A recently opened exhibit at the Huntington Library explores the life and work of You Chung (Y.C.) Hong (1898-1977), one of the first Chinese Americans to pass the California Bar. An expert on U.S. immigration laws, Hong was a tireless advocate for equal rights of Chinese-Americans and worked to overturn the Chinese Exclusion Act, a federal law signed by president Arthur in 1882 that prohibited the immigration of Chinese laborers and severely restricted the entry of Chinese non-laborers. (The law was not repealed until the Magnuson Act of 1943.)  In addition to appearing at numerous congressional hearings in the subject, Hong represented nearly 7,000 clients during his career. "Y.C. Hong: Advocate for Chinese-American Inclusion" draws from the Huntington's Hong Family Papers (acquired in 2006) and provides a thorough explanation of this prominent attorney and civic leader.

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Translation: These blessings I wish for my compatriots:/ Businesses that flourish,/ Fortunes smoothly sought,/ And once that is done, safe and speedy passage home. Y.C. Hong's business card/business flyer, ca. 1928. The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens. 

Among the photographs, ledgers, and correspondence on display, a Chinese typewriter is a particular standout. Purchased by Hong in the 1930s, the machine features over 2500 characters etched on movable metal slugs in its tray bed. To type, one would move the character selection lever across the character chart, then press down on the type bar. The type bar would then pick up the slug, ink it, and impress the image onto paper.


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Improved Shu Zhendong-style Chinese typewriter ?????????????, ca. 1935. The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens.

Another impressive artifact is a 1936 document called a "coaching paper," containing hundreds of question and answers Chinese immigrants would memorize and then recite to their American sponsors. (Immigrants could expect to face nearly 400 questions during their interviews.) To avoid arousing the suspicion of cheating among American authorities, clients were advised to destroy such documents. Children of American citizens were eligible for citizenship which sparked a lucrative trade in false kinship papers. Those fortunate enough to evade detection and gain entry became known as "paper sons" and "paper daughters."
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Zheng Wenqi's ????? coaching paper, ca. 1936. The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens.

"Y.C. Hong: Advocate for Chinese-American Inclusion" is on view until March 21, 2016 at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California. More information may be found here.

 

 

Our Bright Young Librarians series continues today with Jillian Sparks, Special Collections Librarian with Queen's University Library in Kingston, Ontario:

  

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What is your role at your institution?


My official title at Queen's University is Special Collections Librarian. As a Special Collections Librarian I do a bit of everything--collection development, reference, and cataloguing. However, my primary focus is instruction and outreach. Currently we are engaged in making our collection more accessible to faculty and students. To promote awareness of our holdings, I am doing a series of pop-up exhibits over the next few months in conjunction with Robert Burns Day, Valentine's Day, International Women's Day, and National Poetry Month. I set up a table with materials and free buttons at the entrance of our main library and talk to students about how they can use our collections. Leaving the reading room to meet the students where they are more comfortable helps prepare them to take the next step and visit us in the reading room as well as presents Special Collection with a more personal face.  With these same goals in mind, I also manage our Instagram and Twitter accounts.

How did you get started in rare books?


I was fortunate enough to be exposed to book history and special collections as an undergraduate at Creighton University. I took a course called "Not Lost in Translation" on the history of the bible that inspired me to think about book transmission and book history. While I was completing my M.A. in English at the University of Victoria I had my epiphany realizing that I loved working with special collections materials and was happiest in that environment. My conversion from English studies to book studies developed through my relationship with one book in particular--Mercury: or the Secret and Swift Messenger by John Wilkins. A secret codebook published in 1641, Mercury is full of unique charts and figures describing how the reader can master the art of secret communication. I first encountered Mercury in a textual studies and methods course which was held in Special Collections. Our wonderful professor, Dr. Erin Kelly introduced us to bibliography. We each chose a book to collate, write signature statements for, examine chain lines, and talk about type setting. The pages of Mercury were dirty and the book had been rebound in a simple grey paper case, but it captured my interest.


