
Board Member Brady Banta, presented proposed guidelines for LAMA's Scholarship Fund, designed to provide funding for continuing education for eligible LAMA members. These guidelines and necessary amendments to the LAMA bylaws will be presented to the membership at the Fall Meeting.
LAMA will sponsor a session at March 1996 meeting of The Louisiana Historical Association to be held at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond. The title of the session is "The Fraternal Twins: Archives and History" and will include speakers Dr. Warren Billings, Department of History, University of New Orleans, on the use of archives in the classroom; Dr. Judith K. Schaefer, Murphy Institute, Tulane University, on the history of slavery in Louisiana legal archives; Dr. Charles E. Nolan, Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans, on Louisiana history in religious archives; and Dr. Alfred Lemmon, The Historic New Orleans Collection, on the history of music in archives. LAMA hopes to sponsor future LHA sessions every other year.
Southern Archives
Conference
New Orleans, April 10-12, 1996
The meeting schedule is well on its way to finalization, and includes a diverse choice of sessions and other activities. Planned for Wednesday, April 10 is a pre-conference workshop on internet sources for archivists, conducted by Lee Miller and held at The Historic New Orleans Collection. Also on tap for Wednesday are repository tours of Tulane University Special Collections, the William Ransom Hogan Jazz Archive, Tulane's Latin-American Library, the Newcomb Center for Research on Women, and the Amistad Research Center, as well as a welcome reception in a private Vieux Carre home.
Thursday includes sessions on "Research Methodologies in New Orleans History," "The Thirtieth Anniversary of the Civil Rights Struggle in the American South: Where Have We Been and Where Are We Going?," "Electronic Access," "Legal Issues," "Southern Colonial and Territorial Period Resources," "Collection Development Policies," and "Twentieth-Century Military History." The keynote luncheon will be held at Ralph & Kacoo's Seafood Restaurant, with keynote address by Robert S. Martin, Director of the Texas State Archives. Thursday evening's schedule offers a reception at The Historic New Orleans Collection and dinner at the Palm Court Jazz Cafe and Record Center, complete with entertainment by the Crescent City Joymakers.
Scheduled for Friday is an early morning, complimentary Vieux Carre walking tour conducted by architect and architectural historian Robert Cangelosi, followed by state business meetings, a round table discussion by State Archivists, and, in the afternoon, complimentary tours of French Quarter museums: the Hermann-Grima House, Gallier House, Beauregard House, the Old Ursuline Convent, The Historic New Orleans Collection, the Louisiana State Museum (the Cabildo, Presbytere, Old Mint, and the 1850 House).
Rooms are $92.00, single or double occupancy, plus applicable taxes. On-site parking is available for overnight guests at $10 plus tax per night. Participants are responsible for making their own reservations by calling the hotel's Reservations Center at 1-800-366-2743 on or before February 23, 1996 and identifying themselves as members of the "Southern Archives Conference" to receive the special rates.
For more information, contact Sally K. Reeves, Notarial Archives, Room B-4, Civil District Courts Building, 421 Loyola Avenue, New Orleans LA 70112; ph: 504-568-8577, fax: 504-568-8599; email: skrnona@www.gnofn.org.
Exhibits: A LAMA
Survey
Yet they can also be problematic. Mounting an exhibit, regardless of its size or scope, is a time-consuming process and inevitably a disruptive one. In the current climate throughout the state of budget crises and staff shortages, the hours spent researching, selecting material, designing and mounting an exhibit and then, once it's over, putting all the pieces back into their rightful places mean hours when important, "routine" work is interrupted or postponed. And at times, the number of patrons exhibits draw in or the interest they prompt is discouragingly small.
Despite the problems associated with mounting changing exhibits, however, the respondents to this latest LAMA questionnaire answered the question "Are they worth the trouble?" with firm and often enthusiastic affirmatives. As a profession, we evidently believe in the benefit of displaying our wares, and we go to a good deal of trouble to try to do it right. This essay surveys the exhibits practices in repositories throughout the state. The 14 repositories which responded to the questionnaire represent a cross-section of the LAMA membership--from small municipal or institutional archives to archives/special collections housed in university or public libraries, to large collections with their own "stand-alone" buildings--and, thus, perhaps give a fairly accurate idea of how, where, and why we spend so much time creating displays.
The exhibit announcements carried in each Newsletter testify to the variety and ingenuity of topics on display in Louisiana repositories. In this issue alone, repositories announce exhibits based on topics as diverse as the history of sugar production, World War II, hurricanes, and financial institutions. The exhibits described in previous newsletters indicate a similar diversity. Typically, exhibit topics are chosen in order to illustrate a milestone event or a moment in history, to celebrate the achievements of an individual, group, or institution, or to display a body of literary or artistic work. And, of course, to publicize a repository's collections and to attract new users.
The resources available to Louisiana repositories in terms of space and equipment vary according to the size or type of the parent institution. Repositories housed in their own buildings naturally have more elaborate facilities and more room than those which share space with a library. The State Archives' Louisiana Room has eleven wall cases and four maximum security floor cases dedicated for displays; in addition, exhibits at the State Archives can be mounted in the building's main lobby or in a 26' x 34' gallery using self-supporting display cases. A display case in the research library holds small exhibits rotated throughout the year. LSU's Hill Memorial Library, home to the Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections, has a first-floor exhibition lobby and a second-floor, balcony-area exhibition space, both of which are equipped with museum-carpeted walls. The balcony space contains a dozen built-in display cases around the perimeter plus one double and eight single freestanding cases. The Historic New Orleans Collection uses its Williams Gallery, on the first floor of its Royal Street facility for large exhibits and is currently renovating an additional French Quarter building which will greatly increase its display space.
