An Almanac of One's Own

Sometimes, when we are in search of inspiration for a blog post, we go wandering through the shelves in search of hidden gems and intriguing volumes that reside amidst our printed collections. A favorite place to browse, for this librarian at least, is the 1926 collection. The Class of 1926 Memorial Collection (its formal title) was established in 1960 by the Dartmouth Class of '26 to honor its deceased members; it consists of examples of illustrated books published throughout the New England states during Dartmouth's first century from the year of Dartmouth's chartering through to its centennial date, 1769-1869. As you may have guessed, a high percentage of these books are meant for moral guidance or the instruction of children. There are also a number of texts devoted to educating the reader about world events and places, and there are a goodly number of almanacs scattered about for good measure.

Today's find is a little book titled The Lady's Almanac for 1856. There are numerous other small volumes next to it on the shelf, each with the same publisher's binding and of
the same diminutive stature. Within the blue covers, each month has its own chart for sunrises and sunsets, moonrises, moon phases, and a place where a lady may jot down important "memoranda" for each day of the month (although the space afforded seems hardly sufficient to record a single thought). A simple poem and full-page engraving begin each monthly entry, and each poem inevitably addresses one of the recurring themes of childhood, nature, or religious duty.

What really catches the eye, at least of a modern-day observer, is the number of advertisements in the front and back of the book that are clearly meant for a lady; or, at least, provide insight as to what merchants at the time thought that a lady should like. Advertisements for home furnishings, skin cream, children's clothing, piano fortes, and sewing machines all jostle for attention within the almanac. Interestingly enough, an ad for a commercial college shows a man and a woman both sitting opposite each other at scribe's desks, suggesting that some measure of educational equality might be within reach for women at the time, if only at a clerical level. This brief hint of parity is overpowered, however, by the text in the latter half of the almanac, which conforms to stereotypes of the time about a woman's place in society. "The longer I live, the less grows my sympathy with women who are always wishing themselves men," begins one short essay titled, "Woman's Mission", while another is titled "The Fine Art of Patching."

In many ways, this vision of society seems very antiquated; in others, it is still uncomfortably too familiar. To explore this window into the 1850s for yourself, come to Special Collections and ask to see 1926 Collection L33.