Seminar papers and the rigors of graduate school kept me busy until six months later while working with Dr. Janelle Jenstad and special collections staff on a 17th and 18th-century English books exhibit when Wilkins' book showed up again. Questions on why would someone write a code book in the 17th century and why would someone collect it 200 years later plagued me. Thankfully, Dr. Kelly agreed to supervise a directed study over the summer. During my three-month love affair with Mercury; I would sneak away from my master's essay at every chance to touch, feel, and smell the pages of that book.  The months of bibliographic study--excavating every detail about publication and John Wilkins's history--culminated in a comparative study between Mercury and Wilkins's other work, Essay Towards a Real Character and Philosophical Language (1668), in which I discussed the similarity between the secret codes in the former and universal language in the latter. From then on there was no going back for me, I needed to pursue rare book librarianship.


From the University of Victoria, I headed east to the University of Iowa in order to pursue a joint MLIS degree and Certificate in Book Studies. I was very lucky to be selected as one of the Olson Graduate Research Assistants for Special Collections and University Archives. This two year position prepared me for the many facets of rare book librarianship and allowed me to work with several other Bright Young Librarians--Patrick Olson, Colleen Theisen, Margaret Gamm, and Amy Hildreth Chen--who have all been great mentors!

Where did you earn your MLS/advanced degree? 


I earned my M.A. in English with a specialization in Medieval and Early Modern Studies from the University of Victoria. My MLIS and Certificate in Book Studies is from the University of Iowa. Iowa's School of Library and Information Science partners with the Center for the Book to offer a joint program in library science and book studies that involves both book history and book arts. I focused on book binding which has been invaluable in my own research and enabled me to make historical book binding models I use when teaching.

Favorite rare book / ephemera that you've handled?


I am sentimental about Mercury and all of John Wilkins' works and continue to study them. In general, I am drawn to historical scientific works. I am interested in what language is used to convey scientific knowledge and how it creates scientific community. Similarly, I find scientific diagrams and illustrations beautiful and am fascinated with how the visuals complement the text. The History of Hydraulics collection is my favorite collection at the University of Iowa and I am very excited to begin exploring our scientific collections at Queen's, especially our botanical collection. We have a herbarium compiled by Catherine Parr Traill that is exquisite.

What do you personally collect?


I have an ever growing collection of Jane Austen books and related materials. Tea with Jane Austen is one of the latest additions. My husband and I also collect cookbooks.

What do you like to do outside of work?


I love to cook, hence the cookbook collection. I live at the confluence of the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario and am looking forward to hiking, fishing, camping, and just exploring southeast Ontario this summer.


What excites you about rare book librarianship?


Everything about it excites me! It is so satisfying to unravel the provenance, unique textual characteristics, and identify binding features while cataloguing. I think this side appeals to every puzzle lover. Yet at the same time rare book librarianship is all about sharing discoveries and helping to facilitate new ones. I love the outreach side of my job and working with students in the classroom and our reading room.

Thoughts on the future of special collections / rare book librarianship?


Special collections as a field is going through a very exciting transition. Thanks to social media and a number of digital projects, people are now pushing the traditional boundaries of rare book librarianship. As librarians share materials through Tumblr, Instagram, and various video platforms, people get to learn about collections and see behind the veil of the reading room. Digital projects like crowdsourcing transcription and identifying photographs are also incredibly engaging. As a result, I think administrators look to special collections to lead new digital research opportunities and to provide an active learning environment for students. I am especially excited about the evolution of special collections instruction and the overall impact it will have on undergraduate research. We need to cultivate our future readers and advocates and I think that begins in the classroom.

Any unusual or interesting collection at your library you'd like to draw our attention to?