Repositories housed within library buildings typically have specially designed exhibit areas in or near their reading rooms or in the lobby of the library. Nicholls has the Ellender Room, a large, formal reception room with 27 built-in, lighted, glass fronted, floor-to-ceiling display cases. LSU, Shreveport has an exhibit/seminar room in a lobby area between the Archives and the Noel Rare Book Collection with five flat display cases and portable, free-standing panels. UNO's Archives/Special Collections reading room includes two large, see-through wall cases visible from the inside and outside of the room, each divided into four contiguous display areas; inside the room are three free-standing flatbed display cases. USL mounts displays both in the Jefferson Caffery Reading Room and in the Dupre Library lobby; horizontal and vertical cases are available in both areas. Louisiana Tech has three tower and eight horizontal cases in its Prescott Library facility and one horizontal and two tower cases in the Alumni Center. SLU, Northwestern, and McNeese all have a fairly large number of display cases and/or panels in their reading rooms.
Smaller facilities generally have less formal and spacious exhibit areas. The Louisiana Division of New Orleans Public Library has two flat-bed exhibit cases, a large curio case, a tall horizontal case, and two 4' x 4' panels positioned in the entryway to the its third-floor reading room and stack area. The second-floor "bridge," a spacious, glassed-in mezzanine, has occasionally been used for large exhibits consisting of reproductions of original material mounted on panels. The Touro Infirmary Archives has a permanent "History Wall" opposite the hospital's main elevators. Other displays are arranged in cases, two in the archives and various others around the hospital. The Morgan City Archives also has an exhibit wall in its outer research room, but at this time does not have adequate space to house exhibit cases.
On average, the repositories reflected in the survey mount three to four exhibits each year--with a high of seven to eight at the State Archives. A common practice in some archives is to mount several major exhibits each year and several, smaller, changing displays. Nicholls, Touro, LLMVC, and THNOC, for example, follow this practice.
In archives that are part of larger institutions, the number and topic of exhibits is sometimes determined by the "needs" of the parent institution, which may request that the archives mount exhibits celebrating the institution's history or publicizing its current activities--requests which are difficult, if not impossible, to refuse, regardless of other demands placed on archival staff and resources. Bobs Tusa at Louisiana Tech reports that she has done five major exhibits in the last 14 months, and, as a result, feels that her department is "out of balance." She adds, "I've sworn off for a while, except Homecoming is in October and the School of Forestry is 50 years old in 1995-1996." At the New Orleans Public Library, four of the exhibits mounted by the archives staff in the last two years have resulted from "requests" from the Library's administration; two of these exhibits were major efforts requiring several months of concentrated work. The Louisiana Division archives staff, too, has "sworn off" such ambitious displays--except 1996 will mark the 100th anniversary of the New Orleans Public Library, an event which, like Tech's Homecoming and departmental anniversaries, will by its nature demand, and deserve, an archival presence. This dilemma--wanting to do something which there is legitimately no time to do--is one no doubt familiar to repositories state-wide.
And the dilemma is, of course, compounded by the fact that the majority of repositories do not have the luxury of an exhibits staff. The State Archives has two exhibit coordinators, and at the LSU Libraries, a Library Associate III with eight years of experience and training in conservation and preservation techniques is responsible for displays. At The Historic New Orleans Collection, exhibits are designed by the Director of Programs and appropriate staff. For the most part, however, exhibits in Louisiana repositories are produced by the archives staff --and sometimes by the repository's "lone arranger." Touro gets support from the hospital's marketing department, and UNO has student workers who can help. At the Louisiana Division of NOPL, the Library's Duplications Department cooperates with the two-person archives staff by laminating reproductions used on panels and, when feasible, making reproductions of prints. But in these repositories, as in the majority of archives state-wide, the lion's share of the work of creating displays falls to the archivists themselves.
It's not surprising, then, that the amount of time spent designing and mounting exhibits varies widely from repository to repository--and from exhibit to exhibit, depending on its size, scope, and intended audience. While small exhibits can be done quickly in a day or two, most repositories report that large exhibits can take from several weeks to months to prepare. And most would probably agree with Bobs Tusa's description of the amount of preparation time: "FAR TOO MUCH! No one who has ever pulled unmarked items from a manuscripts collection for exhibition has any idea!" Mary Linn Wernet of Northwestern outlines a typical exhibit schedule in this way: "2 weeks of pulling and tagging materials, 2 weeks photocopying and mounting materials, 1 week putting items in cases, 2 weeks for full description cards, etc., 1 week for exhibit handout (or when pushed, 2 weeks of pulling extra duty and lots of coffee)."
Surprisingly, only two of the repositories responding to the questionnaire (the State Archives and The Historic New Orleans Collection) reported that they have the luxury of a dedicated exhibits budget. For the most part, exhibit expenses come out of general supply or petty cash budgets or are borrowed from monies earmarked for "related" activities--e.g., photocopying or encapsulation. Louisiana Tech reports that they try to tie their exhibits to an event that does have funding. The Morgan City Archives and LSU both make use of occasional donations from outside sources. SLU recycles mats and frames and "moves money around" in its budget to cover display expenditures. In recent years, NOPL has been able to depend upon modest allotments from the Library's general fund to cover the cost of color laser photocopies and, on one occasion, benefited from grant funding provided for Black History Month programming to finance a major exhibit. The operative word to describe exhibit funding state-wide, however, seems to be "creative"; "we just manage to find it somewhere," says Kathie Bordelon at McNeese, and most repositories seem to handle display expenses in much the same way.
Archives typically announce new displays in their own institutional publications--newsletters or student newspapers--but also send press releases to local and regional print and electronic media. University archives can depend on the university's public information bureau for assistance in distributing press releases or brochures to appropriate sources. But attracting attention of the public-- and the media--is not always easy.
