Chemistry 50th

Another 50th anniversary, this one for Chemistry, got a call from Marcus Hoffman today. The reunion they're planning is this coming April 28. Will start looking for photos, articles etc. as I can.

Honors Program

Donna Kowal, current head of the program, and a student from it, visited the archives this morning. They are interested in the history of the program, honors classes at Brockport, celebrating the history of it through a web page, slideshows etc. I shared what I know, what resources I have... To be continued!

President's office

Got a call from President's office, they had a call from an older gentleman, he'd been a campus school kid here many years ago, some other connections with the college and the community - he is an Elwell, so imagine he may be related to AB Elwell 1899, who was friend's with Buzz Guelf etc. Am going to contact the family, see what he is looking for, listen to his story...

Another intern!

A student from Anthro/Public History stopped by, looking into an internship for this spring. We chatted, she has some interesting experience, digitization/scanning work, will look forward to working with her. Like all interns there's a process, went over it...


Update: she came back, we filled out her papers for Dr. Spiller, she will be doing a 3 credit internship this spring. So as of now have two students doing 3 credit internships, and one doing a 1 credit.

Interns update

Working to catch up with interns, make sure projects etc. are followed through on and that I have them before the end of the semester!

Interviews with adapted PE profs

A grad student in KSSPE did some video interviews with adapted PE folks and is coming today to share those with me. Will need to make sure of permissions etc.

Consult

Have been contacted by a community member who was at my one presentation at Mornings with Profs and who has questions about handling/preserving a scrapbook. Apparently some of the material is from family members who attended the old Normal in the 1920s. Replied with some advice, links, and suggested some times they could come to the archives, something they said they wanted to do.

EOP history

Spent much of today digging into the history of the EOP. I have various primary docs here, but never had occasion to go through them. Interesting history, would be an excellent internship research project! The question came from the EOP office, it was 50 years ago that the EOP program was first set up in NY. Our Brockport program was started it seems in the 1969-70 academic year. A David Henderson was the director in the early years, and a Ray Coley was assistant director.


Sent an email back, with some scans and text info, will continue working with them.

History of basketball at Brockport

A pretty big subject really, long history, but to start off recommended searching Cherishing this Heritage, and the Stylus in nyshistoricnewspapers.org. Explained how to access, use etc., said will be happy to have them visit the archives if they wish.

Interview

A student coming in this afternoon to interview me, as part of her career prep to go to library school. She is particularly interested in archives and museums.

More History Dept. 50tth

Prof Spiller and Bekah, the dept. intern, are coming over to look through primary sources. Got out Dedman retirement book, catalogs, faculty bulletins etc.

Gymnastics

Student emailed me about history of gymnastics here. Shared link to nyshistoricnewspapers.org, tips on how to search Stylus, and invited her to let me know if she wanted to visit the archives in person.

Smith dissertation

The Smith dissertation on the early history of Brockport is in high demand for Spiller's HST390, but somehow the 2nd part got lost or I thought it was up on Digital Commons but wasn't. Found original pdf, added, is OK now. This would be an excellent document to get retyped in Word, then made a pdf. The pdf of it I was given from Syracuse U. is huge, 200mb, it is hard to resize these pdf's once they are done.

Pres Yu & fire dept

Advancement asked about a photo of President Yu with local fire department officials, presenting a check from the college. Found a reference in Stylus for Feb. 1998, with photo. Looked in Dusen negatives for '98 and did not see any from him. I don't have any Stylus photos here. One project for future interns would be to work on the Dusen photo list document, it really needs a lot of attention.

The Crypt

This is different, a student came by who'd done an internship before, looking to research the Crypt, the coffee House that was at St. Luke's Episcopal in Brockport. It started in 1964, end date I am not sure. Shared the little I have or know, got them started in nyshistoricnewspapers. The novel twist to this is that the student is hoping to revive the Crypt for a one night special event!

Interns update

Interns are all doing good things. Lyndsey Richard's work on early gay liberation here in the '70s was very useful to a student researcher in yesterday. Some of the works scanned are getting many hits, e.g. the Cornes manuscript Tyler worked on. Being done with earlier projects I have both Tyler and Lyndsey working on organizing, relabeling and more clearly identifying the portrait photos that Jim Dusen took of staff, faculty and some others c1985-95. There are 3 thick binders full, a treasure trove of images of many of the staff of the last 50 years.

Art/photography student

A student from Kitty Hubbard was in, had scheduled a visit to look at images for a project in which she needs to revisit the current scenes of older photos. Gave her a tour of photo collections, made some suggestions, e.g. the Guelf 1913 All Brockport photos etc... She soent a couple hours, downloaded some pics to her flash drive, will likely be back.

HON112 student

A student in Kerfoot's HON112 that I met with recently made appointment and then came in today to learn about the Gay Liberation Front etc. Discussed that era with her, made the files and power point the student intern on the project had assembled available...

Marion Schrank

Query re Marion Schrank, was she first woman VP in SUNY? Not sure about that, no way to know really, but did share that:

Marion (Turturro) Schrank was Class of 1969. She worked at the college from 1972-2002. She worked in Student Affairs in various capacities and in 1986 was made the Assistant VP for Student Affairs. I really can’t say if she was the first in SUNY, but she would have been an early such office holder. She was active in many other areas as well, e.g. chair of the campus committee on women’s issues etc.

Update: I'd forgotten this, but Ken O'Brien and Bruce Leslie mentioned a Vera King Ferris, who was probably the first woman VP here, in the 1970s. She seems to have left c1979 when there was a big administrative reorganization.

Fred Gravetter

Had a request for photos of Fred Gravetter, but unfortunately was unable to find any in Jim Dusen's photos.

Gymnastics history

HON112 student that was here last week contacted me interested in gymnastics history. Explained how to search the Stylus online, and invited her to visit next week.

Photo help

Photography student contacted wanting old images to look at, take pics of the same sites today, compare, contrast... Am meeting her next week after NYLA.

Dedman - history of History Dept

Have been spending time at different points with a History Dept intern who is researching their departmental history. She was in today and we spent an hour together scanning materials from a recently received scrapbook about Wayne Dedman's retirement in 1977. Many photos of founding department members, letters of reminiscence etc.

1974 soccer team photo?

Sometimes what you want is there, sometimes not... In the files we have a '72 and a '76 photo, but nothing in between, not that is labeled anyway. There are some unidentified photos that might be from the period, but there was no year book that year to help verify. There is a gap in the campus photographer collections in the early, mid-70s, because of staff turnover etc. So, had to say sorry, but no luck! (There were lots of Stylus articles, they won a big championship that year, but no pics, and the person needed a team photo specifically.)

Interview

Two students doing an interview for a communications class on spaces on campus. Talked about the library, where it was when it was Drake I, in Hartwell, how libraries have changed...

Stylus reporter

Spent an hour with a Stylus reporter exploring the archives, the college history, in particular the post WWII expansion. She is looking at writing on that, as well as other topics, perhaps a series of things.

HON112 class

Had Kerfoot's HON112 class in, to tour the archives, learn something about the school and it's history, the archives, with a focus on stories, artifacts etc. they could write about.