Roman Rooms

George Ticknor 1807 was a professor of languages at both Harvard University and Smith College during the 19th century and amassed a formidable personal library during his many trips to Europe for both study and pleasure. In particular, his collection of Spanish and Portuguese literature was arguably the best of its kind in the United States during his lifetime. Rauner Library was given a significant portion of Ticknor's library by his estate as well as his library furniture, mantlepiece, and sculptures, all of which now reside just off Rauner's reading room in a room named after the family.

In addition to George's library, furniture, and artwork, Rauner also holds his personal papers and those of his wife Anna, which include personal travel diaries written during their travels abroad in the 1830s. The diaries are filled with interesting perspectives on the countries and places that they visit, and comparing the couple's entries on any given day is a fun exercise in seeing how different individual impressions and experiences can be. Anna's diary is written in a beautiful cursive hand and begins in May of 1835, when the Ticknors landed in England, and ends in September of 1837 near the Splügen Pass between Switzerland and Italy.

In the winter of 1836, The Ticknors took up residence in Rome on the third floor of a private house overlooking the city. Anna took it upon herself to draft in her diary a floor plan of the rooms, which is quite detailed and provides a fascinating example of the style in which wealthy families of the period were accustomed to traveling. The apartments include "six sleeping rooms, a sitting room and dining room, servants' eating room, kitchen and outer & inner antechambers." For Anna, however, the best quality of the rooms is that they are situated upon the side of one of Rome's many hills and are therefore provided a wonderful and constantly sunny view of the city. She also mentions that everything has been provided for them upon their arrival, and that this comprehensive service is possible because tourists of their stature are so common in Rome.

Anna's diaries can be found in her personal papers, MS-1249, while George's diaries are located in his papers, MS-983. The Ticknor Room at Rauner Library can be viewed any time that the reading room is open.

Sailing to.....

Before Mercator, pilots used charts that showed the location of ports and coastal features and provided directions on how to navigate between these points of reference. Details of the coast were critical as vessels often chose to sail closer to land to mitigate potential open sea and weather hazards. These earlier maps were known as portolan charts - a name derived from the Italian - and are often fantastically detailed and depict the coastlines of the major land masses with stunning accuracy.

Our portolan chart was made by Nicolas Comberford around 1657 in Redcliffe, England and depicts the Mediterranean and Black Sea. True to the style, numerous coastal towns and cities are pinpointed and the small islands of the area are numbered and listed in tables in the interior spaces of the adjoining countries. As with most portolan charts, the interior land masses are left largely blank since the focus of the chart was navigation on the water. Unlike most portolans, Comberford has not included the standard compass lines connecting major destinations, opting instead for a more open grid to demonstrate direction and relative distance.

The chart is constructed of vellum attached to hinged and folded oak boards. Despite its use on ship, the map shows very little water staining and is brilliantly colored with gold leaf accents. Though the map apparently belonged to a Captain John Smyth, this is, alas, not the Captain Smith of Virginia fame. That Captain Smith died before the creation of this chart.

Ask for Codex 657940 to see the chart.

One Lick Less

We have nine sheets of the corrected galley proofs from William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying along with a letter from Edith Greenburg of Cape and Smith. The publishers were in a rush to get the book out, and Faulkner was tardy on getting his proofs back to them. So, they sent him a handful of questions about specific concerns they had and asked for an immediate reply via air mail.

They were understandably perplexed by a large gap left on page 164 in the sentence, "The shape of my body where I used to be a virgin is a        and I couldn't think..." Was it on purpose? The first edition, also in our collection, reveals that it was indeed intended.

But what caught our eye was a suggested rewrite of a sentence to shorten a page and, thus, keep a single line from appearing on the next page to end the chapter.  What was "Pa breathes quietly, with a faint, rasping sound, his jaw working the snuff slowly against his gums," became "Pa breathes with a quiet, rasping sound, mouthing the snuff against his gums." Same meaning, but a different rhythm and a different visceral sense.  One line less, one line less...

To see the proofs ask for MS 930469; for the first edition, Rare PZ3.F272 As.

They Played Here?!

