Collins Unbound

Have you seen the beautiful paper cranes installed in the front of the library? The cranes were created by Clarissa Sligh, an African American artist and essayist who combines photography and text into powerful narrative artworks, artist books, and installations that explore memory, identity, transformation, and perception. Sligh’s website describes her experience at age 15 as the lead plaintiff in the 1955 school desegregation case in Virginia (Clarissa Thompson et. al. vs. Arlington County School Board). Sligh writes that “from that moment forward, her work as a student and as a professional…takes into account change, transformation, and complication.”

If you are interested in seeing more of Sligh’s work, the Archives & Special Collections holds six of her artists books: Transforming Hate: An Artist’s Book, What’s Happening With Momma?, Reading Dick & Jane with Me, Wrongly Bodied: Documenting Transformation from Female to Male, It Wasn’t Little Rock, and Voyage(r): Tourist Map to Japan.

A page from “Transforming Hate” by Clarissa Sligh.

The book Transforming Hate evolved from a project in which Sligh folded paper cranes from the pages of white supremacist books for an exhibition organized by the Montana Human Rights Network in 2008. Wrongly Bodied tells the stories of Jake, a contemporary white male imprisoned in a woman’s body as he transitions from female to male, and of Ellen Craft, a 19^th century black slave woman who escapes to Philadelphia from Georgia by passing as a white male slave owner. Reading Dick & Jane with Me was created by Sligh to interrupt the authority of elementary school textbooks from the 1940s and 50s known as “The Dick and Jane Readers,” which portrayed a white upper middle class suburban family. As a young girl reading these books, Sligh felt that these depictions must mean that her family was an aberration outside of normal family life in America.

If you’d like to see Sligh’s artists’ books, please visit us in the Archives & Special Collections.

The Archives & Special Collections has drop-in hours on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM or is open by appointment.

By Laura Edgar, Assistant Archivist

Halloween is right around the corner, so here at the Archives & Special Collections we thought it would be a good idea to dive in and see what the ghosts of students past did for this spooky holiday.

In 1979, some students in Alpha Psi Omega, an honorary dramatic fraternity, offered their services for Halloween makeup to raise money to put on one-act plays directed by students in the drama department. Students could throw on a costume, get their makeup done, then head on over to the Halloween Dance in the Great Hall. The dance even promoted a pumpkin contest with a $25 first place prize and if you were really feeling brave, on Halloween night students in the Langlow House (1218 N. Alder) put on a yearly haunted house!

In a Trail issue from 1988, students dedicated three pages of the issue to provide ideas on what to be for Halloween as well as more information about the Langlow Haunted House. Langlow, the Honors Program house, was bought by the University in 1962 from the Langlow family.  Originally the Kappa Sigma Fraternity house, it was later given to the Honors Program and for many years it was turned into a haunted house for those brave enough to enter the building. The haunted house theme in 1988 was “A Nightmare on Alder Street.” It cost students $1 to enter and all the proceeds went to Oxfam, an international hunger relief organization. This haunted house was just one of the ways that students who lived in the house worked to “be a part of the community.”

The Archives & Special Collections has drop-in hours on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM or is open by appointment

By Rowan Coates

University of Puget Sound has a long history of journalism and the Archives & Special Collections is currently working to explore this intriguing aspect of our school. From journalism courses of the past to The Maroon and The Trail, Puget Sound students have always been young journalists.

As one of the Archives & Special Collections Peer Research Specialists, I am putting together an exhibit that explores our history of journalism, specifically the many changing shapes of our campus newspaper. From 1897 to 2019, the exhibit will cover how our newspaper has evolved, both physically and culturally.

At the moment, Puget Sound has ceased publishing a student-run newspaper. This exhibit will hopefully contextualize this lapse in publication, and potentially inspire journalistic change. The exhibit will be up in the coming weeks. Come by to learn about the history of student voice and get inspired to be a part of the future of campus journalism!

The Archives & Special Collections has drop-in hours on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM or is open by appointment.

By Julia Schiff

The Archives & Special Collections has many unique books that give a little glimpse into everyday life at different points in history. One such example of this is The Ladies’ Repository. The Ladies’ Repository was a magazine that was written for women by Methodist ministers, which is particularly interesting considering Puget Sound’s ties to the Methodist Church.

The magazine was published from 1841 to 1876 and started when the idea for a monthly magazine for women was presented by Samuel Williams, a Methodist from Cincinnati, Ohio. He wanted to create a magazine focused on a Methodist mindset for women to read and grow their moral character. The Ladies Repository included illustrations, songs, prose, and poetry, many of which included Methodist teachings and ideas.

In 1853, The Ladies’ Repository hired a new editor, Davis E. Clark. Clark expanded the magazine from one for women only to a magazine that was relevant for the entire family and circulation increased to 40,000 households. After the Civil War (1861-1865), the magazine began to decline and it was replaced by The National Repository in 1876.

The volume in the A&SC includes monthly issues from January through December, 1859. In the January 1859 issue there is an image and article describing the life of Bishop Edward R. Ames by Reverend Thomas Eddy. Many of the articles are written by men for women as a way to educate and inform women. Men weren’t the only contributors though; many women submitted poetry and illustrations to be printed. One example of this is the poem titled “Comfort” by Emily C. Huntington (pg. 6, January 1859).

This volume is one of many that we have in the Archives & Special Collections so if you’re interested in looking at some of our rare books, stop by!

The Archives & Special Collections has drop-in hours on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM or is open by appointment.

By Rowan Coates