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New information about George Washington's last will and testament and three periods in its history is presented, based on close study of the object, primary sources, site visits, interviews, and recent historical literature. The will's early and Civil War histories are described, clarifying fact and legend. A 1910 preservation treatment by William Berwick, who set the standard for treating American manuscripts and documents from the late nineteenth through the early twentieth century, is discussed in comparison to the object's recent conservation to show how current conservation standards are linked to early methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hoping to evoke in readers memories of their own encounters with the missing or illegible, this visual essay highlights materials from across the Archives that represent mysteries. There are texts that have stumped the Archives' crowdsourced attempts to transcribe them, photographs of unidentified people, and manuscripts that have been damaged, destroyed, or lost, such as torn out pages from an artist's diary or a letter consisting of only the postscript. One could regard these objects with melancholy, as representing gaps in knowledge that may never be bridged. They raise questions about the limits of any archive, and the necessary incompleteness of the work we do as scholars. However, by being irreducible to facts—by, we might say, not doing their job—I argue that indecipherable or incomprehensible archival materials may assert a hold on the researcher that legible materials do not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Archival work among the Tell en-Naṣbeh materials housed in the Badè Museum in Berkeley, California, turned up evidence of a previously unpublished assemblage of in situ storage jars that was excavated in April, 1932. These jars seem to belong to the Babylonian–Persian periods. While the assemblage was obviously known to the excavators, for some unknown reason the jars were not published or discussed as such in the original 1947 site report. This paper discusses how the archival material was discovered, issues involving the interpretation of these old excavation materials, the unusual context of the jars, parallels for the jars and how they add to our knowledge of the site and its history following the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, historians of archives have paid increasingly careful attention to the development of state, colonial, religious, and corporate archives in the early modern period, arguing that power (of various kinds) was mediated and extended through material writing practices in and around archives. The history of early modern science, likewise, has tracked the production of scientific knowledge through the inscription and circulation of written records within and between laboratories, libraries, homes, and public spaces, such as coffeehouses and bookshops. This Focus section interrogates these two bodies of scholarship against each other. The contributors ask how archival digitization is transforming historical practice; how awareness of archival histories can help us to reconceptualize our work as historians of science; how an archive's layered purposes, built up over centuries of record keeping, can shape the historical narratives we write; and how scientific knowledge emerging from archives gained authority and authenticity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on archival materials documenting the professional career of Clarence Luther Forsling with the U.S. Forest Service and the Department of Interior and the Charles Lathrop Pack Forestry Foundation.

This paper describes the system of positional verbs (e.g., 'be standing' and 'be lying') in Colonial Valley Zapotec (CVZ), a historical form of Valley Zapotec preserved in archival documents written during the Mexican colonial period. We provide data showing that positional verbs in CVZ have unique morphological properties and participate in a defined set of syntactic constructions, showing that positional verbs formed a formal class of verbs in Valley Zapotec as early as the mid-1500s. This work contributes to the typological literature on positional verbs, demonstrating the type of morphosyntactic work that can be done with a corpus of CVZ texts, and contributes to our understanding of the structure and development of the modern Zapotec positional verb system with implications for the larger Zapotec locative system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the relationship between award-winning American author Conrad Richter and Laurel Book Service owner Karl Goedecke. Goedecke and his wife Katherine owned and operated the mail order book service since 1932. The data on the 25-year connection between Richter and Goedecke are provided by the Conrad Richter Papers and the Karl Goedecke Papers in the Special Collections at the Pennsylvania State University Libraries.

At the end of the 1950s, Robert Rauschenberg began exploring radio sound as a new material and medium in his artistic practice, first in the Combine painting Broadcast (1959) and a few years later in the sculptural installation Oracle (1962–65). Although often invoked as significant examples of the artist's involvement with art and technology, the historical and aesthetic implications of these pieces, originally conceived as invitations for the audience to interact, have received little scholarly attention. Drawing on previously unstudied archival materials including photographs, statements, reviews, and interviews, this essay critically examines the driving forces in Rauschenberg's experiments with sound and sight. Focusing on the radio pieces' ability to trigger very different modes of temporal experience, I explore how they engage a complex network of questions, thoughts, actions, and reactions that reach far beyond the artist's initial ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historians are increasingly working with material that is not only digital but has been digitized. Early digitization projects aimed to encode data for systematic analysis; more recent projects have sought to reproduce unique archival material in a manner that allows for open-ended historical inquiry without the need to travel to archives and manipulate physical objects. Such projects have undeniable benefits for the preservation of documents and access to them. Yet historians must be aware of the scope of digitization, the reasons why material is chosen to be digitized, and limitations on the dissemination of digitized sources. Furthermore, some physical aspects of sources, and of collections of sources, are lost in their digital simulacra. Nonetheless, digitization and the standardization of metadata offer significant possibilities for future archival research and documentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the circumstances surrounding the publication of the 1932 Odyssey Press edition of James Joyce's "Ulysses" which has consistently been accorded a privileged status. It traces the origins and acceptance of that status and assesses its authority by exploring the nature of Stuart Gilbert's involvement in revising the edition at the request of Joyce. Papers and archival materials are presented concerning the debate on the correctness and accuracy of the Odyssey Press 1932 edition.