Several repositories note that exhibits linked to events or those that are formally opened with a reception generally receive the greatest attention. Bruce Turner at USL writes, "For the last several years we have mounted exhibits to coordinate with a lecture series sponsored by the Friends of Dupre Library. These have been effective on the evening of the lecture itself. Otherwise, our space is somewhat isolated so we have little walk-through traffic. Despite news releases, our attendance is always less than what we feel the exhibits deserve." Bobs Tusa of Louisiana Tech notes that exhibits are worth doing "if one is selective and ties them to something worthy of publicity. Just to install an exhibit and to publicize it doesn't work here. Tied to the Tech Centennial, or to 105th birthday of a local bank, or to the Camp Ruston POW Camp Symposium co-sponsored with the History Department...THAT works." In the same vein, Laura Street of LSU, Shreveport says that their exhibits "are usually in connection with an event being held on campus and are publicized along with the event." She also reports that LSU, Shreveport has had success with off-campus exhibits connected to community events: "For example, we mounted a large exhibit on the history of the Shreveport Municipal Auditorium in connection with a day-long event promoting the restoration of that building." The Historic New Orleans Collection's major exhibits are always accompanied by opening receptions and often by a series of lectures or other public events tied to the display; as a result, their displays inevitably attract considerable media and public attention. A new method of getting the word out--mounting exhibits on the World Wide Web--is currently being pursued only at New Orleans Public Library (concentrating so far on the exhibit's text, rather than on images), though Louisiana Tech, LSU, Northwestern, and UNO all plan to explore or utilize this option in the future.
All in all, the consensus is that exhibits are worth it. The respondents to the LAMA survey, while aware of the time vs. ultimate return conflict posed by mounting exhibits, all seem to accept this duty as part of the territory and, perhaps, as a weapon used to combat the fourth law in the facetious "Laws of Archivy," posted a few months ago to the Archives and Archivists Listserv: "If you've seen one archives, you've seen them all."
Acquisitions
Archives and Special Collections of McNeese State University Library announces the acquisition of three new collections: the Dr. Donald J. Millet Collection, containing addresses on historical subjects, photographs from the Lake Charles vicinity, materials related to the Knapp memorial on the McNeese campus, correspondence, and biographical material on area citizens; the Bea North/Maplewood, Louisiana Collection, consisting of ca. 1940s scrapbooks concerning Maplewood, the Maplewood Star, Cities Service Refinery, and articles by and about Mrs. North; and the Conway LeBleu Collection, two scrapbooks containing clippings, photographs, and correspondence from 1964- 1988, chronicling LeBleu's 24 years in the Louisiana House of Representatives from District 36.
Touro Infirmary Archives has added the Nuclear Medicine Collection of John U. Hidalgo, 1951-1976. With Dr. Sam Nadler and Dr. Ted Bock, Hidalgo pioneered nuclear medicine in New Orleans, at Tulane and Touro. In 1950, after working at the Medical Division of the Oak Ridge Institute for Nuclear Studies, Dr. Hidalgo began a program with his Touro Clinic patients that led to the formation of the Department of Biophysics. This collection of his papers also includes Hidalgo's "History of Nuclear Medicine."
Touro also announces a "tremendous find in house"--an 1854-1868 minute book, thought to be lost, and the Infirmary's original constitution and by-laws, with original signatures. The minute book, which turned up in the back of an old file, brings the Touro Annual Reports and Minutes in the Archives to 1990. Archivist Catherine Cahn reports that the discovery "is a fund of information , a good deal of it de-bunking some of Touro's myths, and fleshing out the character of our all-too-human founders and early doctors."
The Southeastern Louisiana University Archives has received from Fred Benton, Jr. of Baton Rouge the gift of the General Halbert Paine Collection, consisting of numerous letters, seven photographs of Civil War vintage, diary notes and Paine's reminiscences in manuscript form of his life during the Civil War. General Paine was stationed in Louisiana under General Butler, commanded at Baton Rouge, and fought at the siege and battle of Port Hudson. Southeastern has also accessioned a collection of glass negatives of the Jahnke Shipyard at Madisonville, circa WWI.
At the Allen J. Ellender Archives, Nicholls State University, U.S. Representative Billy Tauzin joined local business leaders and Nicholls officials recently at a donation ceremony. The Lovell Collection, comprised of field notes, maps, abstracts, aerial photographs, surveyors' computations and other surveying items, was donated to the Archives by Louisiana Land & Exploration Company. Purchased by LL&E from the Lovell Estate in 1962, the collection is the compilation of work by the father and son surveying team of J.A. Lovell and J.C. Lovell. These early records concern Lafourche, Terrebonne, Assumption, and St. Mary Parishes. The donation was coordinated by Head of Special Collections, Carol Mathias; Leighton Stewart, president of LL&E, made the presentation. The Louisiana Society of Professional Surveyors, represented by president Tim Allen, donated storage units, and T. Baker Smith and Sons, Inc., a local engineering and surveying firm, added a $1000 donation to help defray the cost of processing the collection.
The Morgan City Archives has acquired the original discharge paper of James St.Clair from the American Army, dated June 6, 1783 and signed by George Washington. It has also added an original hand-written letter to Mayor St. Clair of Morgan City, dated September 4, 1876, signed by Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain).
Archives and Manuscripts/Special Collections, Earl K. Long Library, University of New Orleans announces a number of new acquisitions: The Josie Arlington Collection, 13 photographic prints of the famous New Orleans madam, her family and her Esplanade Avenue residence and some posed erotica, ca. 1900; the David P. Levy Collection, 1 1/2 linear feet of records produced and/or gathered by Levy while working to effect changes in Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Protection Project, 1947 (1970-1985) 1995; the Thiberge Collection, 3 bound volumes and loose clippings of school materials bearing on the education of the Thieberg girls by the Sisters of the Society of the Sacred Heart, 1888 (1922-1923) 1923; the Societe d'Economie et d'Assistance Mutuelle Collection, minutes volumes with inclusions, 1876-1877; the Beatrice Rodriguez Owsley Collection, 6 linear feet to date (6/5/95) of audiocassette interviews with members of the New Orleans Hispanic community, 1986-ongoing; Association of Commerce Collection, 2 linear inches of scrapbook contents concerning the Association's interests and activities, 1921- 1923; 1943-1946; University of New Orleans Collection, 30 linear feet of records from the Chancellor's Office, ca. 1990s, and 10 linear feet of accounting records from the Earl K. Long Library, 1990s; Orleans Parish School Board Collection, 70 linear feet of Board records, ca. 1980s; the Associate Louisiana Supreme Court Justice James L. Dennis Collection, 3 linear feet of Justice Dennis' papers relating to the transfer of criminal jurisdiction from the Supreme Court to the Courts of Appeal; the papers supplement other collections for legal research in UNO's holdings.
