Author Archives: Suzanne Reller

Stealing St. Patrick: Another Moment in Archives Month and the Cincinnati Irish

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 By Kevin Grace

St. Patrick's Day ParadeIt has its roots in the fact that, historically, German and Irish Catholic congregants were often at odds in Cincinnati.  On Mt. Adams, where both Irish and German working-class families lived, there were two Catholic churches, Church of the Holy Cross for the Irish, Immaculata Church for the Germans.  Holy Cross parish was established in 1873 to serve the Irish immigrants on the hill and Immaculata was dedicated in 1860, fulfilling a promise made to God by a fearful and distraught Archbishop John Baptist Purcell when he crossed the Atlantic on stormy, tossing seas.  With a German congregation, Immaculata was part of Purcell’s adroit handling of the ethnic differences in the 19th century  Cincinnati archdiocese. Continue reading →

Welcome to the ARB Intern for 2012-2013

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By Kevin Grace

Molly Gullett is a fourth year History major at the University of Cincinnati and is the Archives & Rare Books Library intern for the 2012-2013 academic year.   Each year, ARB selects an intern to work on one specific project from its collections.  The intern must be an undergraduate of junior or senior standing or a graduate student, and must have taken courses relevant to the project.  Other qualifications include the earning of academic credit within the intern’s major field of study.  The project includes complete processing of a collection, the preparing of an Encoded Archival Description finding aid, and the design and preparation of a web exhibit that highlights the collection.  The project will be completed by the end of spring semester of 2013.

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Subway Project: When Good Negatives Go Bad

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By Angela Vanderbilt

The project is off to a great start after the first week, with progress made on identifying the percentage of nitrate negatives in the collection, meeting with Robin Imaging Services – the contracted vendor that will be digitizing the negatives and prints – and deciding on what metadata will be captured during scanning to build the online collections.

With help from Lauren Fink, ARB’s student worker, I gathered from archival storage the 32 boxes containing the City Engineer’s negatives and prints and began surveying the collection to determine the percentage of cellulose nitrate vs. cellulose acetate negatives present. Continue reading →

Archives Month in Ohio and the Cincinnati Irish

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By Kevin Grace

Mollie GilmartinThis week’s posting to acknowledge the “Peoples of Ohio” theme of Archives Month, and the Irish in southwest Ohio is the tragic tale of young Mollie Gilmartin.  Born in County Sligo, Mary “Mollie” Gilmartin was the object of affection from her family’s parish priest, Dominick O’Grady.  Seeking to end the unwanted attention, her family decided a new life in America would be best for Molllie, so in September 1893, they sent her to Chicago where her brother Michael was a priest. The intent was for Michael to look after her while she built a new life for herself, but O’Grady followed her across the ocean. Continue reading →

Cincinnati Subway and Street Images Digitization Project

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By:  Kevin Grace

Today’s image from the project is certainly an intriguing one: when the Rapid Transit Commission in Cincinnati went ahead with their intent to turn the Miami-Erie Canal route into a subway system, they hired a photographer to document every step of the project.  His images detailing the particular day, time, and street location of the subway construction in the 1920s form the bulk of our digitization endeavor.  He captured extraordinary exterior views of the canal bed being widened and deepened as tunnels were built, showing the streets and buildings along the route that is now Central Parkway in Cincinnati.  However, the construction also led to these buildings being damaged – cracks in ceilings, walls, and foundations in private homes and businesses, for which the owners were submitting claims for repairs and restitution.

Photographer for City Engineer

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Archives Month Celebrates the Peoples of Ohio

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By:  Kevin Grace

Archives Month PosterEvery October, the Society of Ohio Archivists sponsors “Archives Month in Ohio” in order to bring awareness to the rich historical materials contained in the state’s libraries, museums, and historical organizations.  The intent is to make citizens aware of these holdings, and to see further use of them by students, scholars, and teachers.

The theme for Archives Month this year is “Peoples of Ohio,” celebrating the ethnic and racial diversity in the Buckeye State.  In Cincinnati, the focus is on Irish Americans with exhibits and presentations planned that explore the Irish culture both in the Queen City.  Once again, an image from the holdings of the Archives & Rare Books Library has been selected for the statewide poster – a photo of Lance Underwood of the Emerald Society Pipes and Drums Corps, performing at the 2012 St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Cincinnati. Continue reading →

New Department of Psychology Collection at ARB

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By Suzanne Maggard

The Archives and Rare Books Library recently received a new collection from UC’s psychology department containing records from 1967 until 2011.  The collection includes information on faculty and graduate students, annual reports, and accreditation documentation and supplements the very small number of items that the archives already held related to the history of the psychology department.  This new collection is now available for research by faculty, student, staff, and the public.

Wayland R. Benedict

Wayland R. Benedict

The psychology department has a long history at UC.  Wayland Richardson Benedict taught the first psychology courses at UC starting in 1876 as part of the philosophy department.  Courses like Empirical Psychology covering topics in sensation, content, strength and tone of sensation continued to be offered until a separate Department of Experimental Psychology and Pedagogy was created in the Spring of 1901.  The Psychology Department endured quite a bit of instability in its early years and the first three department heads stayed for only a short time. Continue reading →

Cincinnati Subway and Street Project Grant Underway

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By Angela Vanderbilt

Digital Archivist, Cincinnati City Engineer Digitization Project

Angela VanderbiltAs the month of October begins, so too begins a new project for the Archives and Rare Books Library – digitizing and making available on the web the collection of negatives and prints documenting Cincinnati’s early 20th century subway development and street improvement program. New projects often require new hands to help facilitate, and it is my pleasure to join this project as Digital Archivist, marking my own beginning as I strike out on a new project in a new city. Continue reading →