Kenneth Spencer Research Library

Each week we’ll be posting a photograph from University Archives that shows a scene from KU’s past. We’ve also scanned more than 34,800 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

Good luck, Jayhawks, on final exams next week!

A KU student studying, 1970-1971. University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG 56/0 1970-1971 Prints: Housing (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

You can find additional photos of KU students studying in a previous blog post from 2014.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

During the 2017 fall semester I had the opportunity to work as the Ringle Conservation Intern at the Kenneth Spencer Research Library. My time here has focused on treating and housing the Albert T. Reid Cartoon Collection, which includes 1899 original cartoons from various artists. This collection started as a generous donation of works from Reid in the 1930s, and between 1954 and 1956 the William Allen White Foundation and the School of Journalism at the University collected around 1750 items from around 600 different cartoonists.

The process of treating this collection required me to spend time dry-cleaning and housing every cartoon; this gave me the ability to read a majority of the cartoons, which gave me insight to the nature of the world in which these artists resided. Cartoonists, especially those who were creating political or editorial cartoons, were critiquing the world they inhabited. It was often hard not to draw parallels from our current political state while viewing cartoons of Russia’s influence on the world or a dawning of nuclear war. It was also particularly interesting that at the same time as these political cartoons were being created, so were early incarnations of some of our favorite pop-culture icons.

Bugs Bunny, Warner Bros., 01/13/1954 (CS 326)
Click image to enlarge.

When working with this collection I was particularly drawn to the comic strips, especially the strips that were science fiction oriented, i.e. Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, and Brick Bradford. There’s something wonderful about the worlds these artists developed with little knowledge of where we would find ourselves. Looking at these today is like looking at a nostalgic future. I also found it fascinating that many of these same tropes and design ascetics are used by contemporary science fiction creators. I wonder if contemporary creators were influenced by these characters and cartoonists as I was.

Flash Gordon, by Dan Berry, 09/01/1954 (CS-312)
Click image to enlarge.

Buck Rogers, by Rick Yager, 02/27/1956 (CS-308)
Click image to enlarge.

The Reid Cartoon Collection is a fantastic resource. It brings me great satisfaction that this collection will soon be accessible.

Matthew Willie Garcia
2017 Ringle Conservation Intern
Conservation Services

In honor of the centennial of World War I, we’re going to follow the experiences of one American soldier: nineteen-year-old Forrest W. Bassett, whose letters are held in Spencer’s Kansas Collection. Each Monday we’ll post a new entry, which will feature selected letters from Forrest to thirteen-year-old Ava Marie Shaw from that following week, one hundred years after he wrote them.

Forrest W. Bassett was born in Beloit, Wisconsin, on December 21, 1897 to Daniel F. and Ida V. Bassett. On July 20, 1917 he was sworn into military service at Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis, Missouri. Soon after, he was transferred to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for training as a radio operator in Company A of the U. S. Signal Corps’ 6th Field Battalion.

Ava Marie Shaw was born in Chicago, Illinois, on October 12, 1903 to Robert and Esther Shaw. Both of Marie’s parents – and her three older siblings – were born in Wisconsin. By 1910 the family was living in Woodstock, Illinois, northwest of Chicago. By 1917 they were in Beloit.

Frequently mentioned in the letters are Forrest’s older half-sister Blanche Treadway (born 1883), who had married Arthur Poquette in 1904, and Marie’s older sister Ethel (born 1896).

Highlights from this week’s letters include Forrest encouraging Marie to attend high school if possible (“these four years are worth a great deal even though one has to study some things that seem to be non-essential”), outlining his daily schedule, and describing extremely cold weather at Fort Leavenworth (“It was 7 below outside and I’ll bet it was 20 below in the kitchen. The water would freeze on the dishes while they drained”).

Click images to enlarge.

Thurs. Dec. 6, 1917

Dear Marie,

Your letters and the typed letter all came O.K. The latter will be read by every man in the Company. Last night I typed an extra copy for Sgt. Baber. This afternoon Sgt. Brown said that he read that in a recent raid on German trenches the American forces found the heads of the thirteen U.S. captains stuck up on bayonets in the trench. I don’t believe it but I’ll bet there are more barbarous things of this sort done than we ever hear or think about. Believe me I know one American they won’t get alive.