In May 1964, the Ronettes came to Dartmouth on a package tour with Soul Sister, Carl Holmes, and King Curtis to play Green Key weekend. It was a particularly good couple of years for popular music on campus. Johnny Cash was here in February 1964 to shoot an episode of Hootenanny, and Peter, Paul and Mary played Dartmouth's Leverone Field House in 1965.

We just mounted an exhibit in the Baker Library Main Hall that looks back on pop music acts that played Dartmouth when they were in their prime. It features the likes of Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw (with Billie Holiday), Duke Ellington, Pete Seeger, Simon & Garfunkel, Ray Charles, Sly and the Family Stone, Cat Stevens, Bruce Springsteen, the Grateful Dead, Labelle, the Clash, and the Bangles among others.

As we were putting the finishing touches on the exhibit a little miracle occurred.  We leaned that Noel Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul and Mary was going to be on campus to participate in Baccalaureate with his wife Elizabeth. They graciously took some time after the ceremony on Saturday to walk through the exhibit with us. Here is Noel in front of the "folk" case with a poster from the 1965 concert.

The exhibit will run through August 31, 2014--so come in and take a look.

That Sinking Feeling

Two years ago, a writer for Dartbeat, the Dartmouth student newspaper's blog, posted a fascinating entry about the sinking of the Titanic. The author, Kristin Yu, mentioned that two of the passengers on board the ship were related to a member of the class of 1912, Howard "Rainy" Burchard Lines, and were on their way across the Atlantic to attend his graduation. Mary Lines, Rainy's sister, and Elizabeth Lines, his mother, were among the lucky few to survive the horrendous tragedy that became a cultural phenomenon which persists even to this day. A few years later, sadly, Lines himself would die while serving in France as an ambulance driver in World War I.

Recently, while exploring our archives, a visitor to Rauner made a thrilling discovery related to this already gripping tale. Rauner Library holds various WWI materials connected to Howard Burchard Lines, about which we've already blogged. In addition to his papers, we also have Lines' membook, a scrapbook with a personalized cover that was distributed to Dartmouth freshmen upon their arrival on campus from the mid-1800s into the 1930s. As one of our previous blog entries makes clear, membooks were full of empty pages that Dartmouth students would fill with various mementoes from their time at college. By the time a Dartmouth man graduated, he would have accumulated a souvenir compiled of newspaper clippings, dance cards, programs and tickets to cultural events, personal photographs, pressed flowers, and any other little oddities that caught the owner's fancy.

Lines' membook is filled with these typical scraps and bits of his college years. Because of the 100th anniversary of World War I, he was fresh on our minds when a visitor came in and asked to see a sample membook, and so we paged his membook for her. What she found next gave us goosebumps: among the pages of Lines' scrapbook, between dance cards and other superficial vestiges of boyish fun, lie two small but weighty slips of paper. One is a boarding pass of sorts that allowed Mary Lines and one passenger admittance to U.S. Customs from RMS Titanic; the other is a telegram to Howard Lines that tersely states: "Safe on board carpathia. Lines." RMS Carpathia was the ship made famous by rescuing the survivors of the Titanic on that cold night in April, who doubtless all attempted to contact their loved ones immediately from the ship to let them know that they were okay.

Who knows what other fateful documents lie hidden within the pages of these old membooks, awaiting discovery after more than a hundred years? Come in and help us with the hunt by asking to see a random membook, or see the telegram and ticket for yourself by asking for Lines' membook (DC History Membook Lines 1912). Also, for more on Howard "Rainy" Lines 1912, ask to see his Alumni File or any number of items related to his experiences during the war, including MS-452.

Daniel Sargent Curtis

Claude Monet to
Ariana Randolph Wormeley Curtis
December 7, 1908

In August 1869, Daniel Sargent Curtis took a train headed to Needham, Massachusetts. He was joined in the train compartment by Judge Al Churchill who, with a female guest, took a seat nearby. At some point during that journey an altercation ensued connected to an ill-placed carpetbag, a toy wagon, and an empty seat. Words were exchanged, with Churchill commenting that Curtis must not be a gentleman. Feeling insulted, Curtis twisted Churchill's nose and struck him in the eye, breaking his glasses. Curtis was charged with assault and sentenced to two months in jail. According to John Berendt, author of The City of Fallen Angels, more than 300 prominent citizens of Massachusetts petitioned for a pardon for Curtis. However, Curtis refused to sign it. He also refused Churchill's offer to drop the charges for an apology because he felt that his actions on the train had been justified - and so Daniel Curtis went to jail.

