Kenneth Spencer Research Library

One of the most useful tools in a conservator’s arsenal is a good basic box template. Once one masters a simple enclosure pattern, the elements of the pattern can be adapted to create custom housings for just about anything – and in library and archives conservation, many objects besides books are in need of protective enclosures.

Our audiovisual preservation specialist Chris Bañuelos recently came to me with a few reels of videotape that were in need of housing. Enclosures for many types of audiovisual materials can be usually be purchased from archival suppliers, but this particular format, 2-inch quad tape, is apparently so obscure that containers for it are hard to come by. Chris had original boxes for some of the tapes, but these were made of acidic corrugated cardboard. I agreed to try and replicate the style of the original boxes using archival corrugated cardboard – I always enjoy a good enclosure challenge.

I did not set out to reinvent the wheel here; I wanted to mimic the original boxes as closely as possible by adapting the pattern for a basic corrugated book enclosure. I unfolded one of the old boxes and traced it on a blank sheet of paper to get a rough outline, then I measured the box and added the measurements to the tracing to make a template. I planned to use B-flute corrugated board, which is approximately but not exactly the same thickness as the original cardboard. Because of this difference I expected that my first trial of the template would likely be imperfect, but I went ahead with it anyway. I wanted to see what would be off in the finished box so that I could go back and fine-tune the template accordingly.

Sure enough, my first attempt wasn’t quite right – the lid was a bit too short and an even bigger bit too narrow, causing it to fit too loosely to stay closed. I added an eighth inch here and a quarter inch there and tried again. This time it looked great, but the lid was now just a little too tight for a person to easily and comfortably open it. After yet another small adjustment to the template, I had a box with a well-fitting, easy-to-open lid.

The last step was to fit the inside of the box with a short hub that would keep the reel from shifting. I used my handy circle cutter (which dates back to my high school days!) to score circles in scraps of the corrugated board, then finished cutting them out with a scalpel. I stacked three disks together, adhering with double-sided tape, and centered the stack in the bottom of the box, again with double-sided tape.

The finished box is similar in style to the original. Now that I’ve perfected the pattern through a little trial and error, I have a reliable template that I can hand to a student worker who should be able to successfully recreate the box.

Angela Andres
Special Collections Conservator
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).

Both of this week’s letters focus on Forrest’s “first taste of riding” a horse. “My horse certainly is a dandy,” Forrest tells Marie, “he knows his business to a dot. One trouble with him is that he shys [shies] at motorcycles, and once, when we were at a halt out in the hills, a cannon fired a salute back at the fort and I thought he jumped a foot.”

Click images to enlarge.

Fri. Oct. 26, 1917

Dear Marie,

This sure has been a fine day for us here. How is your throat; I hope you won’t have any hard luck with it. Yesterday the weather was fierce, cold, drizzly rain all P.M. Of course it was the 5th section’s turn to water the horses and distribute the hay and grain. When we got back from the stables my feet were soaked. We have big heavy greenish colored raincoats. (Everything in the line of clothing and equipment has that olive drab color and just matches the dead grass. A motorcycle sidecar in the field seems to blend into the background so you can hardly distinguish it.) Well – these raincoats have a very queer cut as they are intended for mounted service men. They are so long that they just miss touching the ground, and when buttoned single breasted they are a regular tent. The back is split clear to the waist.

Yesterday I had my first taste of riding. After an hour of snappy drill on “Shank’s horses” the fifth section and a few others went to the stables and saddled the horses. We have 34 borrowed saddles now so we had a pretty good column, riding single file, each man leading an extra horse or pack mule. We went out in the hills which are heavily wooded. Gee, it was great riding that morning; the weather couldn’t have been better. The lietenant got lost once and had to ask a party of Engineers, who were out making maps, the right road in. We went about five miles altogether, half of it on a good trot, and got in about 11:00 A.M.

