Finding the Fourth of July

When a group of upstart colonists declared their territories independent of the British Crown on July 4, 1776, they did it in a petition addressed to King George III. In the weeks following, this Declaration of Independence was reprinted, discussed and debated both in the colonies and in Britain, in newspapers, letters, pamphlets, and broadsides. You can now read those debates and discussions, and see them scanned online, whether celebratory, like a news item from New York:
We hear from Ticonderoga that on the 28th of July, immediately after divine Worship, the Declaration of independence was read by Colonel St. Clair, and having said, “God save the Free Independent States of America!” the army manifested their Joy with three Cheers. It was remarkably pleasing to see the Spirit of the Soldiers so raised after all their Calamities, the Language of every Man’s Countenance was, now we are a People! We have a Name among the States of this World. New York, August 19, 1776. New York Gazette and Weekly Mercury.
or dismissive, as in an essay written by Tory Governor of Massachusetts Thomas Hutchinson:
They begin with a false hypothesis, That the Colonies are one distinct people and the kingdom another, connected by political bands. The colonies, politically considered never were a distinct people from the kingdom. There never has been but one political band, and that was just the same before the first Colonists emigrated as it has been ever since. Hutchinson, Thomas, Strictures up the declaration of the Congress at Philadelphia, 1776.
These essays and much more are available in two of our newest licensed online collections: America’s Historical Newspapers, and Eighteenth Century Collections Online. America’s Historical Newspapers (Series I, 1690-1876) spans an extraordinary period in our history, from the Salem Witch trials to post-Civil War reconstruction. With newspapers from every part of the United States, scanned from more than 90 repositories including the Library of Congress and the American Antiquarian Society, from Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette to Alexander Hamilton’s New York Evening Post, this collection offers Northeastern researchers the first draft of American history. Eighteenth Century Collections Online is the place to look for British perspectives.  Based on the English Short Title catalog, it offers scans of works published in Britain 18th century, plus English language publications from other parts of the world. The period encompasses Boswell’s Life of Johnson, Hume’s History of England, and an early how-to: Best’s Concise Treatise on the Art of Angling. With printed books, pamphlets, essays, and broadsides, this collection complements another important collection, Early English Books Online, to offer Northeastern researchers an online library encompassing almost the entire printed record of the English Renaissance as well as the English Enlightenment. Exploring these two newly licensed collections allows us to understand, from the point of view of the people living at the time, the bonds that united Britain and America, as well as the forces that pulled us asunder.

Meet the 2017 CERES Exhibit Toolkit Projects!

The DSG is proud to announce the projects chosen for this year’s round of CERES Exhibit Toolkit development. We will work with the following four projects to implement enhancements and new features to improve user experience, create additional exhibit tools, and incorporate the Toolkit in the classroom:  

Boston as Middle Passage

In 2015, students and researchers working with the National Parks Service built a website to preserve research documenting Boston as one of many transatlantic slave trade Middle Passage sites. Sadly, in less than two years the site has become unusable due to server issues and lapsed hosting. This year we will work with the creators of the site to transfer the rescued research materials to the DRS and recreate the original exhibits in the Early Black Boston Digital Almanac (a 2016 Toolkit project still in development).  

Dragon Prayer Book

The Dragon Prayer Book project is a research endeavor led by Erika Boeckeler, faculty in the Department of English, to study the Dominican Prayer Book, a fifteenth century manuscript held by Archives and Special Collections. The Dragon Prayer Book project was accepted as a Toolkit project in 2016, and this year we will work with the project team to enhance the Toolkit’s IIIF high-resolution image viewer: http://dragonprayerbook.northeastern.edu/mirador/  

Freedom House

As part of their ongoing effort to highlight archival collections using online exhibits, last year Archives and Special Collections used the Toolkit to create and set of exhibits for the Freedom House photograph collection: http://freedomhouse.library.northeastern.edu/. This year, Archives proposed a new browse feature that would allow them to build dynamic exhibits that could bring together all Freedom House materials that match a particular subject term, like “Kennedy, John F.”. This enhancement will allow Archives and other Toolkit site builders to create dynamic exhibits that automatically populate with DRS materials matching particular subjects, creators, or other faceted metadata values.  

Literature and Digital Diversity

This fall, Elizabeth Dillon and Sarah Connell will be co-teaching Literature and Digital Diversity, an undergraduate course focusing on “the use of digital methods to analyze and archive literary texts, with particular attention to issues of diversity and inclusion”. Students in the class will use the Toolkit to explore “how computers, databases, and analytical tools give substance to concepts of aesthetic, cultural, and intellectual value as inflected by race and gender.” This project will be the first to use the CERES classroom teaching materials originally developed for Nicole Aljoe’s award-winning Writing Black Boston class, which used the Toolkit to create the Early Black Boston Digital Almanac (still in development). To increase the breadth of materials available to the class (and other site builders), we will also consider adding Europeana as an additional data source for Toolkit materials (similar to the DPLA connection built in 2016).   We also continue work with our partners on the 2015 and 2016 projects: For more information about these projects, visit the DSG website (about the projects, about CERES) or contact us.

