Map Stories

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words - this is certainly true if that picture is a map. When we think of what purpose maps serve, we often jump immediately to their use as tools for navigation, or finding things. We focus less on the stories a map can tell us. But whether we unfold a tourist's guide to find our way around a new city, or crack open an atlas while curled up in our own home, maps transport us to new, sometimes far off places, and help us navigate unfamiliar territories with confidence and excitement. And the details on a map - where boundaries are drawn and how places are named - speak volumes about the perspective and worldview of the cartographers and intended audience. Some maps make assumptions about landmasses or geographical layouts that are later proved false, but which provide a window into the way the world looked to those who, at the time, viewed the map as authoritative.

For the next several weeks in Rauner, we have an exhibit that explores this hidden potential of maps. Our cases examine maps as telling stories about perspective, speculation, and journeys. Juxtaposing, for example, relief maps of the White Mountains with Christopher Robin's map of the Hundred Acre Woods, Thorin's map from The Hobbit with an English seafaring chart, and Dante's circles of hell with maps of polar expeditions, each case considers one of the three themes across maps in different styles and across time.

All of our maps have exciting, nostalgic, intriguing, and wondrous stories to tell. To come and see some of them, stop by Rauner and head up to the Mezzanine level to find Map Stories: A World on a Page, open through April 13. If you can't make it in person to see the exhibit, you can read more about it online: https://www.dartmouth.edu/~library/rauner/exhibits/map-stories.html.

Serious History

Humor - and especially black humor - often sticks in the imagination in a way that a dry reading of a subject doesn't. The Monarchs of Merry England and More Monarchs of Merry England aren't exactly political cartoons, though the illustrations and text serve much the same purpose. Sometimes the juxtaposition of the comic imagery and the actual sordid details of the event make the reality all the more vividly memorable.

Does the execution of Mary Queen of Scots really seem like something to dance about? But you know it solved a lot of problems for Elizabeth I.

Was William the Conqueror restrained in his dealings with the local populace during his advance into England? Not so much really.

Another interesting thing about these images is the depth of knowledge the author assumes the reader has. Who was Isabella and why was it important that she not have any intended?

For those of you hanging on the edge of your seats.....and after some quick research.... Isabella was the daughter of Charles VI of France. By marrying her, Richard II was attempting to consolidate England's claim to the throne of France. Despite what the imagery suggests, she was seven at the time and Richard died a few years later.

Ask for Illus R59mon and Illus R59mor.

Tiny Treasures

If you've ever seen Rauner's Instagram, you may know that Tuesday is a bit of a special day when we post pictures of our coolest and littlest artifacts. We recently went through our most popular post of 2017 and discovered that our followers are big fans of these #tintytuesday posts, especially those featuring miniature books! And by "miniature," we mean really really tiny. The generally accepted definition of a miniature book is that it measures less than three inches, and many of the ones in the collection are somewhere around the size of a thumbprint. In cases where they fit comfortably in the palm of your hand, or slip into a pocket for easy transport, miniature books have a few claims to utility. Mostly, though, they're just a lot of fun, and often surprisingly elaborate and beautiful. For fingerprint sized books, they definitely rival their larger counterparts in aesthetic design!

In celebration of the completed cataloguing of our Madelyn Hickmott miniatures collection, and as a nod to our many miniature book fans on Instagram, we've put together a case exhibit of some of our favorite miniatures! Come by and check it out in the lobby of Rauner. Less than half of the collection is in the case, so if you're especially curious, come in to the reading room and ask at the front desk to see the others, including Miniatures 25, shown above.

Trout Fishing in America

We just picked up a beautiful copy of a 1960s classic that inspired a generation of hipsters to try to write novels: the first printing of Richard Brautigan's Trout Fishing in America. The cover art declares itself as a hippy bible, though Brautigan was fairly cynical about the younger generation that adored his work.

A blurb on the back cover says it all:

Mr. Brautigan submitted a book to us in 1962 called TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA. I gather from the reports that it was not about trout fishing--The Viking Press.

Needless to say, our first edition is not published by Viking but by the Four Seasons Foundation in San Francisco. To take a look, ask for Rare PR3503.R2736 T767 1967.

To Each his Own

Have you ever wondered whether there was a reason for the arrangement of student desks in school rooms? Well, in 1855, Virgil Woodcock of Swanzey, New Hampshire, did. A carpenter by profession, Woodcock argued that his “Diagonal Arrangement,” which included favoring single desks over double desks, had many benefits. Firstly, it would provide each student with “a separate desk and chair” thereby giving the student “full control of his books and writing.” In addition, he declared that this arrangement “releases every one from any interference with another and gives to all the privilege of inhaling the pure air, without taking it second handed from the one sitting near him.”

