New Beginnings

Well ladies and gentlemen, it’s that time of year again to whip out your tissues and get ready to send our lovely seniors into the real world to make us all very proud. As they walk the Laurie Auditorium stage on May 18, 2013, they will be ending one adventure and starting a new one (cheesy...I know). One of our very own down here in Special Collections, Faith Bradham, will be starting her new life in August at Indiana University, attending graduate school to become a librarian and spreading her love of books to everyone she can. Your Special Collections family is very proud of you, Faith-- now go do awesome things and never forget that we’ve always got your back!

Trinity University diploma from the Waxahachie campus

Although the beginning and ending ceremonies are held in Laurie Auditorium both freshmen and senior year, it was not always this way. Previous ceremonies on the Skyline campus were held in the Sunken Gardens, located directly across the 281 highway and walking distance from campus.

Trinity University Spring Commencement at the Sunken Gardens

Due to lack of space (and probably the unbearable Texas heat), the ceremonies were eventually moved inside. Because, lets be honest, who wants to sweat up a storm under one of those polyester graduation gowns in the 100 degree temps? Not me. However, that has never stopped friends and families from enjoying the outdoors as they take photographs outside by the Miller Fountain and the Trinity Tower to commemorate this important day.

Trinity students have been known to add a personal touch
their graduation day attire

In addition to walking the stage on graduation day, graduating seniors also have the opportunity to leave their mark on Trinity, specifically on the iconic Trinity Tower. As wide-eyed first years, students climb the Trinity tower, taking photographs at the top with the University’s president. When graduating, students climb the tower once more, this time signing a brick at the top (which will cost $20.13 this year--see what they did there?). Therefore, while graduating, seniors participate in similar ceremonies as they did four years ago, this time transitioning out of college life and into a new phase in their lives.

As we creep closer and closer to graduation, seniors are getting closer to holding that much deserved diploma. Just as those who walked across the stage at the Sunken Gardens in the 1950s before their friends and family, 2013 seniors will walk (or stumble) across the Laurie Auditorium stage with the support of all their friends and family. The seniors of 2013 will be dearly missed next year, and campus will definitely not be the same without them. Congratulations friends, and never forget that your Triniland family is here cheering you on!

Oh, and try not to trip...

--Angeline Bottera '15

Student Days -- Reverend Black at Andover Newton Theological School, 1940s

Here at Trinity University, all anticipate the end of the semester, and student and faculty life is abuzz as projects and papers are due, and seniors wrap up their undergraduate life.  The digital collections contain two sets of photographs that represent Reverend Black's own time as a student at Andover Newton Theological Seminary (as it was called in those days) in Newton, Massachusetts, which he attended from 1940 to 1943.  The photographs are candid snapshots, primarily of Reverend Black and his fellow students studying, or enjoying leisure time and each others company in their residential dormitory.
Over the years of his life, Reverend Black often remarked that his time at the school was the first time he had ever lived in a non-segregated society. The experience was no doubt similar for other African Americans from the South attending Andover Newton Theological Seminary in the years before desegregation of the South. As is seen in the second photo, Samuel H. James, Jr. was also at the school at the time. He became Reverend S.H. James of the Second Baptist Church in San Antonio, was the first African American elected as councilman to the San Antonio city council, and was a founding civil rights leader in San Antonio in his own right.
Others who went on to become influential ministers also appear in some of the photographs, such as Alfonso Leon Lowry and Edward McCreary. The Trinity Digital Collections provides access to the thesis Reverend Black wrote to gain his degree, Communism as a Religion, made available by kind permission of the Franklin Trask Library at Andover Newton Theological School.

Claude W. Black, Jr. at study
Andover photos, part one 

Samuel H. James, Jr.

Andover photos, part one

Group photo
Andover photos, part one 

Student reflections Andover photos, part one

Playing chess

Andover photos, part two

Fiesta at Trinity!