The article reports on the collection of papers given to the Archive of American Art Regional Center in Southern California. Among the papers received were those of Laura Andreson and Constance Perkins as well as the Southern California Artists Index, 1930-1945, which were donated by Joseph H. Krause of California State University. Another important addition was a set of seventy-three sketchbooks by the late Carlos Almaraz, on loan for microfilming. An addition to the Woman's Building collection consisting of thirty-one boxes of records of the founding of a feminist art organization is also included.

The article reports on the project of the Archives of American Art in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which involves transferring records to microfilm, in particular the holdings of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. The first set of microfilms were of the Sartain family papers, which include selections from the Centennial Exhibition records, Henry Gilpin's letters, journals and selections from the Hopkinson Family papers. Other donations included in the collection are catalogues, reviews, press releases and some Beatrice Fenton materials.

The article reports on the acquisition of art records and papers in Southern California. It is mentioned that the papers of Alberto Vargas, an illustrator, renders insights into art and social history; the collection of papers also chronicle the work of Vargas. The report also includes acquired papers of Peter Krasnov which consists of his correspondences with Edward Weston. Such letters are said to reveal vital information about twentieth century American photography. The article also includes information on the interview with artist Carlos Almaraz conducted by Professor Margarita Nieto. The Almaraz-Nieto interview discloses the artist's family background along with a discussion of the roots of chicano muralism and its objectives, is given attention in the article.

The article reports on the acquisitions of art records and papers in the West Coast area including papers of American Impressionist Karl Albert Buehr. The Buehr family papers, according to the article, are useful to students of art history of the Chicago area. It is also mentioned that other acquisitions include papers of portraitist Alfred Jonniaux, photographs and papers of the works of Harold Paris, and scrapbooks of architect Reginald Johnson. The John Quinn ledgers are also given attention which are said to include entries of purchases made by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors.

In addition to the greater availability of electronic resources, the most notable trends in scholarship over the past decade include continuing study of the means, methods, and varied contexts of composition and transmission within manuscript culture; greater understanding of the complex interrelation of manuscript and print; growing awareness of the importance of women in producing and circulating manuscripts; and the especially vigorous debate over dramatic manuscripts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the success of the Council for Preservation of Anthropological Records (CoPAR) in preserving its anthropological record. The members of the CoPAR contacted several museologists, archivists, practitioners and information specialists to gain an understanding of their viewpoints on ethical issues in preservation and the value of anthropological records to future research. One of the most ambitious plan of the CoPAR to date has been its project to develop a computerized database for finding anthropological records in collections.

In the eighteenth century there were enough printed sources and archival materials to challenge or even overwhelm historians of that day. Two productive editors of lexicons and information management were Christian Gottlieb Jöcher, who taught history at the University of Leipzig and became the chief librarian at his university, and Johann Heinrich Zedler, an eminent collector of biographical data. Jöcher published his multivolume Allegemeines Gelehrten Lexicon in 1750-51. Jöcher's chief rival and competitor, Zedler, published and finished his 64-volume Universal-Lexicon 1732-50. Both Jöcher and Zedler claimed much networking among other scholars. Some questions treated in this essay include the following: What characterized Jöcher's and Zedler's library and source management? In what ways is their viral work still of use and value to librarians and other scholars? Does revisiting old and dusty scholarship help us understand our own information jam? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past five decades, the definition of visual literacy has been expanded and reshaped, yet there was no single resource that brought together these years of important research. To fill this gap, the author created Recommended Reads for Visual Literacy , a bibliography of recent articles, historical books, and archival collections that serves as a detailed web resource for visual literacy. This project seeks to empower the current research community and to encourage art librarians and visual resources curators to explore the existing literature on visual literacy to inform their knowledge base and instruction practices. In this article, the author describes the process of creating the bibliography, its limitations, and next steps for the project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For a long time, amateur artists were not regarded as a serious subject in art-historical research. Commonly cited reasons for this late interest were their relatively obscure names or even total anonymity, the low expectations regarding the artistic quality of their work and the negative perception of these nonprofessional artists. Yet the late interest in amateur artists is striking considering the wealth of nonacademic literature on the amateur as a figure: from how-to manuals, journalism, biographies, diaries, letters, and other archival materials. Through an analysis of the historiography of amateur artists I study how societal changes influenced the evolution of research on amateur artists. Aristocratic amateur artists in Belgium during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries serve as a case study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the acquisition of art documents and papers in Philadelphia including records of the Robert Carlen Galleries which were donated to the Archives of American Art. Information on Carlen's beginnings as founder of the gallery, as well as his relations with other collectors are also disclosed. The gallery records consists of eight boxes of letters, clippings, prints, and financial records. Also included in the article are acquisitions of records of Julius Bloch's works including his journals and sketchbooks along with papers of John Taylor Arms and Albert Winslow Barker, which are part of the Archive. The acquisition of records of the Newman Galleries are also included in the article.