The Amistad Research Center has added the papers of Dr. Molefi Kete Asante, Professor and Chair of African-American Studies at Temple University and one of the leading proponents of Afrocentric perspectives. Correspondence and other files have already been accessioned. Assante's papers are the first deposit to what is the nation's first Afrocentric Archive, which will document the Afrocentric paradigm as taught by its leading proponents.
Among other recent Amistad accessions are the John Hatchett Papers, articles, correspondence and books of Professor Hatchett, minister, activist, and Egyptologist; Kevin Johnson Papers (1961-1992), the radio talk show host's audiotapes and videotapes of interviews with prominent African-Americans, including Malcom X, and speeches by Marcus Garvey; the Joseph Madison Papers (1970-1994), papers, reel-to-reel tape, audiotape, videotape, clippings, and photographs of the NAACP National Board Member and former Executive Director of the NAACP in Detroit, and President of the Michigan Leadership Conference; the Hazel S. Moore Papers (1911-1994), files and early church records from the Librarian, Chair of South Central Conference of UCC and active Tougaloo alumna; Frederick Morrow Papers (1950- 1994), correspondence, manuscripts, clippings of the author of Black Man in the White House (1963), the first African- American White House Aide; NKOMBO Papers (1968- ), papers of the literary journal of the Black Arts Movement, founded by Tom Dent and Kalaama Ya Salaam from the Free Southern Theater Writing Workshop; and the Deborah Sellers Family Papers (1900- ), family photos from the Collins and Perrault studios, stamps and postcards.
The Cammie G. Henry Research Center, Northwestern State University, has received 206 site reports, master plans, and structural studies largely pertaining to the Louisiana area from Robert DeBlieux. They have also accessioned 4 linear feet of records (1965-1986) from NSU's Educational Fraternity Organization, Phi Delta Kappa, Zeta Alpha Chapter records.
Among the numerous accessions at the Louisiana State Archives are the following series titles: Louisiana State Archives History: 1956-present; Secretary of State Accounting Records: 1980-1991; Division of Black Culture: 1984-1988; City of Crowley Records: 1905-1979; Culture, Recreation and Tourism: 1950-1973; Leprosy Colony (Carville): 1894-1994; Secretary of State, Elections Scrapbooks: 1958-1983; Fort Jackson: 1822-1918; James W. Polk Collection: 1942-1980; and Tombstone Rubbings: 1740-1935.
The Historic New Orleans Collection's Manuscript Division has received the Frank Wells Correspondence and the Albert D. Carmichael Diary. Wells, a Vermont native, spent much of the Civil War in Louisiana, stationed with the 13th Connecticut Volunteers. His observations in correspondence with his brother, sisters, and father humanize historical fact. Carmichael, an enlisted man from Iowa, kept a diary from January 4 to March 3, 1864, which includes detailed descriptions and personal reflections on the destruction at Vicksburg and his journey from St. Louis to New Orleans to rejoin his battalion.
New additions at Louisiana State University's Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections include the Palmer-Lincoln Family Papers, the papers of Edward C. Palmer (1865-1923), a wholesale paper dealer in New Orleans. The papers consist of correspondence of the Palmer and Lincoln families discussing business and personal matters.
An addition to the Samuel J. Marino papers documents the musical careers of Marino and fellow members of the "Owen Reed Orchestra," a swing band active in Baton Rouge from the mid-1930s until World War II. This accretion adds to other papers of Marino which document "The Louisiana Kings," a band which played at LSU around 1935-37. Some of the new materials reflect the later musical activities of Marino, Owen Reed, Johnny Kidd, and other LSU Alumni.
Also new at LLMVC are the papers of Louis E. Chenel and family. Chenel immigrated from France and invested in a tung oil plantation in Folsom, Louisiana in the 1930s. After the plantation failed, he subdivided and sold his 1,000 acres as Merrywood estates. The records document both the tung oil industry and land development in Folsom. Also included in the records are the papers of Chenel's daughter, Denise Chenel Daughtry. Her papers document her career as an artist, as director of the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center, and as the force behind the Krewe of Clones Mardi Gras parade which was affiliated with the Center and which was active during the late 1980s.
The City Archives, New Orleans Public Library, received several additions to its collections during the Spring and Summer. They accessioned new records from New Orleans Civil Service, added 3 cu. ft. to the existing records of the late NOPD Chief Henry Morris, and 28 cu. ft. (1975-1992) to the records of the Clerk of Council. Retiring Health Department head, Dr. Brobson Lutz oversaw the transfer of 45 cu. ft. of records from his office (mid- 1960s-1992). They also received 30 boxes of records from the Department of Safety & Permits' Plan Processing Section, including the massive card index to building records ca. 1900-1989; these cards were generously filmed on 6 rolls of 16mm microfilm by The Historic New Orleans Collection, which retained a copy of the film. Amistad Research Center transferred 37 cu. ft. of the records of former Mayor Sidney J. Barthelemy which had originally been deposited in error at the Center. The Archives also received an additional 8 boxes of records from former City Councilmember Jacquelyn B. Clarkson.
Special Collections, Manuscripts and Archives, Prescott Memorial Library, Louisiana Tech University has accessioned 67 donations to date in the Camp Ruston Collections, a joint project begun in May 1994 by Louisiana Tech and the Ruston Developmental Center to collect materials documenting the history of Camp Ruston. The collections currently include maps and aerial surveys, photographs, artifacts (including items unearthed during Tech's archaeological survey of the site, as well as Camp Ruston scrip, Christmas cards, dinner menus, musical concert programs, athletic equipment, and dinnerware), National Archives records, POWs' art works, service records, correspondence, and taped oral history interviews of former prisoners and staff.