Queen's is home to an extensive Canadiana collection that covers the early history of Canada to Canadian fine press and artist's books. We recently received a new collection, the Schulich-Woolf Rare Book Collection, about 400 volumes mostly on British history and culture of the 16th through 18th centuries. We are also home to Canadian writer and journalist Robertson Davies' personal library and have maintained his library's original order. Davies collected 19th century theatre history when no one else was really interested. The collection includes tinsel prints of several Victorian actors.


Any upcoming exhibitions at your library?


Our current exhibit is on Vero Wynne-Edwards and the 1937 MacMillan-Thebaud Expedition. In the spring, Kim Bell will be curating an exhibit on magazines produced by prisoners at the Kingston Penitentiary called "Prison Sentences: Penitentiary Literature in Kingston." Kim has collaborated with Canada's Penitentiary Museum in order to showcase the full history of the prison press and I think it will be quite fascinating. There will be a digital exhibit as well. We will be featuring books from our Children's Books collection over the summer and will open in the fall with an exhibit celebrating the 175th anniversary of Queen's. 

"Drawings and Digressions," a new exhibit featuring the art of Timothy C. Ely is on view in New York City, hosted by Abby Schoolman Books, which specializes in the work of contemporary fine art bookbinders.  

Screen Shot 2016-01-25 at 4.49.47 PM.pngThe work of Tim Ely, master bookbinder and artist, has long been on our radar. Prompted by an exhibit at the Northwest Museum of Arts in Spokane, Washington, Nick Basbanes profiled him in our winter 2011 issue.

An inveterate doodler for as long as he can remember ... Ely admits to constant daydreaming as a boy, and to always recording the images that fill his brain onto pieces of paper. All of the books he makes are carefully planned and sketched out in advance, and detailed in notebooks, now numbering seventy-three, which constitute the bibliographical record of his accomplishments over the past half-century. He estimates that he has made 450 books over that period.

The current exhibit of enigmatic landscapes is on view through March at the Gallery at Midtown Integrative Health and Wellness. Ely writes of it, "This series of drawings shapes an idea of what speculatively goes on for me in this relationship of humans with land, embedded as I am in my own territory." 

The MIHAW gallery is located at 515 Madison Ave., 6th floor, and the hours are: 7am to 6pm Monday-Thursday and 7am to 5pm on Fridays. Ely's books can be seen by appointment at Abby Schoolman Books.

Image Courtesy of Abby Schoolman Books.

1537.jpgA previously unknown Beatrix Potter story was discovered in the Victoria & Albert archive in London. The story will be published for the first time this fall with illustrations by Quentin Blake.

Two years ago, Penguin publisher Jo Hanks found mention of the unedited story, entitled "The Tale of Kitty Boots," in a letter that Potter wrote to her publisher in 1914.  A search through the Victoria & Albert archive eventually uncovered the story as well as a rough sketch of Kitty-in-Boots.

The story remained unfinished when Potter died in 1943, despite intentions from the author to finish it  Other Potter letters in the V&A archive reveal that she struggled to return to Kitty-in-Boots after a series of real-life interruptions such as keeping up with the daily chores of sheep farming.

The Kitty-in-Boots story attracted illustrator Quentin Blake to the project, known in particular for his illustrations of the Roald Dahl books. Blake said "It seemed almost incredible when, early in 2015, I was sent the manuscript of a story by Beatrix Potter; one which had lain unpublished for 100 years and which, with the exception of a single drawing, she had never illustrated."

Image: Beatrix Potter/Frederick Warne & Co. & the V&A Museum.
Peruse the catalogue for this Thursday's Illustration Art auction at Swann Galleries, and you'll see a fine mix of book and magazine illustration art, including a particularly nice selection of New Yorker art and cartoons. For maximum comic effect, however, take note of several caricatures that harmonize with current political events.

Trump 188.jpgLot 188, for example, is a pen-and-ink drawing of Donald Trump by artist David Levine. It was published in the New York Review of Books on May 22, 1988 alongside "Big Shots," a review of Trump: The Art of the Deal. The subject--currently a vociferous candidate for the US presidency--appears to be wearing a suit, a tie, and a diaper. The estimate is $2,000-3,000--quite the bargain should he succeed with his current scheme.   

