New and improved (and inclusive) subject headings in Special Collections

October 15, 2019October 15, 2019 Kaitlin Buerge

We’ve been updating our records with new subject headings from the Library of Congress.

Our copy of *Chrisine Jorgensen: A Personal Autobiography*, currently on exhibit.

Until last week, the record for Christine Jorgensen’s autobiography had one subject heading: “Sex change.”

This means that despite the fact that Jorgensen was a transgender woman, and the first American to become widely-known for having sex reassignment surgery, you wouldn’t find her autobiography at Middlebury if you searched the catalog for “transgender.”

Preservation Manager Joseph Watson asked Cataloger Marlena Evans if the Library of Congress had perhaps updated their subject headings to reflect current terminology used to represent the transgender community.

Thanks to Marlena’s diligence, we now know that Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) include a number of terms (at least 47!) that we can use to catalog works by and about members of the transgender community. Marlena has also updated other records in Special Collections with new subject headings (see below!).

If you’ve ever wondered about those clickable subject headings in library catalog records, they are anything but arbitrary. The Library of Congress maintains a thesaurus of controlled, precise subject headings that catalogers and librarians all over the United States assign to their holdings and use to find works about similar topics.

Researchers use these too! You can click any one of the headings in a record and find similar and related works.

If you are interested in Jorgensen and other writers in the LGBTQ+ community, be sure to check out our current exhibit: Before and After Stonewall: Queer Stories Throughout American History.

Questions? Email specialcollections@middlebury.edu

More issues of The Middlebury Campus digitized

October 3, 2019October 3, 2019 Kaitlin Buerge

New old issues of The Middlebury Campus (1981-2008), now available via the Internet Archive!

Thanks to the efforts of Middlebury’s Digital Projects & Archives Librarian, Patrick Wallace, we are happy to announce that digitized issues of The Middlebury Campus dating from 1981 to 2008 are now available via the Internet Archive (go/ia).

These “new” issues of The Campus have been added to an ever-growing (over 3,000 items!) digital collection entitled “Middlebury College Newspapers and Magazines” available on the site. In addition to digitized copies of The Campus, the collection also includes The Undergraduate (precursor to The Campus), and Middlebury Magazine.

*Visit* *go/ia* *to access digitized copies of The Campus and more!*

Did you know digitized materials on the Internet Archive are full-text searchable? Simply click the bubble next to “Text contents” below the search bar. We searched for ourselves and found this mention in a Campus article from March 7, 2007:

We can’t help but agree with the author on this one.

Questions about accessing digitized materials? Email specialcollections@middlebury.edu

Votes…for Women? Women’s Suffrage materials at the Museum and Special Collections

September 19, 2019October 3, 2019 Kaitlin Buerge

This year (2019) marks the 100-year anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment giving women the right to vote. American women voted at a national level for the first time in 1920.

This semester, the Middlebury College Museum of Art’s “Votes…for Women?” exhibit features several objects from Special Collections (including suffrage postcards and a cookbook!).

Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft — *A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, With Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects by Mary Wollstonecraft. Boston, 1792.*

Because exhibit cases only fit so much, we’re featuring some additional materials pertaining to women’s suffrage and women’s rights with this post!

We are particularly excited to have on our shelves this (left) first American edition of Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, With Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects published in 1792. Wollstonecraft argued that women should receive education beyond what was required for domestic life, and that all human beings deserve the same fundamental rights. This volume was number 642 of the Middlebury College Library’s original 10,000, and features a rather telling handwritten poem on its title page (presumably written by some member of the Middlebury College community): “O ye lords of ladies intellectual / Now tell me truly, have they not hen-peck’d you all.“

Special Collections also holds a number of pamphlets produced by various organizations (women’s suffrage groups, political parties, etc.) during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

*Minutes of the eighth annual meeting of Vermont Woman’s Suffrage Association. Jericho, Vt., 1892*

Suffrage was often framed as means through which Prohibition might be achieved, as evidenced by this resolution in the minutes (right) of the eighth annual meeting of the Vermont Woman’s Suffrage Association in 1892: “Resolved, That we reaffirm our belief that the ballot in the hands of woman is the strongest weapon that can be hurled against the liquor traffic” (15).

Other works include (but are not limited to) suffrage cook books (below), anti-suffrage essays, sheet music, speeches, and other writings by men and women in favor of increasing women’s rights in society.

