In case you haven’t seen it, there are quite a few articles about the Woodson’s various projects and collection in the most recent issue of News from Fondren. They include information on the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (CAMH) archive, the Reginald Moore Convict Leasing research collection, the Shepherd School digitization project, the Houston Folk Music Archive’s Homecoming concert, and the Wilson Collection of Historical Cartography and Geography.
While most university archival collections from deans and professors offer no great surprises, every once in a while one pops up. Below is Lars Lerup’s, the former Dean of Rice School of Architecture (1993-2009), recipe for a marinade including a lovely doodle.
We hope everyone had a nice break. We’re back and ready for researchers, if you’re able to drag yourself in. If you’d rather stay at home, we’ve got you covered.
Our hardworking student archivist, Trevor Egerton created a new online exhibit entitled: A Soldier’s Story: WWI Letters and Diaries of Paul B. Hendrickson
It tells the story of Paul B. Hendrickson and includes an interactive map about his time here in Houston and in Europe. We hope you enjoy it.
Christmas cards, 1918
“My heartiest greetings to you this Christmas Morning, and my Best Wishes to you for the New Year”
We’re ending our posts for 2018 with a return to the Sheelah Green-Wilkinson scrapbook album, 1916-1918, and a couple of the Christmas greeting cards for 1918.
Christmas card, 1918, engraving of the tower in the Grand Place, Courtrai, Belgium
One hundred years ago an Armistsice had been signed and the first World War was winding down to an end. The Belgian city of Courtrai, pictured in the card above, had just been recaptured by the Belgian, British and French forces in October of 1918.
Christmas card from the Red Cross and Order of St. John, 1918
This formal card, from the Red Cross and the Order of St. John, includes coats of arms of the British Commonwealth nations. The interior of the card is more casual, including a Santa, Christmas pudding, and tobacco with its illustrations of soldiers, ships, and cannon, and looks toward peace in the new year (see above).
The Woodson Research Center closes for winter break tomorrow, and reopens January 2nd, 2019. Have a wonderful holiday, and see you all in the new year!
In honor of the first plane in flight, let’s look at one of our rare books from the Benjamin Monroe Anderson Collection on the History of Aeronautics.
The Romance of Aeronautics, published in 1912, by Charles Cyril Turner (1870-1952) is a children’s book recounting the history of flight, which was still an incredibly new technology.
The book contains a wealth of images including drawings and photographs of different contraptions. Excuse the odd angles for the photographs the book’s binding is quite tight.
During the 1923-1924 school year, the headmaster, A.S. Langton, gifted this book to W. Baker. The Kimberley British Evening School might now be the Kimberley School in Nottingham, although their website does not contain its history and the Wikipedia page lists that the school opened in 1946. As noted above, the book is in really good condition, so perhaps young Baker was not a fan of the topic.
As always, here’s an interesting list of other books in The Romance series.
In 1840, Catherine Grace Frances Gore published The Snow Storm, A Christmas Story under the name Mrs. Gore. She was a prolific “silver fork writer” who chronicled the lives of the upper class and aristocracy.
Here is a signature from the first owner, Miss M. Brown. Later owner, F. S. Bradburn looks to be a rare book collector and has a connection with emeritus professor, Dr. Robert Patten, who helped the Woodson acquire books for the Cruikshank rare book collection from which the book comes.
This 2nd edition of her book dedicated to her son contains illustrations by George Cruikshank.
While it might only be me, I really love the advertisements for books by the publisher. It seems like there a lot of coffee table books listed. Fisher’s Drawing-Room Scrap Book is available via Harvard via the Hathi Trust.
For those keeping up with the new Houston Jewish History Archive, we wanted to alert you to the new blog. It highlights items from the collection, but also tells the story of Houston’s Jewish community.
The most recent post is on Hanukkah celebrations.
During my weekly search for content, I found this little guy. This rock football player has two feet/legs, but also has another little rock to sit on, perhaps, while he waits to be put in the game or to keep him upright.
There is a sticker on the underside of his foot that has been removed. The remnants seem to suggest that someone purchased this rock. As always, any additional information is always great.
Have an enjoyable Thanksgiving, but please don’t steal a TV.
–via Rice Thresher, 52, no. 11 (1964)
“Will be glad to see home some time and have a good long talk. Your loving son, Paul”
Sunday, November 11 marks 100 years since the end of the First World War. Armistice Day commemorates the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany, ending hostilities on the Western Front of WWI. The cessation took effect at eleven o’clock in the morning – the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918. A formal peace agreement was reached at the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.
We recently digitized one of our World War I collections and it is now available in our digital archive. The Paul B. Hendrickson World War I collection contains correspondence written by Hendrickson to his family back home during his time in service. There is a diary kept during the year he was in France and almost 300 postcards which were sent home. Hendrickson was stationed in France near Saint Mihiel sector on Armistice Day and wrote to his parents: “This is a big day here. Every one is celebrating. We played quite a while, and some of our boys grabbed a couple Frenchmen and began dancing.”
“This is a big day here. Every one is celebrating. We played quite a while, and some of our boys grabbed a couple Frenchmen and began dancing.”
Hendrickson enlisted on April 12, 1917 in Danville, Illinois in the Band, Headquarters Co, 5th Illinois Infantry National Guard, serving in the first enlistment. The regiment initially trained at Camp Parker in Quincy, Illinois. While there, he studied bugling and map drawing. On September 14, 1917, he traveled to Camp Logan, a newly created training camp in Houston, Texas. Hendrickson arrived at Camp Logan on September 17, 1917. While at Camp Logan, he trained in trench warfare, open formation maneuvers, and rifle range practice. He arrived in France on May 24, 1918. He served in the Amiens sector, July 21-August 18; Verdun sector, September 9 – October 17; and St. Mihiel sector, November 7-11, 1918. He returned to the U.S. on May 22, 1919. View the finding aid online.