Spring is in full swing in San Antonio, and we all know what that means--it's Fiesta time! This beloved festival takes place over a 10 day period each spring in San Antonio, featuring events such as Night in Old San Antonio, the River Parade, Oysterbake, and, the oldest and perhaps the most cherished event, the Battle of Flowers. 

The largest parade of Fiesta, the Battle of Flowers meanders over two and a half miles of downtown San Antonio and is made up of uniformed bands, color guards, and many, many gorgeously decorated floats. Here in Special Collections, we decided to look into the history of Fiesta and Trinity's involvement with it, particularly as regards the Battle of Flowers, and create an exhibit with our findings.

So, I delved into the archives and discovered that Trinity has a thirty year history of submitting floats to the Battle of Flowers--I found several fun photos of floats we constructed, and I also found some interesting tidbits of information about Trinity student's interest in and love of Fiesta. Last but not least, I made sure to display Trinity's collection of Fiesta medals, since they perfectly represent Trinity's great way of getting into the Fiesta spirit!

Make sure to stop by Special Collections this month and check out our Fiesta exhibit! 

--Faith Bradham, '13

Love is in the Air... of the Archives!

 

In the spirit of Valentine's Day, Special Collections & Archives has created a new exhibit entitled "Love in the Archives"--a tripartite collection of romantic materials culled from the collection by Angel, Kate, and me (with Amy's guidance, of course!).

I quickly claimed any love letters we might have, since I find the correspondence between lovers fascinating. Love letters offer a unique glimpse into a person's character and into their inner emotions, thus showing a different side of a person than the public may normally see. I composed a display called "Enveloping Desire" that contains materials ranging from war letters written to sweethearts to poetry written to historical women. Unfortunately, the letters in our collection seem to have a depressing theme of unrequited love: from Sam Houston's letters to a young lady who rejected him for one of his best friends to the poetic passion of a 12th century nun for the general that left her alone for the rest of her life, hardly any of Special Collections' romance seems to end happily.





Thankfully, Kate chose a happier topic, concentrating on the various romantic productions that Trinity's Theatre department has staged throughout the years. Kate was inspired to create her display by the fact that these plays, whether modern or Shakespearean, proclaim the same transcendent power of love; a topic both contemporary and ancient audiences can agree on. She focused on Trinity's production of Romeo and Juliet in 1978, Candida in 1989, The Importance of Being Earnest in 1977, and A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1978.

Finally, Angel combed through the Dicke Smith collection for her display, "Mastering the Art of Love," which exhibits romantic instances of visual art found in the collection. Each of the books that Angel used in this display showcase a different type and era of artistic expression. Examples range from a collection of glamour shots of Hollywood stars to the Postsecret book (which is made up of selections from the Postsecret blog of anonymous postcard confessions) to selections from Renoir's achingly beautiful portraiture.








Make sure to stop by while the exhibit is up and enjoy these choice specimens from Special Collections & Archives! As always, questions and comments are appreciated.

--Faith Bradham, '13 

The "Lunch Bunch"

Thanks to Jeremy Donald, our Faculty Technology Liaison Librarian, a "blog/share" button has been added to the all of the images in the Trinity Digital Collections to allow embedded sharing of images in blogs or websites. Below I have shared a photo from the Claude and ZerNona Black Papers, using the button:

Reverend Claude W. Black and the Lunch Bunch group, 2001

Link

A post on the blog of Elias Tzoc, a Digital Initiatives Librarian at Miami University, talks about the PHP and Java code he put together for this function, and I thought it would great to see if it would work with our collections. Happily, it does. If you use CONTENTdm and are interested in using this feature, Elias provides instructions for creating the "share-it" button.
The button provides greater potential for student and researcher access, as by clicking on the word "Link" below the image, it links back to the image in the Digital Collections, providing the information necessary to understand and properly credit the source.
The image seen here portrays a meeting of the "Lunch Bunch" (a monthly gathering of a variety of friends interested in local activism and social justice, and that Reverend Black met with from the 1960s at least until 2006). This particular 2001 meeting photo includes (from left to right) Arnold Flores, Herschel "Herky" Bernard, Reverend Black, Albert A. Peña, and Charles [surname undetermined].