I was awfully sorry to hear about the bad cold and sure do hope you are feeling good now. Some time I hope you will be sufficiently considerate of my feelings to tell me when you are getting cold the way you did Saturday. We have our troubles with the cold weather, too. Here’s the day’s program.

Rise at 5:45. Assemble in ranks in front of barracks at 5:55. Reveille at 6:00. Calisthenics 6:00-6:15. The stars are still out and it’s so dark that one can hardly see what way the drill master is doing each exercise. Make up beds and clean up, 6:15-6:30. Mess call at 6:30. Breakfast of pancakes, butterine, syrup, grapenuts, canned milk, sugar, coffee, stewed figs.

After mess we sweep out and fuss up the barracks. Assemble for drill at 7:25. March up to stables, (a little over a mile and a half), get there at 8:00 and groom our horses until 9:00, then saddle up for mounted drill out in the field. We assemble in regular section formation and ride to the drill grounds in a column of two’s.

This morning it was so cold that when I walked from the toilet “shack” to the barracks, about 200 feet, my wet hair was frozen into big curls. If my hair was only longer, I could have cut one off and sent it to you, ain’t it so?

When we watered the horses, the ice was frozen an inch and a half thick in the tank. Big drops froze on Ten’s head just while going to the picket line. Gee, but it sure was cold. We ride with our overcoats on so I kept one hand in my pocket most of the time. Some of the fellows in the other sections had to lead mules and I’ll bet they pretty near froze their fingers.

We dismounted once to adjust our saddles, and warm our feet by running around in circles. When I first got on my feet they were sore and stiff from the cold. At 11:05, we headed for the stables at a good fast trot and at 11:15 we had our saddles hung up, and worked until 11:30 rubbing our horses dry. We got home at noon and ate dinner at 12:15. From 1:00-2:00 P.M. we had some snappy infantry foot drill.

The hour, 2:00-3:00 was spent practising with wig-wag and semaphore. We had buzzer telegraph practice from 3:00 till 4:00. The rest of the afternoon was spent memorizing guard orders.

Hash was dished out at 5:15. Retreat roll call at 6:00. Then walk to the City to write to the sweetest little girl. I wonder if she can read this awful writing – and does the story of our day’s work really interest Her? Will you tell me?

Last Tuesday was a pretty busy day. Walked to stables and back twice which amounts to about 7 miles. Groom horses an hour in the morning and ride all the rest of the morning and nearly all of the afternoon.

I then walked to town and started a letter to you but gave it up after writing nearly a page.

I wish I could think of something to write every day if you like my letters nearly as well as I do yours.

Well I guess I will quit. Stock says he is “all in” and wants to go home.

With love,
Forrest.

Sunday, Dec 9, 1917

Dear Marie,

I sure am awfully sorry to hear that your cold is getting worse, and hope that you will be feeling like yourself again by this time. I know you must feel miserable, especially when you are in school. I wish I could learn to be more careful but did not think for a minute that you were getting cold until you spoke.

You are doing well in school and I am mighty glad to hear it. Keep it up and you will not regret it when you go to High School. You cannot appreciate the value of a little hard work at school, now, but believe in me when I say that you will realize later, the advantages of all the school you can get. Whatever you do, don’t give up the idea of going to H.S. You simply must go if you possibly can. These four years are worth a great deal even though one has to study some things that seem to be non-essential. High school gives one only a fundamental idea of a lot of important things; those graduates who don’t think they “know it all” realize how much there is to learn. One feels an “urge”, or incentive, to think and get a better understanding of things in every day life and also of things that we might otherwise overlook. So remember, little girl, no matter what we will or will not be to each other, if you would take the advice of a good friend, go to High School.

I should be glad to have you make something for me for Christmas. While I told all the folks not to send anything, yet I do want something from just You alone. Would you like to make a box of fudge for my birthday – the 21st? This will be the last box, for I simply must cut out that stuff.

Your picture is in my watch now. I have nearly all the pictures that we took this summer and often take them out and think of the happy times we have had together this summer. Here’s hoping that those we took Thanksgiving will be good. Those three days with You were the happiest I have ever known and I will never forget.

