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Plant Your Victory Gardens!
As spring arrives, many of us begin to plant our vegetable gardens. Our cold weather crops–peas, spinach, and carrots–are already in the ground and we’re dreaming of ripe tomatoes. During World War I,...
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From Brown and Back Again
On June 1, 2013, Brown’s John Hay Library — built in 1910 and now home to the Library’s special collections — will close its doors for a major renovation of the first floor. (Updates on the project can...
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Photographing Clara
As a followup to last week’s post about John Hay, I thought it would be a good time to discuss photographing the portrait of Clara Stone Hay. The wife of Brown alumnus John Hay, Clara Stone Hay’s...
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Dorm Life
North Slater Hall, North West corner, room 20. February 1910 A quiet lull has settled upon campus following the Magnolia bloom, end of semester, and graduation. The dormitories are empty after a mad...
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The World-Wide Telegraph
Digital Production Services routinely photographs rare or oversize items requested by researchers for use in publications. In the event that these materials are out of copyright, many of these requests...
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Studio on the go
The library Annex: known for housing a vast collection of books not stored in our on-campus libraries, it’s also home to an art vault for Brown’s portrait collection. During the slower summer months,...
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Total Eclipse of the Sun
The solar eclipse expedition team readies equipment on the steps of the Ladd Observatory before departing to Sweden Charles H. Smiley was a professor of Astronomy and director of Ladd Observatory at...
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P. as in Paul?
While a great deal of the photography that I do here at Brown involves planned projects (often from our Signature Collections), we also get requests from patrons and scholars from around the world, as...
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How Students Enhance Our World
One of the most rewarding aspects of working at an academic library is having the opportunity to work with students, opening their eyes to what happens behind the scenes. Brown University student...
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The Martial Macaroni: Pray Sirs, Do You Laugh at Me?
This macaroni from Woolwich, has topped of his look with a feather in his cap. This summer in Providence, there has been much to-do about the dandy, thanks to the well-received Artist/Rebel/Dandy: Men...
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Civil War General Hawkins’ sword to return to Annmary Brown Memorial
As announced earlier this summer in a Brown University press release and on the Library News blog, a silver Tiffany presentation sword once owned by General Rush Hawkins (Annmary Brown Memorial...
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No tannins at all, and very little fruit (part I)
Perelman Papers, Box 11 Such was the assessment of a leaking bottle of wine from the manuscripts collection (by a library staff member who dared to take a sip). There’s more to this story, and I was...
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No tannins at all, and very little fruit (part II)
This post is part two of the “No tannins at all, and very little fruit” post from Sept. 6, 2013. The first post outlines how I approached photographing the bottle of wine from the Archives; this post...
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College Hill: What Was There
Brown University Library Digital Collections are a rich resource for historical photographs. The collection Images of Brown contains over 4,000 digital objects alone, with more being added all the...
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Interpreting Flatland
“Instructions” for reading the 1980 Arion Press edition of Flatland, atop aluminum covers and frame. This semester the Library will commemorate the mathematical-philosophical novel Flatland: A Romance...
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Mr. Owl and Mrs. Pussycat: a tale of Halloween–or is it?
This little tale, part of our Alcohol, Temperance & Prohibition Collection, is not the same owl and pussycat story I remember from my childhood. Published in the time of prohibition by the...
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The Art School Down the Hill
Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design are within steps of each other, so it’s no surprise that the two have a great deal of overlap in the community. While my full time work is as a...
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Thomas Alexander Tefft: Architect Extraordinaire
I wear a couple of hats here at Brown University, one as staff member of Digital Production Services, aiding in the production of digitized resources for library collections and faculty projects, and...
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How do you solve a problem like a foldout?
When assessing how to photograph a book, we must first make several determinations. The key to photographing books well – by which I mean providing well-lit images, in good focus, without damaging the...
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“And a glad New Year”
Ringing in the New Year with this charming carrier’s message from 1893! This is from the John Hay Library collection of Carriers’ Addresses. These addresses were published in the United States by...
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