Louisiana Tech has also received the original diary of Simsboro farmer Arthur Osban Jones, donated by Jones' sons Calvin B. Jones and George Jones. The diary covers January 1, 1926 through January 5, 1944 and provides an excellent record of daily life on a farm in north central Louisiana, as well as useful source material for researchers in meteorology, agriculture, history, and the social science. The donation includes both the original handwritten diary and a typewritten transcript, and photographs and family history.
Additional Tech donations include the archives of the Louisiana Association of Public, Community, and Adult Education (LAPCAE), founded in 1975; scrapbooks of the Ruston State Bank, 1969-1990 and a portrait of the Bank's founder; and the Roach family deeds, original homestead deeds of Union Parish residents Andrew Jackson Roach and John Aiken Roach.
Events, Exhibits,
Meetings
The Morgan City Archives conducted a history presentation before the Morgan City Kiwanis Club at the Petroleum Club of Morgan City on February 25. On April 28, the Governor J.Y. Sanders Statue, donated by Sanders' granddaughter, Mary Sanders of Baton Rouge (an honorary member of the Morgan City Archives Commission) was installed and dedicated in Lawrence Park at Morgan City. The sculptor of the bust is Marge Ward of New Orleans.
At the Southeastern Louisiana University Archives a photographic exhibit on "World War II in the Pacific" is on display in the Rayburn Room, home of the Archives and Center for Regional Studies. The exhibit will remain on display through the end of 1995.
Touro Archives, along with the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans and Temple Sinai, will host the the annual meeting of the Southern Jewish Historical Society in New Orleans on October 27-29, 1995. Touro Archivist Catherine Cahn is co-chair of the Host Committee and will speak on "Benevolent Societies' Response to River-Borne Diseases in 19th-century New Orleans." In connection with the conference, Touro is also mounting a display and planning tours and other events.
The Amistad Research Center is exhibiting 20 works by William H. Johnson through December 1, 1995. A member of the Harlem Renaissance, Johnson won the Harmon Foundation's Gold Medal in 1930 and during the 1930s was included in many Harmon Foundation-sponsored traveling art exhibits. Johnson's style evolved from representational to expressionistic and, finally, to his sharply-outlined figures from rural Black life and the Bible. The Center holds 26 pieces by Johnson in gouache, oil, linocut, and woodcut.
On April 29, 1995, Amistad hosted "A Man Called Dutch," a one-day exhibit of Bernardo Wade's 200 color photographs taken while he was official photographer for New Orleans Mayor Ernest N. "Dutch" Morial.
"The Evil Wind: Hurricanes in South Louisiana" was on view in the Louisiana Division, New Orleans Public Library through September, 1995. The exhibit drew upon material in the City Archives, the Louisiana Division book and newspaper collections, and the Louisiana Photograph Collection to illustrate the effect that hurricanes have had on the City of New Orleans and the surrounding region throughout history. It looked first at several 17th- and 18th- century storms and then more closely at storms of the current century, focusing specifically on the two terrible storms that will mark anniversaries in 1995: the great unnamed storm of 1915 and Hurricane Betsy of 1965. An online version of the exhibit (text only) is available in NUTRIAS, NOPL's home page on the World Wide Web, at http://www.gnofn.org/~nopl/exhibits/hurricane1.h tm.
A new exhibit "Rosa Freeman Keller: A Legacy of Southern Activism" will open in the Louisiana Division on October 2 and continue on view through January, 1996. This exhibit will honor the extraordinary career of Civil Rights activist and long-time NOPL Board member Rosa Keller, using photographs, memorabilia and documents from the City Archives and Louisiana Division Collections as well as photographs and awards provided by the Keller family. This exhibit will also be available online, this time with images, at http://www.gnofn.org/~nopl/exhibits/keller.htm .
Northwestern State University's Cammie C. Henry Research Center hosted part of the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, National Center for Preservation Technology and Training and NSU's Department of Social Sciences' Heritage Area Workshop, held on June 12-16, 1995. The workshop addressed researching the history and cultural resources of heritage areas.
The Henry Research Center also assisted the Natchitoches National Guard Armory with a World War II celebration on August 12 by exhibiting 11 panels depicting many related documents and images from the collection and displaying several period books and magazines. The exhibited items were on display during a city-wide celebration on September 2, and a World War II exhibition will be on display in the Research Center through the Spring of 1996.
The Louisiana State Archives celebrated the opening of the Louisiana Cotton Museum in Lake Providence. A full time staff member, Richard Holloway, has been assigned as curator at that facility. In addition, the E.D. White House in Thibodeaux was reopened in October, 1994, under the auspices of the State Archives. The house, home of Chief Justice White, features several exhibits relative to White's life and career. Patrick Hotard is serving as curator. The State Archives also hosted a display of the original Louisiana Purchase documents at the Old State Capitol; the exhibit, which ended August 3, attracted more than 40,000 visitors.
Two exhibits will be held at the LSU Libraries Special Collections at Hill Memorial Library: "Sugar: 200 Years of Raising Cane" will be on exhibit beginning on September 15 on the second floor of Hill Memorial Library. Also at Hill Memorial this fall will be an exhibit of photographs by A.J. Meek, LSU professor of photography. The exhibit will feature Meek's photographs of Civil War battlefields and will include panoramic format prints.
A special preview and reception were held July 9 in the Department of Special Collections, Manuscripts and Archives in the Prescott Memorial Library at Louisiana Tech to inaugurate the exhibit "The Ruston State Bank and Trust Company: A Pictorial History," which remained on view through the end of July. The exhibit documented the history of the Ruston State Bank, founded on July 9, 1890 and recognized as the oldest state bank in continuous operation in Louisiana. The bank was acquired last year by Premier Bank. The items on exhibit were donated and loaned by former bank officers, employees and their families and included the bank's first ledger, checks written in the 1890s, portraits of the ten bank presidents from 1890 to 1994, historical photographs showing the interior of the original bank and of the balloon races sponsored by the bank, six large scrapbooks, a secret code book used by banks in the early 20th century to communicate transactions by telegram, and pieces of antique bank equipment.