Henry James to
Ariana Randolph Wormeley Curtis
May 3, 1897

It is often stated that it was this "unfortunate incident" that prompted the Curtis family to leave America for Venice, Italy. Berendt, however, states that the desire to leave America had been voiced by Curtis many years before this event. Curtis left for Venice in 1881 with his wife, Ariana Randolph Wormeley, and their son Ralf. There they rented and later bought the Palazzo Barbaro. After restoring it to its former glory the Palazzo Barbaro became the center of American life in Venice. The Curtises hosted many writers, artists and other expatriates at their home, including John Singer Sargent (a distant relative), Robert Browning, Edith Wharton, Isabella Stewart Gardner, Claude Monet and Henry James (a close friend of Ariana). James had several prolonged visits with the Curtises between 1887 and 1907, and, when not in Venice, wrote many letters to his "Dear Mrs. Curtis," often with tales about life at home in England or with requests for introductions for his acquaintances.

Henry James to
Ariana Randolph Wormeley Curtis
May 3, 1897

Henry James to
Ariana Randolph Wormeley Curtis
May 3, 1897

The correspondence of Daniel Sargent Curtis and his family is a small but vital collection and includes not only letters from Henry James to Ariana Curtis, but also letters from Henry Adams, Claude Monet, John Singer Sargent, Lady Ritchie and John Addington Symonds.

Ask for MS-194 to read the letters in the collection.

A Day to Remember

On June 6, 1944, Clinton Gardner, Class of 1944, found himself digging a foxhole on Omaha Beach as part of the D-Day invasion of German occupied Europe. The landing area was already strewn with bodies and the Germans were raking the incoming allied forces with artillery and machine gun fire. Gardner, a Lieutenant in the artillery, was not about to move any further inland until the infantry made a hole in the German defenses, and that did not seem to be about to happen.

An incoming round suddenly exploded in front of him. His head snapped back and then a curtain of blood blinded him. In his memoir, D-Day and Beyond, Gardner recounts how he stood up and staggered toward two of his fellow officers wiping blood from his eyes. The two officers stared at him in horror. Then he reached up and felt his helmet. There was a gaping hole, large enough that he could get two hands into it. Gingerly he felt around and found that he could feel a soft, mushy surface that he assumed must be his brain. Sick and disoriented though he was, he managed to get his first aid kit out and pour sulfa powder into the hole and then stuff it full of gauze.

Unable to walk or speak properly, Gardner watched as his unit packed up and began to move inland, following the infantry who had suddenly begun to advance. The other officers told him that they would send medics back for him. He was soon alone on the beach with a handful of wounded and dying soldiers, all of whom would have been killed by German mortar fire had not a group of British troops happened along. The British moved the wounded Americans up the beach to a sheltered area among some rocks.

After 23 hours wounded on the beach, a group of medics finally arrived and moved Gardner and the others to a field hospital in Vierville. There Gardner made the happy discovery that what he had felt through the gash in his helmet was not his brain, but badly lacerated scalp tissue. Though his skull was scarred, it was not broken. Getting the helmet off was another matter: it took three doctors and a fair amount of pulling and twisting as the edges had curled in and were imbedded in his scalp. Eventually Gardner was sent back to England to recover, but that was not the end of the war for him. Later he would find himself being bombed by friendly fire during Battle of the Bulge and still later he would serve as the American Commandant at Buchenwald following its liberation.

Gardner’s helmet remains, to this day, the most damaged helmet whose wearer survived his wounds.

To see Clint Gardner’s helmet or to read his letter home ask for MS-1109. A guide to the collection is available. To read his book, D-Day and Beyond, ask for Alumni G1728.