The article presents information on the acquisition of art records and papers in the New York area including the papers on Robert Smithson that support the documentation of twentieth century art, letters of artist George Grosz to his friend Erich Hermann which reflect his ideas about art, Robert Rosenblum papers which aid in the strengthening of the list of major art historians, and other correspondences that aid the enhancement of the documentation on artists. It is mentioned that the Smithson papers consisted of drafts, manuscripts, Smithson's writings, and other records that provide more information on his works. It is also noted that the second major acquisition is the papers of the artist and collector Aline Meyer Liebman which reflect her interest in photography.

The article covers issues related to the conservation of library materials in the United States. A correct procedure for opening a newly-bound volume of a book is to slowly open the book to a normal reading angle. The Library of Congress has launched efforts to perfect the diethyl-zinc mass deacidification process. A seminar on conservation of library materials has been sponsored by the New York Metropolitan Reference and Research Library Agency held on November 29, 1983.

In 2017, the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) joined the National Digital Stewardship Residency for Art Information (NDSR Art) inaugural cohort, hosting a project focused on preservation and stewardship of Mia's time-based media art, part of the museum's permanent collections and distinct from its library and archival materials. Post-residency, Mia's resident and project team members from the museum's Library & Archives and Collections Information Management departments revisited the project, considering the overlaps and divergences between museum, library, and archival approaches to digital preservation and stewardship. Each offered a unique perspective and reflections on their professional practices. [This article expands on a presentation delivered at the Upper Midwest Digital Collections Conference held in St Paul, Minnesota, in November 2018.] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents archival materials consisting Charles Sheldon's correspondence, his handwritten diaries of exploration and hunting trips in Alaska, his journal kept by James Wickersham, and miscellaneous papers, minutes of the Boone and Crockett Club meetings, copies of Alaska Game Laws, and biographical notes on Sheldon written by his son William.

Carsten Juhl engages the philosophical significance of Pia Arke's research processes and conditions of display. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Bibliographical Society of America's (BSA) annual meeting held in New York on January 29, 2016. It states that the Society introduced the Justin G.Schiller Prize, an award for encouraging scholarship in the bibliography of historical children's books. It is note that BSA's archival materials had been transported from Cambridge, Massachusetts to New York City.

Presents archival materials about American author Alfred Betram Guthrie Jr.

Ed Halter considers James Richards's responses to the present media landscape and to the histories that inform it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital access to large amounts of scholarly text presents both challenges and opportunities for researchers in the humanities. Meeting these challenges depends on having high-quality representations of the contents of digital resources suitable for both machines and humans to use. Different ways of categorizing these contents are appropriate for different purposes, leading to the further problem of relating the contents of different categorization schemes to each other. This essay discusses the rationale for categorizing philosophical concepts and surveys some of the main approaches to doing so for materials that are continuously changing. It describes the goals and methods of the Indiana Philosophy Ontology (InPhO) project and provides an example of the kind of analysis that is made possible by powerful modeling methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a discussion of the final revisions which were made in 1777 to David Garrick's first play "Lethe," which was originally written in 1740. A discussion of the play's story line is presented. An examination which was conducted on fragments of the original and revised manuscripts of the play is discussed.

The article assesses the significance of Arthur Schomburg's work in collecting books, manuscripts and art works to the recovery of black culture. His collection documented the experiences of African-descended people. The author argues that Schomburg was interested in the advancement of African-descended peoples. He believes Schomburg created an archive of Afrodiasporic history to challenge the epistemological foundations of racial science and the master narratives of Western history.

This article presents a revised research which dealt with the contributions of Ulrich Middeldorf to art in fiction collection in the U.S. His biography is provided. The estimate of the number of fictions collected by Middeldorf is stated. Information on his fiction collection is given.

The article deals with the role of community user in the academic art library. The definition of community users is presented. The responsibilities of academic art libraries to the community users are examined. Ways of dealing with the community user's needs are discussed.

Lists several books, magazine articles, theses and dissertations and archival materials on environmental history in the U.S. Range of topics and subject matter relevant to environmental history that were explored by the research materials; Author credits; Publisher information.

The article focuses on the identification of authors of adult fiction and their illustrators which were published by Bobbs-Merrill Co. in the U.S. from 1899 to 1960. The Bobbs-Merrill archive at the Lily Library of Indiana University in Bloomington was used to identify the authors and illustrators. There were 1,021 authors identified from the archive. The bibliographic records from the archive was used to classify the materials as adult fiction, poetry and whether they were illustrated.

This section presents a revised research which analyzed the development of the Cataloging Cultural Objects (CCO) in the U.S. The importance of the art and cultural heritage communities to CCO are assessed. The significance of CCO to archival resources is discussed. The composition of CCO is provided.

Presents archival materials about Walter Leroy Huber, a conservationist in the U.S.

Presents archival materials on the California Water Resources Oral History Series program aimed at documenting historical developments in water resources in California.

Presents archival materials created by the Fairbanks North Star Borough consisting of newsclippings, pamphlets, and related materials on the subject of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline and its impact on Fairbanks, Alaska.