T.M. Berry Project: Mod In The Mountains

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By Laura Laugle

Much of my time lately has been spent buried deep in the remnants of the everyday business of the Office of Economic Opportunity, where official government policies and memoranda abound. Though all of it is informative, to say that I find every item I come across riveting would be untrue. Luckily, a few striking photographs caught my attention and cried out for a closer look.

A young family pictured in their new home in Berea, KY. I’m especially fond of the kitchen. Those robin’s egg blue appliances would probably sell for thousands in an upscale vintage shop. Très mod-chic!

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T.M. Berry Project: HMM. . .

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Unidentified Object from Berry CollectionBy Laura Laugle

My work on the Berry Project for much of this week can be best summed up by one word: “wonder.” Many factors have contributed to this conclusion. Unfortunately one of them is “I wonder what on Earth that is!” (Please feel free to tell me if you have any idea what the metal object pictured could be, because I haven’t the foggiest.) For the most part though, I’m referring to the almost constant sense that I’m reading a great epic novel, except that its chapters are all out of order. For instance, I’ve come across items linking Theodore Berry with arguably three of the most influential public figures of the 1960s: John F. Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Henry Kissinger. Continue reading →

New German-Americana at ARB: The Robert E. Cazden Collection

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Der Weg zum Glueck Roman aus dem Leben - pamphlet coverCurrently in process at the Archives and Rare Books Library are the papers of Robert E. Cazden, Professor Emeritus of the School of Library and Information Science at the University of Kentucky.  Cazden was a scholar of printing, publishing, and the German-American book trade, and his papers focus largely on the research he conducted for his books including  German Exile Literature in America 1933-1950: A History of the Free German Press and Book Trade (1970) and Social History of the German Book Trade in America to the Civil War (1984). Continue reading →

An Update on the Theodore M. Berry Collection

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Woodward High School "W"

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After just over a month working with the Theodore M. Berry collection, I’m really beginning to feel that I have a strong grasp on who he was as a person, a politician and a civil rights activist and what he meant to the city of Cincinnati and to the United States. During my initial exploration of the collection, I was lucky enough to discover things in a fairly logical, chronological order; finding a large felt “W” from Berry’s stint on the football team at Woodward High School, a membership card for the University of Cincinnati chapter of AΦA , his 1931 class picture from the College of Law, a letter of acceptance from the Ohio Bar Association, literature from his Cincinnati City Council campaigns, over 100 letters of congratulations after his presidential appointment to the Office of Economic Opportunity, newspaper clippings from his 1972 Mayor Inauguration and a 1945 Valentine from Ted to his wife, Johnnie Mae. These things, which on their own would seem too little to be of much significance, are together telling me a story of a man whose impact on Cincinnati and on the United States as a nation seems immeasurable. Continue reading →

Rare Editions of Mark Twain's Works in ARB

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Volume one of Mark Twain’s authorized and uncensored autobiography is now widely available.  For those interested in this literary great, the Archives and Rare Books Library holds some rare volumes of Twain’s work including a first edition of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  Learn more about the Archives and Rare Books Library holdings and Twain’s autobiography in this article by Dawn Fuller:  http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.aspx?id=12564