We are having it pretty cold now. Saturday morning it was 7 below, and one sure does feel it here. It snowed all day Friday – the 4th, 3rd, 2nd and 1st sections had mounted drill in the storm, and so I was thankful I’m in the fifth. We have seventy brand new saddles of the very best type so the whole company will ride together soon. Some of the Saddles we have now are the little flat ones with steel stirrups – used by English gentlemen for riding in the parks but useless for our work. It sure is no joke to stick to one of the “pancake” saddles and lead an argumentative mule at the same time. Lieut. Butler said that the fellows were letting too many mules get away, and that the next fellow that let go of the rope before falling from the saddle was going to hear from him. My reputation for hanging on to my mule or lead-horse is without a spot so far, but yours truly is going to kiss that mule goodbye before he will do any Charlie Chaplin flop on the cold, hard ground.

Saturday I was on kitchen police duty and we didn’t have any fire in the dining room at breakfast time. It was 7 below outside and I’ll bet it was 20 below in the kitchen. The water would freeze on the dishes while they drained.  We couldn’t mop the floor because the water would freeze before the floor was clean and dry. Even the vinegar froze solid. When I got through fussing with the wet dish towel I thawed out my fingers with cold water. We feed 86 men now. Each private gets “K.P.” about three or four times a month, for one day. Well the Y.M.C.A. wants to lock up so goodnight.

Yours,
Forrest.

Meredith Huff
Public Services

Emma Piazza
Public Services Student Assistant

Each week we’ll be posting a photograph from University Archives that shows a scene from KU’s past. We’ve also scanned more than 34,800 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

KU’s volleyball team will begin its sixth-straight NCAA Tournament appearance tomorrow night with a first-round match against Missouri. Good luck, Jayhawks! Rock Chalk!

KU volleyball player Julie Woodruff, 1989-1990.
University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG 66/20/32 Julie Woodruff 1989/1990 Prints:
Athletic Department: Women’s Volleyball (Photos).
Click image to enlarge.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

It’s that time of year when dinner parties and invitations of all sorts abound, so we thought it might be interesting to turn to a nineteenth-century etiquette book to explore its advice on the age-old question of when to arrive for dinner.

 

Stamped cloth binding and title page of  and title page of Etiquette for Gentlemen: With Hints on the Art of Conversation. London: Tilt and Bogue, 1841. Call #: A445. Click images to enlarge.

Of the numerous etiquette books in Spencer Research Library’s collections, Etiquette for Gentlemen: With Hints on the Art of Conversation offers particularly unyielding guidance.  Its anonymous author advises:

If you accept [a dinner invitation], you arrive at the house rigourously at the hour specified. It is equally inconvenient to be too late and to be too early.  If you fall into the latter error, you find every thing in disorder; the master of the house is in his dressing-room; the lady is still in the pantry; the fire not yet lighted in the parlour.  If by accident or thoughtlessness you arrive too soon, you may pretend that you called to inquire the exact hour at which they dine, having mislaid the note, and then retire to walk for an appetite. If you are too late, the evil is still greater, and indeed almost without remedy.  Your delay spoils the dinner and destroys the appetite and temper of the guests; and you yourself are so much embarrassed at the inconvenience you have occasioned, that you commit a thousand errors at table.  If you do not reach the house until dinner is served, you had better retire to a restaurateur’s, and thence send an apology, and not interrupt the harmony of the courses by awkward excuses and cold acceptances.

Arrival etiquette in Etiquette for Gentlemen: With Hints on the Art of Conversation. London: Tilt and Bogue, 1841. Call #: A445. Click image to enlarge.

Etiquette for Gentlemen appears to have been first published in 1838, and the library holds the 1841 edition. The book’s advice, however, is hardly new as its preface confesses:  “It is […] scarcely possible that anything original should be found in a brochure like the present: almost all that it contains must have fallen under the notice of every gentleman who has been in the habit of frequenting good society.”  As with many etiquette books, the volume’s directives will strike modern readers as by turns sensible, humorous, odd, ill-conceived, and offensive. The volume itself is small enough to fit in the palm of one’s hand (and certainly one’s pocket) for ready consultation whenever the need might arise. Although, isn’t it perhaps impolite to pause a social interaction in order to consult one’s etiquette book?!

Elspeth Healey
Special Collections Librarian