*The Woman Suffrage Cook Book by Hattie A. Burr. Boston, 1886.*

Our favorite? The close-to-home diaries of Viola White, former curator of the Abernethy Library in Special Collections. Read these and you’ll learn that, while she doesn’t reveal whether or not she voted in the 1920 election, she is deeply disappointed that Harding has won.

Want to search on your own? Open Midcat, change “Middlebury College Libraries” to “Special Collections (Library 101)” in the drop-down menu, and enter your search terms.

*Votes for Women* *by Sande Wascher-James*, 2015.

Before and After Stonewall: Queer Stories Throughout American History

August 29, 2019September 25, 2019 Kaitlin Buerge

*Giovanni’s Room* *by James Baldwin (1956)*

This fall in the Library Atrium, view Special Collections’ new exhibit commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots, an event that sparked the movement for equal rights for members of the LGBTQ+ community.

Curated by Suria Vanrajah ’22, the exhibit presents a timeline illustrating the increased visibility and acceptance of queer literature in America.

On view through January 2020, with the companion exhibit:

Middlebury College Coming Out: A Foundation for Queer Activism
Depicting Middlebury College’s LGBTQ community in the decades following the Stonewall riots.

Curated by Joseph Watson, Reid Macfarlane, ’21 and Halle Shephard, ’22.
Located on the Library Lower Level.

Questions? Contact specialcollections@middlebury.edu

Remembering Anne Sexton: New finds in Special Collections

March 7, 2019April 11, 2019 Kaitlin Buerge

Twenty-five years ago, Special Collections purchased a small collection of materials produced by and pertaining to the poet Anne Sexton (1928-1974). Along with nine books from Sexton’s personal library, the collection contains materials compiled by her therapist, Barbara Schwartz, during the final nine months of the poet’s life before her suicide on October 4, 1974.

Robert Frost and Anne Sexton at Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, 1959 (photo from the College Archives).

Its contents include 41 typed drafts of poems (12 of which are unpublished) written by Sexton. Of particular note is “The Execution,” written in the hand of Barbara Schwartz, as it was dictated over the phone to her by Sexton following a suicide attempt, dated February 9, 1974. The collection also includes correspondence, clippings, audio cassette tapes of poetry readings, and one formerly restricted envelope marked “Barbara Schwartz’s notes on her psychotherapy sessions with Anne Sexton.”

*First page of “The Execution” (unpublished), dictated over the phone by Sexton to Schwartz, 1974.*

Observing the conclusion of its restriction period, we opened the envelope for the first time last fall.

*Notes written by Schwartz during a session with Sexton.*

Materials within include Phone-O-Gram messages, correspondence between Schwartz and associates of Sexton, as well as Schwartz’s notes from her psychotherapy sessions with the poet.

These notes, like the one pictured right, document with poignant and sometimes unsettling detail, the intimate concerns, fears, and desires of Anne Sexton leading up to her death.

An issue at the center of Anne Sexton research since the 1990s has been the decision by therapists to provide biographers with their records. In 1991, a longtime therapist of Sexton’s provided a biographer with access to audiotapes of their sessions, sparking heated debates about the ethical treatment of patient records in psychiatric and literary circles. Interestingly, Sexton’s own daughter has always supported the dissemination of these materials, citing her mother’s confessional style of poetry as precedence for sharing details about her personal life and mental health.

*Phone-O-Gram from the office of Barbara Schwartz, indicating a call for Dr. Schwartz from Sexton. The back of the card reads “Says needs 3x a week.”*

We recognize that materials such as these can be difficult to work with, but it is our hope at Special Collections that they be used by students, faculty, and researchers in their study and understanding of Anne Sexton and her work.

……………………………………….

“Talk to me about sadness. I talk about it too much in my own head but I never mind others talking about it either; I occasionally feel like I tremendously need others to talk about it as well.”

Anne Sexton. From Anne Sexton: A Self-Portrait in Letters. Ed. Linda Gray Sexton and Lois Ames, 1977.

……………………………………….

View the finding aid for the Anne Sexton collection at Middlebury College’s Special Collections and Archives, via ArchivesSpace.

For further reading, see: “Poet Told All; Therapist Provides the Record.”