My horse certainly is a dandy – he knows his business to a dot. One trouble with him is that he shys at motorcycles, and once, when we were at a halt out in the hills, a cannon fired a salute back at the fort and I thought he jumped a foot. One fellow was thrown off his horse but not hurt. Our saddles ought to be here pretty soon now, and I suppose we will have regular mounted drill on our horses when they do come. Lietenant Butler gives us Sig. Corps drill maneuvers every morning now. It is a lot more interesting than the Infantry foot drill. We are learning the silent commands now, as when we are on horses we will be spread out so as to make it hard to hear spoken commands. First the Liet. blows a whistle for attention and gives the command by holding or waving his arm in a certain way for each maneuver. The section chiefs repeat the command then the Lietenant gives the command of execution, (which means to go ahead and do it), by raising his arm straight up and dropping it out sideways to the saddle. (That is when he is in one.)

Well I must quit. Won’t you let the chevrons be enough? Will let you know about them later. Be sure to take good care of your throat.

Yours,
Forrest.

Here is a picture of a couple of the fellows. Sgt. Brown is the chief of the fourth section.

Sunday, Oct. 28, 1917.

Dear Marie,

Just finished the hardest days work I seen for a month. My turn at stable police came today after I had planned to do a lot of picture work. Jerry Berry and I worked steady from breakfast till 11:00 then I saddled my horse and went to the barracks (a short mile) for an early dinner. This was only the second time I had been on a horse, and the first time alone, so had to watch my step. The most trouble I had was when we passed motorcycles and autos. He’s no city bred horse by a long shot and sure does hate those little three wheeled buzz wagons. When we came near an auto he slowed down from a trot to a walk and as the auto passed he laid back his ears and stopped short. We sure had some dinner. Pork-chops, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, cabbage, bread pudding, and cocoa. I guess Tom was hungry too, for, on the way back, when he caught sight of the stables, he lit out on a gallop. This is easier riding than a trot so I let him go to it. I am mighty glad we have horses, for the riding is sure great stuff. We are allowed mounted passes from 1:00 P.M. to 4:00 on Sunday. When I got back the other fellows went to dinner. At 1:30 we bedded the stalls and put out the hay and grain. I took a few pictures and then it was time for me to go to supper, so as to get back before regular mess.

Say, would your Mother let you use my .25 cal. automatic? If you want to shoot, and your folks don’t object, you’re welcome to it. Of course the gun has to be thoroughly cleaned right after using, and I will have to show you how to take it apart and remove the barrel.

Don’t you think it would be better if you did go to these parties even if you don’t care very much about them? I wish you would – I don’t like to hear of people noticing that you only go with me. Please don’t misunderstand me – I simply think you out to go just for that one reason, don’t you?

I can’t get the goods nor the fine olive drab silk floss for the chevrons so will have to give it up. Here are some cards.

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!

It’s starting look like autumn on Mount Oread, with leaves and colors similar to the scene in this week’s picture!

Memorial Drive in the fall, 1960s. University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG 0/24/1 Memorial Drive 1960s Slides: Campus: Areas and Objects (Photos).
Click images to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

The relationship between the pronunciation of English and its system of spelling (or orthography) is inconsistent at best. Cough and through or great and meat appear as though they should rhyme, but (alas!) do not. Other words are spelled identically, but are pronounced differently according to their meaning, for example, “bow and arrow” vs. “Congratulations! Take a bow.”

Within the American context, Noah Webster is perhaps the figure best known for tackling spelling reform. At the end of his Dissertations on the English Language (1789), he includes an essay addressing this topic. In it, he appeals to national pride (in both the positive and negative senses of that phrase) and asks his readers a rather leading question:

…ought the Americans to retain these faults [in English spelling] which produce innumerable inconveniencies in the acquisition and use of the language, or ought they at once to reform these abuses, and introduce order and regularity into the orthography of the AMERICAN TONGUE?

The revolutionary sentiment of America’s recent War of Independence, it seems, animated Webster’s thinking on orthography as well.

Laying out a revolution in an appendix: Noah Webster’s essay on spelling reform in his Dissertations on the English Language: with Notes, Historical and Critical, to Which Is Added, by Way of Appendix, an Essay on a Reformed Mode of Spelling, with Dr. Franklin’s Arguments on That Subject. Boston: Isaiah Thomas and Company, 1789. Call #: C1514. Click image to enlarge.

