Today marks the 236th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. The idea of a “tea party” to oppose taxes saw a rebirth this year as conservative activists staged tea parties on April 15 and beyond to protest current fiscal policies. But the original tea party happened on a cold December 16th in 1773. The Rosenbach …
Several of the collections staff are starting to work on an exhibition for next summer on “the west” in fiction and reality. Right now we’re combing through the collections to find the objects we want to use and this handbill made my day when my colleague Karen Schoenewaldt showed it to me last week. Laid …
After last week’s blog post in which I trailed off into a discussion of the Old 100th psalm tune, I got to wondering if there were any recordings of what the Bay Psalm Book’s music would really have sounded like. Lo and behold, the folks at Smithsonian Folkway records put out such a record, way …
Happy Thanksgiving (a day early) to all Rosenblog readers. Since this is a time of giving thanks, let me start by thanking all of you for reading. An extra special thank you goes out to those of you who support the Rosenbach as members, volunteers, or donors. 2009 has been a tough year for all …
So what, you may ask is the connection between Stephen Colbert, comedian and political satirist, and our copy of the Bay Psalm Book, the first book printed in the United States. (Ok, if you want to be picky, as Colbert no doubt would, its real title is “The Whole Booke of Psalmes Faithfully TRANSLATED into …
Our newest exhibit, Friend or Faux, opens tomorrow and we’ll be kicking off our programming for the show this Saturday (11/14) at noon with the first of a series of seminars on authenticity. This inaugural seminar focuses on silver and will presented by David Barquist, Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Philadelphia Museum of …
Marianne Moore throwing out first pitch in Yankee Stadium, 1968. Moore XII:17:12a With game six of the World Series on tonight (go Phils!) I figured we should own up to having some pretty cool Yankees memorabilia, courtesy of Miss Marianne Moore. Moore was, of course, originally a fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers and her poem …
Sorry to be a bit behind on blogging this week, but I thought I’d give you a glimpse of what I and my collections colleagues have been working on. We’re preparing to install the new exhibit “Friend or Faux: Imitation and Invention from Innocent to Fraudulent” and so we’ve been busily patching and painting walls …
W. Dewitt, portrait of John Brown. Charles Town W.V., 1859. 1981.7 Trying to define the beginning of the Civil War is a bit tricky. The first shots were fired at Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, but the causes and lead-up to the war can be seen to stretch back decades or more. One key …
This guest post is brought to you by the Rosenbach fall collections intern Jessica Walthew.When, where and how was this interesting photo taken? Clue #1: This “photo-multigraph” shows five Dr. Rosenbachs seated around a table. Photo multigraphs are an example of a type of trick photography that was popular at the end of the 19th …