From Audubon’s journal, July 1, 1821:

“I found this bird about three miles from St. Francisville in Louisiana, whilst engaged in searching for a Turkey, which I had wounded.  It was afternoon, and the heat oppressive.  I saw it innocently approaching us until within a few yards, anxiously looking, as if trying to discover our intentions; but as we stood motionless, it once came so near that I could easily have reached it with my gun barrel.  It moved nimbly among the twigs of the low bushes, making now and then short dashes at flies, which it swallowed after killing them under foot, as many other Fly-catchers are in the habit of doing, then peeping at us, and again setting off in pursuit of flies.”

The “Selby” in the bird’s name refers to Prideaux John Selby (1788-1867), a British ornithologist whom Audubon had met during his time in England.  Not only do we own Selby’s large folio volumes of Illustrations Of British Ornithology, last year we acquired two original copper plates which were used to illustrate them.

The white-throated sparrow.

“This pretty little bird is a visitor of Louisiana and all the southern districts, where it remains only a very short time . . . How it comes and how it departs are to me quite unknown.  I can only say, that, all of a sudden, the hedges of the fields bordering on creeks or swampy places, and overgrown with different species of vines, sumach bushes, briars, and the taller kinds of grasses, appear covered with these birds . . .

It is a plump bird, fattening almost to excess, whilst in Louisiana, and affords delicious eating, for which purpose many are killed with blow-guns.  These instruments . . . are prepared by the Indians, [and are] sufficient to propel such an arrow [i.e., dart] with force enough to kill a small bird at the distance of eight or ten paces.

The tree is a Dogwood.

Yesterday we had a veritable flock of sketchers from Devin Dougherty’s Studio Arts class (Drawing I), who were seeking inspiration among the birds.  We set them up with an array of beautiful books from our Enders ornithology collection, and enjoyed having a dozen or so intent minds and hands at work, spread out in the seminar and reading rooms.

We are planning to put some of these sketches alongside the original books in the Watkinson exhibition cases in late April–stay tuned!

On Saturday we hosted a meeting of the Acorn Club–a small but dedicated bibliophilic group (their archives are at the Connecticut Historical Society) that publishes books related to Connecticut history.  Here are a few of the more than 30 publications that they have published over the last 100 years:

Thomas Short : the first printer of Connecticut, by W. De Loss Love (Hartford, 1901)

Supplementary list of books printed in Connecticut, 1709-1800, by Albert Carlos Bates, M.A. (Hartford, 1938)

The journal of William Stebbins, Stratford to Washington in 1810, with an introduction by Leonard W. Labaree and notes by Pierce W. Gaines (Hartford, 1968)

Letters and documents of Ezekiel Williams of Wethersfield, Connecticut, Deputy Commissary General of Prisoners of War within the State of Connecticut (1777-c.1783), introduction & notes by John C. Parsons (Hartford, 1976)

John Warner Barber’s views of Connecticut towns 1834-36, edited by Christopher P. Bickford, J. Bard McNulty (Hartford, 1990)

Connecticut observed : three centuries of visitors’ impressions, 1676-1940, edited by Richard Buel, Jr. and J. Bard McNulty (Hartford, 1999)

For the members’ enjoyment I brought out a random sampling of items from our collection of books printed in Connecticut prior to 1800.  The earliest was this funeral sermon printed in New London and written by Cotton Mather, on Gurdon Saltonsall (1666-1724), Governor of Connecticut from 1708-1724.

Saltonsall was one of the few men in American history to step directly from the pulpit to the governorship.  His challenges were typical for the time: war with the native population and their allies, the French, boundary disputes with the adjacent colonies, and defending Connecticut’s charter from cancellation by England.  He was an early supporter and protector during Yale’s founding and its fledgling years, and came under political fire for insisting it be sited in New Haven rather than Hartford.

Another quite ephemeral piece is An account of the surprizing events of providence, which hapned [sic] at the raising of a bridge in Norwich, June 28th 1728 (New London, 1728).