The following lot is another pen-and-ink depiction of Trump by David Levine, this one showing the real estate mogul shouldering his own lumber. It ran in the New York Review of Books on December 21, 2000, alongside "Golden Boy," a review of The Trumps: Three Generations That Built an Empire. (The review, by the by, eerily warns: "He's not going to go away. We might as well accept the fact that Donald Trump is the price you pay for living in a marketplace culture.") Again, the estimate is $2,000-3,000.

Sanders copy.jpgAnd lest they snub the other side of the aisle, Swann Galleries will also offer Edward Sorel's illustration of a whip-wielding, fist-pounding Bernie Sanders, published in the New Yorker on October 15, 2015, to illustrate an article titled "Bernie Sanders; The Populist Prophet." The pen and ink wash on paper is mounted on card. Its estimate is $1,000-1,500.

Images via Swann Galleries.
Marking 400 years since the Bard's death, the Folger Shakespeare Library is pulling out all the stops in 2016: Readers of the most recent issue of Fine Books & Collections Magazine may recall the Folger just launched a 52-city tour of a selection of its First Folios. Now, those wishing to learn more about the life and times of the "Swan of Avon" need look no further than their computer screens. The Folger's latest endeavor is an online exhibition called "Shakespeare Documented," in partnership from the Bodleian Libraries, the British Library, the National Archives and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. The site bills itself as "the largest and most authoritative resource for learning about primary sources that document the life and career of William Shakespeare."

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Shakespeare Documented is a new online resource sharing the manuscripts and printed books that document the life and career of William Shakespeare. (PRNewsFoto/Folger Shakespeare Library)

Free and accessible as of January 20, "Shakespeare Documented"  provides a comprehensive portrait of the playwright, offering hundreds of print and manuscript documents for in-depth examination, including contemporary accounts (and gossip), anthologies, literary criticism and diary entries--all providing testimony to how Shakespeare became a household name.  Highlights include Shakespeare's signed last will and testament, wherein he bequeaths property to his daughters and his "second best bed" to his wife, Anne Hathaway. (Apparently this was not considered a slight, but a way to ensure Anne received the correct property. However, this is the only mention of her in the will.) A November 1596 petition against the construction of playhouse in Blackfriars argues that such a structure in the neighborhood would attract vagrants and "greatly disturbe and hinder both the Ministers and the Parishioners in tyme of devine service and Sermones." (Despite the resistance, Shakespeare eventually moved his company to Blackfriars in 1609, and in 1613 purchased the property. The mortgage documents are also available for closer review.)

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"Shakespeare" by It may be by a painter called John Taylor who was an important member of the Painter-Stainers' Company.[1] - Official gallery link. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shakespeare.jpg#/media/File:Shakespeare.jpg

Though already exhaustive in its offerings, the site continues to be updated with textual descriptions and will no doubt become an invaluable cache of material for scholars and educators. "Shakespeare Documented" joins the Folger's other digital resources, Folger Digital Texts and Early Modern Manuscripts Online. Discover for yourself at ShakespeareDocumented.org




Our Bright Young Librarians series continues today with Sarah Horowitz, Head of Quaker & Special Collections and Curator of Rare Books & Manuscripts at Haverford College in Pennsylvania.

 

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How did you get started in rare books?


When I was an undergraduate, I had a summer job at a local university library where I pasted labels on the spines of books and did inventory. That summer, the library acquired the collection of a nearby seminary which had closed its doors, and the director asked me to look through the books, determine whether the library already owned the titles, and find records in WorldCat or the National Union Catalog for the new materials. The books were mostly from the sixteenth through eighteenth century, and they were like no books I had ever seen before: the paper was thicker, the bindings were plain at first glance but showed signs of both wear and tooling, and the text was a fascinating mix of fonts, languages, and strange spacing. I was unable to read most of the books, and I was not particularly interested in the subject matter, the majority of which was church history and biblical commentaries, but the objects themselves were fascinating to me.