From his description it appears that the separation of one student from another was the key thinking behind his idea,

[N]o one scholar can see the face of another without one of the two being at right or left half face. When school is called to procession, all can rise at once and step into files in the aisles without coming in contact with one another.

Trying to sell this new concept to teachers, he pointed out to them that “scholars are more directly in view of the teacher, and can therefore be kept in better order, which greatly diminishes the labor of the teacher.”

Woodcock submitted his arrangement to the US Patent office and on March 6, 1855, was granted a patent “for the term of fourteen years.”

Woodcock’s pamphlet is part of a notebook containing signatures of school commissioners, teachers and other notables approving of the new arrangement, some of whom also provided Woodcock with affidavits to that effect. Both items are part of Codex 003426.

The Ledyardites

Almost a century ago, eight Dartmouth students created a small organization in the hopes of finally taking advantage of their proximity to the Connecticut River. With a $5,000 donation from Reverend John E, Johnson ’66, they built a modest boathouse down by the bridge and bought a few canoes. They chose to name their club after Dartmouth legend, John Ledyard, the famed explorer who, in his first year as a Dartmouth student, decided the academic life wasn’t for him, felled a pine tree, carved out a canoe and set off down the Connecticut towards the sea. During the spring of 1921, a year after they created the club the founders set off in their canoes to retrace the paddle of their namesake.

Today, Ledyard Canoe Club is a thriving campus community, of which I feel extremely lucky to be a member. We have carried on in the tradition of our founders, setting our canoes in the Connecticut each year to paddle to the sea, and we have also expanded on that tradition. Throughout the history of the club, Ledyardites have paddled internationally, in such places as Japan, Korea, and Ecuador, as well as domestically down the Rio Grande, the Mississippi, to Lake Powell and in the Florida Everglades. Ledyardites have competed in World Championships and at the Olympics. To fully detail each exciting trip taken by a Ledyardite would take far more than a single blog post and through the course of my research I am continually awed by the depth of experience this club has had.

More and more, throughout my research I have found myself being drawn into Ledyard’s history and connecting with the club and past Ledyardites in ways I did not expect. While Ledyard has changed, expanded and improved throughout the years, the elements I admire so much in the community it is today--our adventurous spirit, support for one another, and love of the club--I see reflected over and over, reaching straight back to our beginning. Longtime Ledyard advisor and whitewater coach, Jay Evans ’49, understands perfectly, saying in a letter sent 18 years ago, “Ledyard has a sense of place. It is a setting, a land and waterscape, a cast of mind perhaps, a legacy for sure, passed on from one generation to another.”

This spring, we will be celebrating that legacy with the Ledyard Explorer’s Symposium. In April, just a week before our official anniversary, various alums and current students will present on our namesake, the club’s history and the future of the club. My research in Rauner this term is devoted to curating an exhibition which will complement the Symposium and make our history more accessible to the Dartmouth Community. I hope to introduce students to Ledyard’s rich history and lasting spirit of exploration.

I highly doubt that our founders would be surprised by Ledyard’s enduring vibrancy. After all, our first president, Professor Richard Goddard ’20, became the club’s advisor for thirty years and stayed in communication with Ledyard throughout his life, like many Ledyard alums. I expect myself, and many of the current Ledyardites I know, will be carrying on that tradition, just as each year Ledyardites set our canoes in the Connecticut and head on down to the sea.

Posted for Jaime Eeg '18, recipient of a Rauner Student Research Fellowship for the 2018 Winter term. The Rauner Student Research Fellowships provide full funding for a Dartmouth student to conduct research with primary sources during an off-term on a topic of their choosing. For more information, visit the fellowship's website.

Roberts on Twain on Cooper (it's not pretty)

We just received Kenneth Roberts's copy of a book of essays by Mark Twain. We have Kenneth Roberts's library and a collection of his papers, so this is the perfect place for the book. The treat, though, is not the association, but what Roberts did to the book. Apparently he took offense at Mark Twain's essay "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses." It is not clear if Roberts approved of Cooper's style, but it is pretty obvious he had some troubles with Twain's prose. Roberts dissects Twain's essay in a kind of rabid attack on the text with pencil in hand. He offers line edits to nearly every sentence to clean up Twain's style and deletes whole swaths of the essay.

The book came to us through the generosity of Joel Shimberg who bought it back in 1967 and has taken care of it for the past 50 years. We are so happy it has landed here, reunited with Roberts's library and open for research use. To see it yourself ask for Roberts PS1311.I6 1897.