Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Greek life over the years...

Happened to notice an event of this title advertised in the Daily Eagle, and looking closer realized it only covered back to the '70s. Understandable, the previous, extensive Greek history here c1850s-1930s is little known today. Contacted the staff advisor to the Greek council and was able to secure a table at the event, which is tomorrow. Will bring some display items, make some connections...

Candidates for Hall of Fame

Athletics sent a list of 75+ people who are possible candidates for the hall of fame. They asked archives help to verify grad dates, sports played etc. One of my interns has begun working on this, starting with the 1992 and 2010 alumni directories, then on the Stylus...

Theatre 50th

Theatre is looking at celebrating their 50th. One initial request was for video/film of a play done in the late '70s. Unfortunately a lot of the films and videos shot here over the years like that were lost in the last years of the old Education Communications Center, or when it was dissolved in the early 1990s. I only have a handful of Brockport produced films, mostly some recruitment films.

But, have lots of still photos, Stylus etc., so will be using those to help.

Tuesday, February 20, 2018

AAS100

A couple students from the AAS100 class were in to research black students of yesteryear. One is looking at Robert Bray '37, the other Barb Stevens '53. Showed them yearbooks, how to search Stylus, catalogs, shared some further history of the school.

Bio info on 3 possible honorary degree candidates

Bio info needed on some candidates for honorary degrees, all of whom have some Brockport connections. Will search RG26 files, Stylus etc.

Hiel Brockway info

Local researcher working on a presentation on Hiel Brockway looking for early newspapers. Will help her, I do have print and microfilm of the one paper, 1830-33, but unfortunately most of the early newspapers were lost to fires in the 1850s. I suggested documents like the Cornes manuscript, digitized here last year, which is an extensive account of life in pre Civil War Brockport and includes a lot of anecdotal information about the Brockway family I have never seen elsewhere.
 
UPDATE: She was in today, we talked a while, I showed her some different resources and she spent time with the old newspapers.

Guerrilla Girls possible donation

A 1970s alum contacted us re a donation related to this group. The background is her involvement as a young woman c1980 with the actor William Hurt, with many connections to the "#me too" movement of today. The materials are not connected to Brockport, but relate to this group that was formed, feminist activists... I have responded to her, and hope to meet her while here in Brockport, but I do feel it might be better in a larger setting where it would get the attention it deserves. It really seems like a collection that is a little out of my league here so to speak.

UPDATE: am meeting her Th @10am.We met and had a cordial chat, and agreed that this material would be better served at some larger, better staffed and secured archives. I am going to check around and make some further suggestions, one I made already was Cornell's women's studies...

Wednesday, February 14, 2018

AAS100

Had Naomi Riley's AAS100 in this morning. Gave a brief presentation on general history of school, diversity here, then some students went to the main library for other research, but two groups stayed in the archives. One to research the beginnings of the AAS dept., and the other to research the history of blacks at Brockport. I had some different files, catalogs, yearbooks etc out, they seemed to enjoy the experience quite a bit, asked some good questions... Some may be back for further work.

Monday, February 12, 2018

Michael Dei Anang

A colleague referred someone to me who is researching Michael Dei Anang, a native of Ghana who was a faculty member here in the 1970s. He was a chair of AAS, and died in 1978. He had been a gov't official in Ghana, and a poet as well. I will have to look for a photo, I don't see one in his bio file from RG26. At one time some books were donated in his honor to the library and there was a collection, but that was already gone or dispersed when I came in 1990 - I think. Some research to do!

Victor Fadool

Request for info on a Victor Fadool, his son contacted athletics, thinking he'd played football here late '40s. Team records are incomplete, but have learned to search further, people are often unsure of exact dates etc. Even back then too you can't assume he graduated, people did transfer out and so on even then, he isn't listed as a grad. I did find a mention of him in Stylus 1951 as being picked for baseball, and then found a couple photos with him in them for baseball and sophomore class pic. Scanned, sent along to athletics.

HST390 - Martin

Morag Martin, History, had her HST390 in today for me to talk to them about conducting oral history interviews etc. They have a rather challenging focus, medical and health issues, but the general principles are the same.

Friday, February 9, 2018

MM House historian

MM House has a new historian, Rozenn Bailleul-LeSeur, and we spent a couple hours together this morning. Her husband is a chemistry prof here, they are relatively new in the area, so we spent some time discussing general local history. I shared a number of useful sites and books with her, as well as contacts for photos, scanning and so forth. It's great to have more going on in local history, and some good possible collaborative things can happen here, including on the Digital Commons.

Thursday, February 8, 2018

Spencerport history

Student volunteering/interning with the Spencerport historical society is coming in to see some Spencerport books I have. While there isn't a Spencerport newspaper in NYS Historic Newspapers, I was curious, limited to Monroe County, just searched for Spencerport, and actually got a number of hits, largely BR, mostly brief things, but some more substantial.

Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Ariel - volunteer

A student who needs to do some volunteer work as part of a scholarship has started today, she is going to type up that Cornes manuscript from the pdf, then we'll have a Word doc we can edit, correct, enhance...

Education prof

An education prof stopped by, ended up showing him around, sending an email with links to things, he is interested in his social studies teacher students doing research with primary documents. We discussed a number of possible topics etc.

Monday, February 5, 2018

Eloise Wilkin

Got a request from Advancement on behalf of an alum looking for the bio of this "Golden Books" editor. We do have a copy, in JUV, The Golden Years of Eloise Wilkin. She had a Brockport connection, her mother was a Harrison, of the local merchant family who once owned Alumni House before the college bought in the late 1800s.

Social media student

Student intern from the social media folks on campus, looking for pics and stories of things about Brockport people might not know. We spent an hour talking and looking through photos. I assembled and emailed her in sections 15 or so photos, of the old Normal school building, Nellie Gansworth '44, Spring In, etc.

Knapp Museum

Emailing with Sue Savard at the museum, re the Cornes manuscript, and about my idea of making a libguide to better illuminate the local history resources available in town. She sent me a spreadsheet of their holdings there, will be interested to go thru it when have the time.

Friday, February 2, 2018

Facebook response

I often get a lot of "likes" on the "Remembering Brockport" group page in Facebook. A recent post of the 1926 high school class that was here at the old Normal got a lot of likes, and some comments. One person had had one of that class, Lois Mercer, as her teacher at Kendall as a girl, and another emailed me to ask for info and pics on her grandmother, Winifred Lee. Both students went all the way in campus school from 1-12, then into the Normal, a complete Brockport education!

Eric Steel & Gloria Mattera photos

Request from Advancement for photos of these two. Steel was a language prof here many years, 1940s - '60s, well known campus character with his dog Fen Fen, lol. Mattera was a '52 grad, and prof at Geneseo many years, instrumental in migrant ed work. Had some good shots of Steel, only an undergrad shot of Mattera, have reached out to my counterpart at Geneseo.

Thursday, February 1, 2018

Team summary reports

Folks in athletics inquiring about sports materials I have. Like a library ref interview, one sometimes drills down and finds out more specifics, in this case they used to keep a paper record of each team's season, a summary, and are thinking of getting back to that, but they don't have those records anymore. I scanned and sent a few team summaries I have here, am waiting to see if that's what they need. Also outlined the holdings I have for sports and athletics records, which are pretty extensive.