 

Then, my senior year in college, I took a class on the history of the book, which included a lab component. Two days a week we discussed readings and looked at materials from special collections, but on Fridays we went to the print studio and learned to make paper, set type, and create different types of prints. Our final project was to print and bind a book, which was added to the library's collection.

 

Both these experiences, where I got to think about books as objects and not just texts, led me to decide to apply to library school so that I could work in rare books and special collections.

 

Where did you earn your advanced degrees?


I earned my MLS, with a specialization in rare books librarianship, from Indiana University, where I was privileged to work at the Lilly Library and spend time with their amazing collections. I also have a master's degree in English from Western Illinois University.

 

What is your role at your institution?


I am the head of Quaker & Special Collections and Curator of Rare Books & Manuscripts. Haverford has a small special collections department, so I do a little bit of everything: teaching, collection development, working with researchers in the reading room, overseeing student workers/interns and their projects, working with donors, planning exhibits, and administrative work. One of the things I love about working at a liberal arts college is the ability to be involved in so many different things.

 

Favorite rare book / ephemera that you've handled?


There are so many! I love the Microcosm of London, an 1808-1810 Ackermann publication that documents low and high life in London through text and aquatints. It is fascinating how, in such an expensive publication, time is taken to document asylums and prisons and other places that seem like odd choices for a plate book. Haverford is the home of one of the few extant copies of William Penn's Excellent Priviledge (1687), which includes the first printing of the Magna Carta in what is now the United States; our copy has great Quaker provenance, as well, having been owned by several generations of the Pemberton family. A bibliography describes it as "the worst specimen of Bradford's [the printer's] work I have ever seen," which is an interesting opening for conversations with students about how something can be important and interesting as an object without being beautiful. I am also very excited about a rare Zapotec catechism, published in Mexico in 1766, that we have recently acquired, around which one of our linguistics professors plans to design a class.   


What do you personally collect?


I collect books illustrated by artists from the Whig and Powder school. These are mostly 1890s publications by illustrators such as Hugh Thompson and Charles and Henry Brock. This started as a working collection, because I was writing on how these illustrators changed the meaning of the novels they were working with through their illustrations, but I now enjoy expanding my collection. I also have a small collection of Roycroft Press books; I grew up not far from East Aurora, NY, where Roycroft was based, and in years past it was quite easy to find them in antique and thrift shops.

 

What do you like to do outside of work?


I love dance and theater, so I try to attend a variety of performances throughout the year; I also take a regular ballet class. I am an avid baker, as my co-workers can attest, so I spend time creating recipes and reading cookbooks and blogs. I can also frequently be found walking or hiking, cooking or dining out with friends, knitting, or playing trivia. As a relatively recent Philadelphia transplant, I have also been exploring the city's historical sites, libraries, and neighborhoods.

 

What excites you about rare book librarianship?


I enjoy connecting researchers, especially undergraduate students, with rare materials, ones that change their perspective or lead them in new directions. This was something I learned early in library school: that while I love rare books, what I enjoy most about working with them is connecting people to them, and seeing how researchers use our materials in ways I might never dream.

 

One of my favorite things about my job at Haverford is that we have a number of faculty who integrate special collections materials into their classes throughout the semester, so I get to work with students over the course of their research projects and see how they grow as interpreters and readers of the materials, as well as how they put these materials in conversation with their classmates' projects and the themes of the course.

 

Thoughts on the future of special collections / rare book librarianship?


Special Collections is a locus for many current trends in higher education, including an increased interest in material culture, an emphasis on visuality and visual studies, and a focus on locality and local resources. Simultaneously, we as a profession have become more open, expanding our collecting areas, especially in ephemera and popular culture; creating digital projects and repositories that allow users to remix and manipulate our materials; and focusing on outreach to new communities, while also deconstructing and rethinking what it means to collect and preserve materials. I think one of the keys for special collections librarianship moving forward is to evaluate how these changes have affected not just what we do day-to-day but also our missions and staffing, and how we can make sure these exciting new opportunities are sustainable. It's an exciting time to be working in special collections.

