Tag Archives: women

fat ‘n’ hairy: ways i’m failing the patriarchy

a banner announcing the fat 'n' hairy display

From April 16th- April 23rd, Chellis House-Women’s Resource Center will be hosting an interactive display in the Davis Family Library atrium called “fat ‘n’ hairy: ways i’m failing the patriarchy.” The display includes a variety of library materials and first-hand accounts from community members listing the ways they are failing the patriarchy. For more, read below.

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Clothing Guide 1944-45, from the Archives

For the 1944-45 school year, the Student Union published these handy HELPS AND HINTS as part of a clothing guide (for women). For example, “No Rubber Boots are to be worn to the dining-rooms, or to lectures and concerts unless the weather is very severe and there is no opportunity to change.” And don’t get us started on shorts. “Shorts are never to be worn in the dining rooms…they are never to be worn downtown unless one is going through town on a bicycle. Then don’t stop to shop or have a coke. Plan those shopping or coking expeditions for sometime when you don’t have shorts on.” Unless, of course, you remembered your leg make-up.


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Middlebury women take a snowy ride up to Ripton, ca. 1940s

In this clip, members of the Women’s Forum of Middlebury College load up holiday gifts into a truck parked behind Forrest Hall, en route to the Meeting House in Ripton, VT. Upon their arrival in Ripton, local children run (and slide, trudge, and sled) to meet them. The Middlebury women, joined by a costumed Santa, distribute their holiday gifts.

Established in 1937, the Women’s Forum was itially organized to further interest in economic, political, and social issues of the day. In 1944 the group merged with the Student Action Assembly to focus on social and service work. This clip dates likely dates from the early to mid 1940’s.

Happy holidays from Special Collections & Archives.

We were greatly shocked with the news…

During a recent visit to the archives by Professor Ellie Gebarowski-Shafer’s Religion 130 class, The Christian Tradition, students plowed through 214 years of Middlebury College missionary history with College Archivist Danielle Rougeau. Amid the pages of 19th century cursive was this diary entry by Mary Martin, wife of a missionary to China and grandmother of Mabel Martin (later Mary Buttolph), Class of 1911. (Mary Martin is pictured below, circa 1865.)

Mary Martin


After the death of her husband and a young son in China, Mary returned to Vermont by way of San Francisco. After 69 days at sea, she writes her last diary entry on May 21, 1965:

We were greatly shocked with the news we heard on our arrival this morning of the assassination of president Lincoln but very glad to learn that the war is over and that slavery is abolished.

Postscript: Lincoln was assassinated on April 15, 1865. News traveled slowly in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Her mention of this news falls smack in the middle of the page below. To learn more about Middlebury missionaries, Mary Martin, or to cut your teeth on some 19th century cursive, visit Special Collections.

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A recipe to keep mites off your cheese, circa 1778

In the same year that Captain Cook sailed to Hawaii and Great Britain declared war on France, Helen Weldon started her recipe book in Bath, England on January 29, 1778. In addition to keeping mites off your cheese, she includes recipes for Mock Turtle (Calves head) soup, Onion Soop [sic] and raspberry vinegar “for those who want a pleasant cooler” in the summer. Remedies like Teeth Water, Poison for Rats & Mice, and Diuretic Balls for Horses are included too. Her handwritten notebook was acquired by Special Collections this summer. Learn more in our online catalog or by visiting Special Collections.

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Receipts Cookery, 1778

 

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Baked Calfs head

International Women’s Day (at the Library)

Today, March 8th, Middlebury College Library celebrates 102 years of International Women’s Day. (And March is also Women’s History Month, so what the heck, let’s celebrate all month long.) The U.N. has a helpful timeline detailing the history of this day and the theme of International Women’s Day 2012: Empower Rural Women – End Hunger and Poverty.

Women's Day 1914, Germany

The Library has endless ways to celebrate women, so today, we’ll name but a few. Please add your own comments below and add to the festivities.

Visit our Women’s and Gender Studies (WAGS) Research Guide

Search Women and Social Movements a research archive organized around the history of women in social movements in the US between 1600 and 2000.

Listen to Biophilia, by Björk, the Icelandic pop star, or anything by Björk, for that matter. Request her CDs at the Davis Library’s circulation desk.

Watch the first season of Xena, Warrior Princess, the French film Séraphine, about a self-taught, middle-age painter, or How to Be a Woman, a compilation of school classroom films of the 1940s-1980s including Let’s make a sandwich (1950) and Why study home economics (1955).

Stream an audio recording by Sofia Gubaidulina, the ground-breaking Russian/Tatar composer known for combining bongos, cymbals, tam-tams, among other percussion instruments.

Or simply browse Midcat for books, DVDs, and more, all about: Women.