On April 7, 1995, as part of Louisiana Tech's Academic Excellence Week, the Department of Special Collections, Manuscripts, and Archives co-sponsored with the Tech History Department, the Lambda Rho chapter of the national history honor society Phi Alpha Theta, and the McGinty Trust the "Camp Ruston Symposium: World War II and the Prisoner of War Experience" in observance of the Tech Centennial and the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II. The subject of the day-long symposium was Camp Ruston, an important World War II prisoner of war internment facility located near Ruston. Speakers included Dr. Arnold Krammer, professor of history at Texas A&M University and author of Nazi Prisoners of War in America; Dr. Matthew J. Schott, professor of history at the University of Southwestern Louisiana, whose book Good War Provinces: The Bayou Stalags of World War II is forthcoming; and Mark Scalia, Tech history major and archaeologist at the Camp Ruston site. Other symposium activities included a panel discussion among Mrs. Mary Snelling Duchaney, one of the American staff at Camp Ruston; Sgr. Cesare Puelli, an Italian former prisoner of war; and Mr. Vince Spione, president of the Camp Ruston foundation. An exhibit of documents, photographs, and artifacts related to Camp Ruston was on display in the Department of Special Collections, Manuscripts and Archives during Academic Excellence Week. Highlighted were examples of art work--paintings, drawings, and woodcarvings--made by the prisoners. Also on exhibit in the department were historical memorabilia in honor of the Centennial of Tech.
Publications and
Access
UNO's Archives and Manuscripts/ Special Collections Department has produced a pamphlet on primary holdings concerning the various ethnic groups that make up the population of New Orleans. This pamphlet was made possible by a grant from the University's Diversity Advisory Committee. Marie Windell is microfilming the maps and other oversized items in UNO's Supreme Court Collection to preserve the antebellum records, 1846-1861. One set of the series will be available on interlibrary loan.
At LSU Shreveport, Noel Memorial Library's Archives and Special Collections is working with Dr. Ann McLaurin, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts, on a "coffee table" book on the history of Byrd High School in Shreveport. In conjunction with this book project, the Archives is starting a Byrd High School Collection; the school is placing all of its yearbooks, school newspapers and other archival material in the Noel Library Archives, and the Archives staff is conducting a series of oral interviews with former Byrd graduates, going back to the 1920s.
The 1995 edition of The Centerpiece, the publication of Southeastern Louisiana University's Center for Regional Studies has been published and is available free of charge by writing to: Center for Regional Studies, SLU 730, Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA 70402.
The Historic New Orleans Collection in cooperation with the National Archive of Cuba has microfilmed the Fondo Floridas, an important documentary source for the states of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, and Florida. The Fondo Floridas makes up a portion of the administrative records of Spanish Louisiana.
Special Collections, Manuscripts and Archives, Louisiana Tech has produced a printed guide to the Camp Ruston Collections, available from Bobs Tusa; it (and other manuscripts collections and archives can also be accessed in Tech's Web site (http://www.latech.edu/tech/library) or via gopher at vm.cc.latech.edu. The Guide to the Camp Ruston Collections provides a brief history of Camp Ruston, and reproduces the finding aids to the thirty Camp Ruston collections which have been arranged, preserved, and described by the department's staff. The Guide will be updated periodically as additional materials are received.
The archives staff at McNeese State University has edited Simply Stated, the Friends of the Library newsletter.
New Orleans Public Library's Louisiana Division has made available in NUTRIAS, NOPL's home page, the Guide to Building Plans in the City Archives, a searchable index of the more than 2500 plans transferred to the Archives by the Department of Safety and Permits and the Vieux Carre Commission. The URL for the Guide is http://www.gnofn.org/~nopl/plans/planlist.htm. Among the information now available in NUTRIAS (http://www.gnofn.org/~nopl/) are finding aids and inventories of all pre-1862 records in the City Archives, the records of New Orleans mayors and a number of City agencies, and an index to the suit records of the Superior Court of the Territory of Orleans. Comments and suggestions about this continually evolving site are welcome.
The Louisiana State Archives has published Guide to the Non-Public Records of the Louisiana State Archives, providing essential information on non-public collections within the repository. An additional publication, Legacy, will be available within the next quarter.
At the Howard Tilton Memorial Library, Tulane University, Assistant University Librarian for Special Collections, Wilbur E. Meneray has edited The Rebellion of 1768: Documents from the Favrot Family Papers and the Rosamonde E. and Emile Kuntz Collection. The volume contains annotated translations of 14 documents concerning the attempt by the inhabitants of Louisiana on October 29, 1768 to expel the Spanish Governor Antonio de Ulloa y de la Torre Guiral and the subsequent reestablishment of Spanish rule by Alejandro O'Reilly.
Tulane Special Collections has also published The Russian Collection, a guide to Imperial Russian and early Soviet holdings in the Special Collections Division. The Guide, compiled by Tulane doctoral student Lee A. Farrow, includes the Romanov Russian History and Travel collection of rare books and the Manuscripts Department's collection of Soviet war posters.
The Tulane Manuscripts Department has also published another in its series of holdings brochures, Preserving Waterways Transportation History. The brochure briefly describes more than 25 collections in the department directly concerning waterways history and suggests avenues through which scholars may access information in hundreds of other collections in the department containing information about water travel, river studies, and riverine commerce. The brochure is also available in the Tulane Special Collections web site at http://www.tulane.edu/~lmiller/Transportation.html.
Grants
The National Institute for Conservation (Washington, D.C.) has funded a $6500 grant for The Amistad Research Center to conduct a collection assessment conservation survey. The grant allows the Center to hire a professional conservator to evaluate the condition of its significant art holdings and to formulate a conservation plan.
In March, Amistad also received a $3000 grant from the Arts Council of New Orleans and the Louisiana Division of the Arts to fund the Regional Debut Exhibition of the Center's Edward Mitchell Bannister works. Bannister (1828-1901) was a significant landscape artist who received the Gold Medal at the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. Amistad owns one of the largest collections of Bannister's graphite drawings, watercolors, and oils, including a rare full- scale portrait.