Glad Tidings 2012 -- Updates and Themes

Glad tidings for researchers! Our web presence is growing, with the online appearance of the Claude and ZerNona Black Papers finding aid, as well as with initial digital content in the CONTENTdm Digital Collections.  Over time, most of the digitized items will be linked from the finding aid to the digital collections website. Wherever a green arrow is seen in the finding aid (like the one highlighted in the following image), clicking through will arrive at material in the digital collections. Green arrows that indicate the presence of digital content are also found within the body of the finding aid, but the initial arrow at the top allows the researcher to view all the linked digital content from the top of the finding aid without having to scroll through and find it.

 

Clicking through from the green arrow at the top of the finding aid to the item “The Christmas Message” will take the researcher to an editorial by Reverend Black, in which he expresses his thoughts on the spirit of Christmas, and how it is usually not found in commercial greeting cards. Here is the direct link to that editorial:
The Christmas Message, by Reverend Black, 1963

Regarding the spirit of Christmas, commercialism, and greeting cards, the collection also includes some ephemera directly related to this topic – African American Christmas cards, specifically, “The Christmas Soul” assortment, “18 Golden Trimmed Christmas Cards With Soul Sentiments.”

The cards were manufactured by a company called Merchant Prince, started by Berkeley G. Burrell, a businessman and advocate for minority enterprises, who was active in private and government-appointed positions.

In an article in Jet Magazine entitled "Greeting Card Firm to Pass $1 Million in Sales" (December 3, 1970, p.24), Mr. Burrell states that he started his business because the greeting card industry “has neglected the Black market and today’s strongly emerging attitude of self-pride and self-identification among Blacks.”  The cards in this set contain images such as a Black Mary and infant Jesus; Black three kings looking toward the star of the East; and, a Black drummer boy, among other depictions. The interior sentiments are predominantly religious, with wishes for peace. love and brotherhood.

Here's to many wishes for a happy holiday season, and for a productive new year, filled with digital content from the Claude and ZerNona Black Papers! 

-- Donna Morales Guerra, Project Archivist

Theatre

It’s no secret that I’m an enthusiastic thespian. I talk (read: complain) about rehearsal far more than I talk about anything else, and I complain (read: brag) about all the hours that I spend in the theatre building to most everyone. So it should come as a surprise to no one that when I’m at work in Archives, and I have completed all of my tasks, I flip through the card catalog, searching under all possible terms for information about the theatre department. Most recently I came across some very exciting photos of our building right after its construction in 1966. I marveled at how much the same certain things looked but even more at how different others looked. Most astonishing were the pictures of rooms and places that I could not identify, like a huge and mysterious tech booth, the location of which I could not fathom:

If actors were actually astronauts...

The theatre was remodeled in 2000, so the Stieren house and stage look strikingly different.

The space that we misleadingly refer to as “The Café Theatre” was clearly an actual café at one time:

We're all pretty upset we lost this classiness.

One change that has been enormously positive has been in how we use our lobby. I think any Trinity student knows that when you want to find a theatre student, the first place to look is in the lobby of the Ruth Taylor building, but this wasn’t always the case. Our lobby used to look like this:

Foyer 1966

Apparently, the department was very strictly against students lollygagging about in “The Foyer,” and instead students could use a green room off the Stieren (that no longer exists). Personally I could not imagine our building without at least three or four students diligently doing homework (read: gossiping unashamedly) in our space. Still, though almost fifty years have passed since these pictures were taken, I don’t feel so distant from them. It’s the faces that all seem the same. The spirit hasn’t changed at all.

TUPS Meeting

--Kate Cuellar '15, Special Collections and Archives Student Assitant