This is part news story and part moral contemplation.  Forty men were working on building a bridge over the Shetucket River (about 3 miles from Norwich, CT), when a 100-foot section collapsed, dropping most of them 20 feet (and one man 40 feet) amid falling timbers to the rocky shallows below.  Many were injured, and two died: Jonathan Gale of Canterbury (who was just 19, whose father had recently died as well), and Daniel Tracy (who was 76, and only there to see the work being done as one of the founders of the project–he just happened to be on the bridge at the time).  This copy belonged to Tracy’s son, Winslow Tracy (1689-1768), which we can deduce from his signature, which he practiced writing on the back:

Another item, close to my bibliophilic heart, is a 1743 catalogue of the books in the Yale College Library.  It’s funny to think that this little 44-page pamphlet lists some 2,600 books of a library that now holds over 12 million volumes–a mere 270 years later.Lastly, my favorite, in an age when title-pages were like movie trailers today, giving a pithy summation of what was to come: The adventures of Colonel Daniel Boon, one of the first settlers at Kentucke: containing the wars with the Indians on the Ohio, from 1769 to 1783, and the first establishment and progress of the settlement on that river.  Written by the Colonel himself.  To which is added, A narrative of the captivity, and extraordinary escape of Mrs. Francis Scott, an inhabitant of Washington County, Virginia; who after the murder of her husband and children, by the Indians, was taken prisoner by them; on the 29th of June, 1785. (Norwich, 1786).

This is the first of what I hope to be regular posts about the weekly bird we will show in the Audubon (took me 7 weeks to get into the groove, but we have 428 to go, so no worries).  Basically, I’m just going to be letting Audubon speak, transcribing sections from his “ornithological biography,” so here we go:

Plate VII: Purple Grackle or Common Crow-Blackbird (male and female)

“I could not think of any better mode of representing these birds than that which I have adopted, as it exhibits them in the exercise of their nefarious propensities.  Look at them: the male, as if full of delight at the sight of the havoc which he has already committed on the tender, juicy, unripe corn on which he stands, has swelled his throat, and is calling in exultation to his companions to come and assist him in demolishing it.  The female has fed herself, and is about to fly off with a well-loaded bill to her hungry and expectant brood . . . see how torn the husk is from the ear, and how nearly devoured the grains of corn already are!  This is the tithe our Blackbirds take from our planters and farmers; but it was so appointed, and such is the will of the beneficent Creator . . . ” (from Vol. I, 1831, pp. 35-41).

We were very pleased indeed to welcome Dr. Christoph Irmscher, a member of the English faculty at Indiana University, to tell us “how to read Audubon” on November 3rd.  Christoph recently edited the Library of America volume on Audubon’s writings, and has been working on Audubon for over 13 years, amid several other topics.  His faculty profile is here:

http://www.indiana.edu/~engweb/faculty/profile_cIrmscher.shtml

We held an informal “review” of the three other volumes in the Reading Room of the Watkinson between 4:00 and 5:00pm, and examined several plates while Christoph explained aspects of production and gave a rich overview of Audubon which was part biography, part literary criticism, and part art history.

Also on display were the seldom mentioned “text” volumes of the set (five volumes of “ornithological biography”–Audubon’s commentary on each bird), as well as three plates recently acquired that were used in the engraver’s shop as examples for the colorists.

The event was the official opening of our new, permanent display of our copy (owned by the engraver, Robert Havell, Jr.) of the famous Birds of America set, as well as a celebration of our recent acquisition of the American Flamingo, to replace the one stolen from the set 35 years ago by a professional thief.

It is always a pleasure to learn more about our own books, not only from specialists like Christoph, but from our own readers and students–some of whom you will find on our other blog, I Found It at the Watkinson.

Anti-Tobacco, by Abiel Abbot Livermore; with A Lecture on Tobacco by Rev. Russell Lant Carpenter and On the Use of Tobacco by G. F. Witter, M.D.  (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1883).

This little jewel was given to us by one of our generous Board members, who was the initial donor of our Roberts Brothers collection and has long fed our printed and manuscript holdings related to that publishing firm.