Reflecting on KDR’s 110-year history at Middlebury: one social house’s commitment to paddle its own canoe

November 13, 2018December 4, 2018 Kaitlin Buerge

KDR founded at Middlebury, 1905

Soon after the founding of Kappa Delta Rho (KDR) at Middlebury College, Delta Tau Delta, a national fraternity already in existence, sent a representative to the College to attempt to absorb KDR into that organization. Reflecting upon this crucial moment in KDR history, founding member George E. Kimball, Class of 1906, famously said that KDR “decided to paddle [its] own canoe and took no further action in the matter.” This early commitment to striking out independently, unfettered by affiliation, characterized the history of the fraternity (and later social house) at the College until its official termination in 2015.

KDR was founded by ten male students in May, 1905, in 14 Painter Hall (a commemorative plaque was installed on the building in 1956). That spring, the founders of KDR were members of Middlebury’s Commons Club, united by their dissatisfaction with its lack of exclusivity (membership was open to all who wished to join).

Painter Hall in 1906, one year after the founding of Kappa Delta Rho. Photo available via the Internet Archive.

Competing with previously established national fraternities on campus was difficult for KDR during its first years in existence (for example: Chi Psi, Delta Kappa Epsilon, and Delta Upsilon). Of the new fraternity’s ability to entice students to join, one faculty member remarked that it would have “a hard row to hoe,” a phrase which members fondly recount when discussing the success of KDR in the face of adversity. In fact, KDR remained exclusive to Middlebury College only until 1913, when its “beta” chapter was established at Cornell University. Today, there are 41 active KDR chapters, and the fraternity has initiated more than 25,000 members since its inception in 1905.

Early traditions

The founders selected official colors (Middlebury blue and Princeton orange) as well as an official flower (the red rose), designed a coat of arms, drew up a constitution, and adopted a motto: Honor Super Omnia (“Honor above all”).

Middlebury College students on a Kappa Delta Rho-sponsored hayride, 1942. Photo available via the Internet Archive.

Early traditions adopted by the Middlebury chapter of KDR include the “Frat Ride,” a post-exam event during which brothers, including KDR alumni, and their dates went to Silver Lake for the day and returned to campus by train, at which time they reportedly danced in the frat rooms until midnight. Other traditions include the annual initiation banquet held at the Brandon Inn. KDR adopted 48 South Street as its physical residence in the 1920s and the chapter remained based in the house until 2015.

Changing faces

The College Archives recently acquired KDR member photo composites from Jonathan Hanlon ’93. The faces on these boards throughout the years are representative of an increasingly diverse student body, as well as KDR’s tendency to reflect that diversity through its membership.

1959 Kappa Delta Rho photo composite. Middlebury College Special Collections & Archives.

Extending the paddle

Although the Middlebury chapter was technically an all-male fraternity, it began including women as “social members” in the late 1970s. According to Chris McInerney ’80, social members ate dinner at the house once a week, were allowed to vote in the election of officers, and were considered by KDR brothers to be members of the chapter.

When in 1990, Middlebury required that all fraternities on campus become coeducational or be terminated, KDR chose again to “paddle [its] own canoe” and officially invite women to pledge. In doing so, it lost the recognition of the national organization for more than a decade, despite its status as founding “alpha” chapter.

1978 Kappa Delta Rho photo composite. Middlebury College Special Collections & Archives.

Despite the loss of its status as a nationally-recognized fraternity, KDR persisted at Middlebury: in 1991, when the College abolished fraternities, KDR emerged as a coeducational “social house,” on a campus no longer host to Greek life.

The National Fraternity of Kappa Delta Rho recognized the Middlebury chapter as its “alpha” again in 2000, but this time as its only “society,” rather than as a fraternity, to reflect the presence of women in the chapter.

2015 Kappa Delta Rho photo composite displaying the social house’s final membership at Middlebury. Middlebury College Special Collections & Archives.

Middlebury terminates KDR in 2015

On June 25, 2015, Middlebury College Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of the College, Katy Smith Abbott, informed KDR that due to violations of hazing and conduct policies, it could no longer operate as a social house on or off campus. Citing these infractions, Abbott explained, “The activities of KDR constitute extraordinary and repeated violations of Middlebury’s policies. Regrettably, we no longer believe that it is possible for KDR to successfully reform and to create a positive impact on our community.”

The KDR house at 48 South Main Street was converted to general student housing beginning in the fall of 2015 and currently serves as housing for upperclassmen.

Kappa Delta Rho members at KDR house, circa 1980s. Available via the Internet Archive.