 

Any unusual or interesting collection at your library you'd like to draw our attention to?


Haverford is best known for its Quaker collections, which are world-renowned and amazing; I continually feel privileged to work with them.  However, I wish people were more aware of some of our holdings beyond Quakerism, which are wide-ranging and eclectic. We have strong holdings in the anti-slavery movement in the U.S. We have a small but exciting collection of Shakespearean literature; collected by an alumnus who was inspired by his English professor, it includes both works of Shakespeare and his contemporaries as well as pieces that Shakespeare may have read. We also have the papers of Murray Freeman, a computer scientist who helped to develop standards for the internet as well as an excellent fine art photography collection, with particular strength in photos of and by African-Americans.

 

Any upcoming exhibitions at your library?


We just took down one of my favorite exhibits that I've ever worked on, about Modernism, pacifism, and the Spanish Civil War. Fortunately, its digital component of student-created material lives on. Our spring exhibit is "Carl Van Vechten: O, Write My Name - Portraits of the Harlem Renaissance and Beyond," which features materials from our photography and rare books collections, and I'm very much looking forward to a student-curated exhibit next academic year on the history of astronomy and the telescope.

 

Bonhams-Darwin copy.jpgBibliophiles will flock to sunny Southern California next month for an event we like to call Rare Book Week West, anchored by one of the three major US antiquarian book fairs (the others being in New York in April and Boston in November). To facilitate and encourage participation during these exciting book fair weeks, Fine Books pulls together information about what else is going on simultaneously--shadow fairs, book and manuscript auctions, library and museum exhibits, and bookish events to attend or places to visit while you're there. Today we're launching the 2016 edition of Rare Book Week West, featuring the Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America-sponsored book fair in Pasadena and Printed Matter's LA Art Book Fair, as well as local auctions held by PBA Galleries and Bonhams (where you can bid on the first edition of Darwin's On the Origin of Species seen here), and more.

If you're headed to CA from February 11-14, let our guide help you plan your trip. 

Image: Courtesy of Bonhams.
Young women in 17th century Europe were not exactly overwhelmed by the number of creative outlets open to them.  Needlework became, for these women, a rare opportunity to explore their imaginative capabilities.  A unique collection of 17th century needlework, offered this week at auction by Sotheby's, provides a fascinating glimpse into the creative forces at work behind a seemingly mundane activity. Some highlights below:

A 17th century needlework book cover with detailed nature scenes (Est. $4,000 - $6,000):

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A colorful depiction of the marriage of James II and Queen Mary of Modena, complete with a variety of royal symbols: (Est. $3,000 - $5,000)

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A beautiful and highly imaginative example of 17th century stumpwork (where the embroidery rises up off the linen).  Look for the caterpillar with the human face two hundred years before "Alice in Wonderland." (Est. $8,000-$12,000)

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A James I needlework casket almost entirely completed with a (very) expensive silver thread.  The scenes around the casket are an allegory for the five senses. (Est. $25,000 - $35,000)

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boh-102---f30v-31_l.jpgOpening this coming weekend is New York's famous Winter Antiques Show, held at the Park Avenue Armory from the 22nd-31st. A collector recently told me that she purchased the very first book in her collection after a visit to this show, about fifteen years ago. So what does it have to offer for collectors of rare books, manuscripts, and maps this year? For starters, Les Enluminures will be there, with an offering of medieval manuscripts, such as the Book of Hours, c. 1490, pictured here. Daniel Crouch Rare Books will also be exhibiting, as will Thomas Heneage Art Books, Arader Galleries, and The Old Print Shop. If you are in town, it's definitely worth checking out! 

Image via Les Enluminures.