It has a connection to the slave bill of sale mentioned a few posts previously (the author, Abiel Abbot Livermore is mentioned therein), but I also found the following passage about the “gigantic evils” of humanity that were supposedly fading away in 1883 very interesting:

“To attack [the universal use of tobacco] seems as idle as to assault Gibralter with a flight of Indian arrows.  But we remember that most of the gigantic evils that have afflicted humanity–such as human sacrifices, idolatry, torture of witnesses and criminals, the persecution of witches, intemperance, polygamy, slavery and the slave trade, or war–could, with equal or greater assurance, claim exemption from from criticism or rebuke on the ground of their antiquity and their universality.  Yet all these abominations now lie more or less under the condemnation of the enlightened sentiment of Christendom, and their dark shadows are passing away before the rising light of a nobler and purer civilization.”

I wonder what Mr. Livermore would think of us now?  Other than the persecution of witches (any Wiccans in the audience, shout out!), all of these are still current problems.

We have been thrilled to host the amazing Dr. Scott Gwara, of the University of South Carolina, who has come to the Watkinson Library for several reasons.

First, he was to give a talk about one of his current projects: a history of medieval manuscripts in North America (he focused his talk last night on those in America’s liberal arts colleges), which he did on the 19th.  Dr. Gwara has visited 80 libraries and seen over 3,000 manuscripts so far, and he says he has some 25,000 to go before the project is finished.  It was rather breathtaking to hear the stories of the individual collectors who have made it possible for these institutions to own these amazing artifacts of the medieval world.

The Watkinson’s collection of some two dozen manuscripts were, of course, featured in part of the lecture.  Scott had already blogged about them for us on his first visit.  Several of these manuscripts came by way of the 19th-century collector Joseph Jesse Cooke (1813-1881), who will be the subject of another post.

Dr. Gwara is also an extended guest speaker in Jonathan Elukin’s History of the Book class, where he is teaching the students about the structure of Books of Hours and medieval Bibles.  Here they are hard at work at their assignments and presentations.

Each student was asked to identify different parts in their books of hours and Bibles, and it was a great moment to see one group exclaim “we GET it!” in surprised delight.

Scott Gwara graduated summa cum laude from Hamilton College and, as a Marshall Scholar, earned a second BA in Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic from Cambridge University.  He received his PhD from the University of Toronto, where he was a Mellon Fellow.  Scott has authored five books and forty articles on Medieval Latin, Old English literature, manuscript transmission, and medieval education.  His forthcoming works are on genre in Old English, treasure-giving in Beowulf, and the notorious book destroyer Otto F. Ege.  Among other things, he is currently writing a history of medieval manuscripts in North America.  For the past 18 years Scott has taught at the University of South Carolina.

[Posted by Sally Dickinson, Associate Curator]

I was invited to go on a field trip to New York with the Book History class at Trinity.  It was a beautiful fall day and proved to be inspirational in more ways than just a walk down Madison Avenue.  Our first stop was The Center for Book Arts.  It was a great opportunity for me to make contact with an organization that fosters creative work in making and reinterpreting the book.  I chatted with book artist Roni Gross as the class arrived and quickly looked at a collection of broadsides on poetry that was produced at the Center.  From my perspective as a curator and book arts devotee, it was extremely helpful to see historical presses and to participate in a printing exercise that Roni deftly guided us through.  She gave an overview of the history of printing before we dove into composing our names from monotypes for a group broadside.  We all got to pull a couple of prints from 2 working vandercooks, a type of press favored by artistic printers today.

Next stop was one of my favorite places in the city—The Morgan Library at the corner of 36^th and Madison.  When I want to see how things should be done in a rare book library, I often look to the Morgan as an example.  “Money is no object” seems to be their motto, which works for uncompromising displays of cultural artifacts and a world-renowned collection of rare books and manuscripts.  Several years ago the brownstone mansion had been renovated and expanded with a stunning modern addition.  It’s important to have low light levels on paper artifacts and to support the bindings of fragile books.  The architecture supported these requirements in an elegant way.  The modern, plexiglass display cases at the Morgan had hidden lighting inside a metal frame that made the books & manuscripts a focal point.   I was an architect in my former life and sometimes I find myself looking at the design of the cases more than the treasures inside!  The highlight of the visit was a seminar with curator Roger Wieck, who showed the class some of the remarkable medieval Books of Hours from the library’s collection.  I was also impressed by our students’ ability to interpret, under Wieck’s guidance, the text and images of the 15^th century manuscripts.