Webster’s  essay continues by proposing a series of relatively radical alterations. He advocates for 1) the omission of all superfluous or silent letters (changing bread to bred, give to giv, built to bilt, and so on),  2) the replacement of characters with vague or indeterminate sounds by characters with more clearly-defined ones (changing laugh to laf and key to kee), and 3) making a “trifling” alteration to a character in order to help differentiate between sounds (such as adding a “small stroke” across “th” to distinguish between the sounds in “thorn” and “mother”).

Machine vs. Masheen: a passage outlining the second of Noah Webster’s three proposed reforms to American orthography from page 395 of his Dissertations on the English Language […]. Boston: Isaiah Thomas and Company, 1789. Call #: C1514

Although Webster did not ultimately adopt all of these proposals in his subsequent (and immensely popular) grammars and dictionaries, he did aid in establishing several changes that are still with us today. Americans now write of the defense of honor, but for the British, or even our Canadian neighbors (to them, neighbours!), it remains the defence of honour.  This national differentiation through orthography was something that Webster considered to be a point in favor of his proposed changes. Webster also argued that his reforms would “facilitate the learning of the language” for both children and non-native speakers alike. They would make it, he asserted in a memorable phrase, “as difficult to spell wrong, as it is now to spell right” (emphasis Webster’s).

Leap ahead 60 years and the Fonetic Advocat  (Phonetic Advocate) adopts an even more radical approach to spelling reform than that of Noah Webster. Published in “Sinsinati” (Cincinnati) in the mid-nineteenth century, the periodical announces in the phonetic spelling of its banner that it is “devoted to education by means of the spelling reform to literature, science and art.”

Sound it out?  The front page of the Fonetic Advocat. Vol. II, No. 20 (May 15, 1850). Call #: MS P286C:1.
Click image to enlarge.

Its publisher, E. Longley, was the director of the American Phonetic Society. Longley championed the use of the English Phonotypic Alphabet, which had recently been developed in England by Isaac Pitman and Alexander John Ellis.  This phonetic alphabet predates and differs from the International Phonetic Alphabet now used by linguists to specify the sounds of spoken language.  Try your hand at reading Longley’s front-page proclamation. If you get stuck, click here to consult the phonetic alphabet chart included on the periodical’s next page.

The issue of the Fonetic Advocat shown above bears an interesting provenance. It once passed through the hands of Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, yet another figure interested in spelling reform. Shaw was so concerned with the subject that he left a bequest to explore the establishment of an alternate phonetic alphabet. Interestingly, Shaw’s manuscript notation at the bottom the front page does not address the issue of phonetic spelling itself, but rather the typeface used for it. He writes, “This type, if ‘justified’ by [William] Morris, and the mutton quads [large spacing type] between the sentences taken out, would make a page of medieval beauty, far superior to any modern psalter.”

Elspeth Healey
Special Collections Librarian
(Adapted from the Summer 2017 exhibition Histories of the English Language).

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).

Forrest’s recent illness features prominently in this letter. “Here is the one [photo] of me writing to you at the hospital,” he tells Marie. “You can see a small scar on the edge of my jaw.”

Click images to enlarge.

Wed. Oct. 21, 1917*

Dear Marie,

Just got your letter of the 21st. You got me guessing as to what “this” is, but the stakes are so high that I’ll take you up on the bet anyway. Better stick to regulation style of slapping the stamps on my letters but I am curious to know this one means anyway. Did you get the pictures O.K.? Here is the one of me writing to you at the hospital. You can see a small scar on the edge of my jaw. It won’t show much but there is a small knot (that’s what the Doc calls it) on the bone. I left the hospital Monday morning. It was cold and rainy all day. I got pretty rusty on my telegraph receiving but my transmitting is a lot better.

My best luck was in getting my horse. I can hardly wait to strap a saddle on him. It will be my first time on a horse.

Please invest the 15 cents in stamps. Co A-6 bought over $7,000 in Liberty bonds. I signed up for $100 to be paid at the rate of $20 per month – 5 months. Well I must quit & scrub some clothes.

Yours, Forrest.

*Forrest meant either Wednesday, October 17th, or Saturday, October 21st.

Meredith Huff
Public Services

Emma Piazza
Public Services Student Assistant