A Louisiana Archivist:
Rebecca Hankins
Amistad Research Center
Rebecca Hankins' description of herself as an "ordinary person" is overly modest. As Head Acquisitions Archivist and information Technology Specialist at The Amistad Research Center in New Orleans, her duties are many and varied. She is, in her own words, "acquisitions archivist, occasional reference archivist, computer systems manager, and Amistad representative."
Rebecca is originally from Pontiac, Michigan. She attended Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti and spent seven years as a language arts instructor of elementary and junior high students at the School of Two Martyrs in Detroit. She also tutored students and taught at a home school organized by the Muslim community. In addition, she was a member of the Michigan Lay Midwives Association, taught pre-natal classes and delivered eight children--including a set of twins!
After moving to New Orleans in 1983, Rebecca honed her computer skills at the Urban League Word Processing Center, completing courses in business-oriented computer systems incorporating data processing, proofreading and editing. In 1988, she sought employment at Amistad, where then Director Clifton H. Johnson recognized her potential and hired her, despite what she describes as a lack of "traditional" academic credentials. Since then, Amistad has allowed her to build on a long-time interest in history and computers and provided "the opportunity to work and grow as a person . . . and as a professional."
During her time at Amistad, Rebecca seems to have had a hand in almost every aspect of the Center's operations, from dictaphone transcription, weeding, inventory, maintenance of stacks, and developing correspondence files, to original MARC AMC cataloging, the retrospective conversion of the Amistad archive, and management of the Center's direct mail marketing. She has also participated in the development of Amistad's traveling historical exhibits. Currently, her primary responsibilities involve accessioning collections and managing the Center's computer systems.
As Acquisitions Archivist, she registers, re-boxes, inventories, acknowledges, and catalogs all collections received at Amistad--and in a typical year, Amistad accessions five new collections each month. Since she joined the Amistad staff, she has helped to significantly reduce a fifteen-year backlog of unprocessed material . Also involved in collection development, Rebecca has most recently secured the papers of Afrocentrist educator Dr. Molefi Kete Asante, Professor and Chair of African-American Studies at Temple University.
As Amistad's resident "computer guru," Rebecca brings an impressive level of expertise to the job, including a knowledge of Fortran and Basic and an array of word processing, desktop publishing, and database software. She installs all of the Center's computer programs and works with the Tulane library staff for quality control. She has developed databases for Amistad's manuscript and pamphlet collections and consults with other staff in engineering databases for their particular needs, and she assists in the design and creation of Amistad's publications Amistad Log and Amistad Reports. To facilitate online cataloging at the Center, she developed a form to input OCLC records using the MARC AMC format.
Rebecca is also the "mother" of Amistad's site on the World Wide Web, having developed the Center's home page, which she continues to maintain and expand. She is also responsible for imputing information into Amistad's gopher space, monitoring the Internet bulletin boards for relevant topics, answering email inquiries and maintaining Amistad's presence on the African American Librarian's listserve.
In addition to her responsibilities as Acquisitions Archivist and Information Systems Specialist, Rebecca also manages the Center's reference desk several times a week, answering phone queries and assisting walk-in researchers, tasks which have allowed her to develop her knowledge and understanding of the Center's collections. She is frequently called upon to conduct tours of the Amistad facility for groups as varied as elementary pupils, university students, community organizations and professional groups. As a representative of Amistad beyond the confines of the repository, she has attended such community programs as the Annual Marcus Garvey Celebration and the Annual Celebration of the African Child at Armstrong Park. As McMain Magnet School's "adoptee" in the "Adopt a Scholar" program; she conducted a research workshop and tour for the school's faculty. She has also represented Amistad on Tulane's Library Council Committee.
In spite of her full schedule at Amistad, Rebecca has also found time for professional writing. Her book review of Charles R. Larson's Invisible in Darkness appeared in The Amistad Chronicles in 1994. With Amistad's former director, Dr. Frederick J. Stielow and Venola Jones, she co-authored "From Management Theory and Practical Administration to MARC-AMC: Or Throwing the Five Switch," forthcoming in the Winter issue of American Archivist. Rebecca is a member of the Greater New Orleans Archivists, LAMA and the Society of American Archivists.
Beyond Amistad and her archival pursuits, Rebecca has served as head of fund raising for the Islamic Hospitality Committee and helped to gather clothing for needy families around the country. She also volunteers at the George Cox Elementary School, giving talks during Black History Month and at other times during the year. Currently, she is pursuing a Bachelor of Liberal Studies degree at Loyola University's City College, where she is on the Dean's List.
On June 10, 1995, at the New Orleans Friends of Amistad Awards Luncheon, Rebecca was honored for her contributions to Amistad. An "ordinary" person? You judge.
People
At the recent SAA annual meeting in Washington, D.C., Lee Miller, Manuscripts Librarian at Tulane, taught a pre-conference workshop, "Cyberspace for Archivists," an introduction to the internet for archivists, which provided a basic overview of all internet functions, plus a special tutorial on the World-Wide Web. The workshop highlighted how archivists can use the Internet with a special emphasis on archival reference and outreach. Lee team taught the workshop with Peter Hirtle, electronic records archivist with the National Archives in Washington.
Lee is also the recipient of the Society of Southwest Archivists 1995 Distinguished Service Award; he was honored for his work as chair of SSA's Membership Committee (during his tenure, SSA membership tripled!), his editorship since 1991 of the Southwestern Archivist, and his creation of SAA's successful Mentoring Program.
Beatrice Rodriguez Owsley, Associate Archivist, Earl K. Long Memorial Library, University of New Orleans, participated in the World of Work Academy, a mentorship project for middle school students of the New Orleans Public Schools. Beatrice also gave two presentations on "The History of UNO" to incoming university students.
Dr. Alfred E. Lemmon, Curator of Manuscripts at The Historic New Orleans Collection, was elected to the executive board of the Society of Southwest Archivists.