Find LGBTQA Organizations in the Archives

Celebrate pride month by checking out digitized documents from some of these Boston LGBTQA organizations.  Northeastern’s Archives and Special Collections are home to the records of many Boston Area organizations. Visit library.northeastern.edu/archives-special-collections for more.

Abe Rybeck as Hagai in Pure PolyESTHERThe Theater Offensive

The Theater Offensive was founded in 1989 by Abraham Rybeck “to form and present the diverse realities of queer lives in art so bold it breaks through personal isolation and political orthodoxy to help build an honest, progressive community.” The Theater Offensive mounts and produces festivals and individual productions by national and local queer performers, and also serves as a development environment for new theatrical work. In addition, The Theater Offensive works to build community through education, outreach, and political activism.

           

Pride Dance at the castle at the Park PlazaAIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts

The AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts, Inc. was founded in 1983 by a group of volunteers. Larry Kessler, one of the founders of the AIDS Action Committee, became its first Executive Director in 1983. The AIDS Action Committee began its life as a special committee of the Fenway Community Health Center and in 1986 became an independent entity. It is the oldest and largest organization in New England dedicated to helping persons with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus).

           

Boston Gay Men's Chorus at Boston Pride MarchBoston Gay Men’s Chorus

The Boston Gay Men’s Chorus, founded in 1982, is a 175-voice ensemble focusing on creative programming and community outreach. The records document the administrative and concert history of the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus and consist of board minutes, committee minutes, programs, newsletters, press materials, financial records, subject files, photographs, and concert banners.

The Speaker: The Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Speakers Bureau of BostonBoston Alliance of Gay and Lesbian Youth

The Boston Alliance of Gay and Lesbian Youth, Inc. known as BAGLY, Inc., was founded in 1980 as the first youth-run organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth in Boston. Headed by Executive Director Grace Sterling Stowell, BAGLY is a youth-led, adult-advised social support organization that creates, sustains and advocates for programs, policies and services for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth aged 22 and under.

     

Stream a New Movie this Summer

Summertime, and the viewing is easy… a perfect time to catch up on movies and documentaries. When it’s too hot to sit outside with a good book, crank up the a.c. close the curtains, get out some snacks and hit play.
  • Pick your format! Snell Library has excellent DVD and streaming video collections. See this year’s academy award winning films on DVD. Classics, contemporary films, and documentaries will expand your horizons.
  • Locate videos by subject, keyword or title in Scholar OneSearch.
  • This icon Film Reel Iconwill appear beside a DVD, streaming videos will say “Online access”
  • Use this streaming media guide to locate titles by vendor and subject. Our largest vendors are Academic Video Online Premium and Kanopy with a wealth of informative and entertaining choices.
Here are some recommended streaming media titles. Feel free to write me about your favorites. Full-Length Features:
  1. Au Revoir les Enfants- the story of friendship and loss between friends in Nazi-occupied France
  2. Charlie Chaplin silent films – see a few!
  3. Diabolique- a French murder tale–don’t miss this classic.
  4. Reaching for the Moon – depicts the relationship between poet Elizabeth Bishop and architect Lota de Macedo Soares.
  5. Stranger than Paradise– Jim Jarmusch’s transcendent adventures of a Hungarian émigré, his friend, and cousin.
Riveting Documentaries:
  1. The Belle of Amherst –a 1976 theatrical performance of Emily Dickinson by Julie Harris. See Cynthia Nixon’s portrayal of Emily in the film “A Quiet Passion” playing in local theaters.
  2. Grey Gardens– meet eccentric Big and Little Edie Beale: mother and daughter, high-society dropouts, and reclusive cousins of Jackie Onassis.
  3. Music of Strangers: Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble- be entertained by these international traveling musicians.
  4. Notes on Blindness– a mesmerizing experience of John Hull’s experience becoming blind as an adult, and how he has adapted to a world without sight.
  5. Photography Transformed:1960-1999– key photographers discusses photography’s effect on American life.
     

Interlibrary Loan: Powering access to resources from around the globe

Interlibrary Loan services come to the rescue when students and faculty need access to information the library doesn’t have. Whether it’s a book, journal/magazine article, or an article from a small newspaper published in the 1930s, the library works to ensure access to a diverse network of library collections and the ability to borrow from them. Here you can see libraries from around the world that have loaned to Northeastern. In addition to these, Northeastern borrows from hundreds of libraries in the United States and Canada ranging from large universities to small community colleges and public libraries. We’ve created an interactive map of all our interlibrary loan transactions in the past year and have highlighted some places where we’ve borrowed from below so you can see how far some of your resources have travelled. ILL Map Blog Post ILL BLog Post Places