At the Morgan City Archives, staff member Betty Guarisco has been promoted to Acting Curator. Margaret Rappmundt was appointed to the Archives Commission, and Roger Busbice was elected new Chairman. Former Commission Member Lela Lehmann received an award from the Foundation for Historical Louisiana at Baton Rouge for her establishment of the Morgan City Archives and for her work in the preservation of Louisiana heritage. Catherine Dilsaver received the Positive Image Award from the Morgan City City Council for her contributions, unselfish dedication, and volunteer work for the Archives. St. Mary's Links published Mrs. Dilsaver's 2-part article "Legacy of Berwick's Bay" in 1994, and her photographs appeared in an 11- page story on Mardi Gras History in the Daily Review. Roland Stansbury's article, "Ship Shoal Light Station," was published in the Fall 1994 issue of St. Mary's Links.
Carol Mathias, Archivist of the Allen J. Ellender Archives, Nicholls State, attended the Executive Board Meeting of the Society of Southwest Archivists at the LBJ Library, Austin, Texas, on September 22.
The 1995-96 graduate assistants in the Archives and Center for Regional Studies at Southeastern Louisiana University are Cheri Alder, Carlton Butler, and Eric Griffin.
Catherine Cahn, Touro Infirmary Archivist, is Co-Chair of the Host Committee for the Southern Jewish Historical Society meeting in New Orleans, October 27-29. The Touro Times carried her article on non-profit hospital mergers with benevolent societies in the 19th-century, related to the current situation in New Orleans. Her story on the Southern Jewish Historical Society meeting in New Orleans appeared in the August issue of Jewish Voice.
Dr. Clifton Johnson, founding director of the Amistad Research Center, has assumed the interim director position at the Center, following the departure of Dr. Frederick Stielow, Director from 1992-1995; Dr. Stielow has accepted a position as Head of Information Systems at Bowie State College in Maryland.
Also at Amistad, Curator Paula Allen travelled to California in April to the studio of William Pajaud, former President of the National Watercolor Society, and acquired the artists' papers and two artworks, Church Sister and Destruction by the Assyrians. Wayne Coleman, Marketing Director, attended the "State of the Arts" Conference sponsored by the Louisiana Division of the Arts in Baton Rouge. The Louisiana African American Museum Association, which Wayne co-founded, held its first annual retreat in Alexandria June 22-25. Co-hosted by the Arna Bontemps African-American Museum and Cultural Center, the retreat drew together Louisiana museum administrators with national museum professionals. Brenda Square, Head of Reference, attended Tulane University's Institute for the 21st Century Experiential Seminar "Training Trainers for a Diverse Environment," and presented the award at the Annual Luncheon of the Cincinnati Chapter of the Friends of the Amistad.
Collin B. Hamer, Jr. Head of the Louisiana Division, New Orleans Public Library, has been reappointed for a fourth year to the Louisiana Advisory Council for the State Documents Depository Program. On May 20, in conjunction with the Friends of New Orleans Public Library's annual book sale, he and NOPD Sgt. Robert Whitney conducted a genealogy seminar at the Latter Branch.
At the SAA Convention in Washington, Wayne Everard, Archivist, Louisiana Division, was elected as one of the two Local Government representatives on the Steering Committee of SAA's Government Records Section. This summer, he participated in the LUI (Louisiana Users of the Internet) conference in Baton Rouge; at this conference, he discussed the development of NUTRIAS, NOPL's home page, and conducted an online tour of the site. In June, Wayne was one of 8 people who testified before the Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board at the Old Mint. Wayne described the records relating to the Garrison investigation deposited in the City Archives by the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office.
Rodney Smith, Assistant Head of the Louisiana Division will participate in a panel discussion, "Patron Service: Librarians and Patrons Speak," at the Fall Conference of the Greater New Orleans/ Catholic Library Association on October 14.
Reni Zietz of Special Collections, LSU Libraries, is now Image Resources Manager for Special Collections.
Mary Linn Wernet, Archivist at the Cammie G. Henry Research Center, NLU, attended the Society of Southwest Archivists meeting in Waco and the Natchez Literary Celebration pre-conference workshop to hear Dr. G. Douglas Inglis of Seville, Spain, lecture on colonial Natchez data from the Spanish archives.
Barbara D. Reilly, Genealogy Librarian at Shreve Memorial Library has accepted a position with Northwestern State University Nursing Education Center.
Dr. Bobs Tusa, Head of Louisiana Tech's Department of Special Collections, Manuscripts, and Archives, participated with approximately 70 other representatives of special collections libraries and archives in the southeastern United States in the two-day planning meeting of SESCA, the Southeastern Special Collections Access project, held in February in Atlanta. SESCA is a joint project of SOLINET (Southeastern Library Network) and SURA (Southeastern University Research Library Association) and a part of the Monticello Electronic Library, recently funded by a $460,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce. The purpose of the meeting was to study ways in which to provide electronic access to materials housed in repositories of colleges, universities, private research centers, and state and local government archives in the Southeast, thereby bringing this region into the infrastructure of the "Information Superhighway."
Dr. Tusa has also been named Treasurer of the North Louisiana Historical Association; at their Spring Banquet, the Lambda Rho chapter of Phi Alpha Theta presented her with a certificate of recognition for her work with the Camp Ruston Project.
On April 23, Dr. Charles Nolan, Archivist of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, addressed the "ROOTS IV of St. Alphonsus" meeting in New Orleans on the his project to restore and preserve the sacramental records of St. Alphonsus. The presentation included a slide show illustrating the current condition of the records and the release, in 1996, of a new series of records from 1843-1965.
Gary Van Zante, Curator, Southeastern Architectural Archive, Tulane University, has been elected to the Board of Directors of Save Our Cemeteries, Inc., which works to preserve the architectural landmarks of New Orleans historic cemeteries. He has also been elected to the Board of the Louisiana Landmarks Society.
Kathie Bordelon, Archivist at McNeese's Archives and Special Collections delivered a presentation on the care of paper documents at the Southwest Genealogical Society Workshop on August 26.