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 21,700 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

Some of my favorites items in University Archives are scrapbooks created by former KU students. Most date from the early twentieth century and include items like photographs, programs for concerts and other events, tickets, dance cards, newspaper clippings, and holiday cards. A scrapbook created by KU alumna Mayrea Noyes contains the very clever valentine shown below.

KU senior Mayrea Noyes received this valentine from an
unknown admirer in 1911. It’s a series of nested envelopes, displayed here
in two columns, the last one opening to reveal a tiny red paper heart.
Mayrea Noyes Scrapbook, University Archives.
Call number: SB 71/99 Noyes. Click image to enlarge.

Mayrea Noyes was born in New York on May 4, 1889 to parents Ellis Bradford (1848-1924) and Elsie Jefferis (1859-1922) Noyes. She had two sisters, Elmira Elsie (1882-1961) and Aline (1892-1956). Mayrea’s father, a long-time civil engineer, graduated from KU in 1874, one of three students in the university’s second graduating class. Thus, even though Mayrea grew up in Portsmouth, Virginia, she attended the University of Kansas, graduating with a bachelor’s degree from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences in 1911. She returned to KU the following year and earned a university teacher’s diploma. Mayrea later attended summer classes at Columbia University (1913) and Virginia Polytechnic Institute (1921).

Mayrea’s senior picture in the 1911 Jayhawker. University Archives.
Call Number: LD 2697 .J3 1911. Click image to enlarge.

Mayrea had a long career as a teacher at Maury High School in Norfolk, Virginia. After she died suddenly of a heart attack on December 2, 1954, the school’s yearbook printed a memorial to her: “Coming to Maury in 1914 she was one of its first home economics teachers and did much to build up that department, serving there until her retirement in 1949. In addition to her teaching she spent many hours counseling students with their personal problems and is remembered by many for her sympathetic attention and sound advice” (85).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt, Megan Sims, and Abbey Ulrich
Public Services Student Assistants

Among the vast holdings of Kenneth Spencer Research Library’s Kansas Collection is an assortment of printed music, all produced by publishers based in the Sunflower State (RH E165). Song topics include patriotism, candidate promotion, parental affection, Kansas themes, waltzes, and love songs.

The publication of sheet music in the United States and Europe hit its stride during the Victorian era. An increase in the disposable income and leisure time of middle-class households meant that they could purchase pianos and other musical instruments, along with music lessons. The songs came to be known as “parlor music,” and many were composed especially for this type of use. Music in the home became a popular means of entertainment. Open the lid of the piano bench in any home that owned a piano and you would find a collection of sheet music. Phonograph records and radio would eventually replace parlor music as both a means of distributing music and home entertainment.

Since Valentine’s Day is here, this blog entry will focus on some of the love songs in the collection. Enjoy!

Sheet music cover, “I Never Knew.” Words and music by Marcus J. Lehman.
Wichita, Kansas: Mid-Continent Co. Publishers, 1920.
Kansas Sheet Music Collection. Call Number: RH E165. Click image to enlarge.

“I Never Knew”

A youthful suitor loved a maid,
How much he never knew.
He with her heart at baseball played,
Until she weary grew.
The more he teased this maiden fair
The more she did despair,
Until one day she went away,
And then I heard him say:

Chorus:
I never knew how much I’d miss you
Till you went away.
But now I want so much to kiss you,
Since you’ve gone to stay.
Your smile,
Your lips,
Your eyes so blue,
Your curls, I miss them, too.
The wealth of love you gave so true,
But most I just miss you.

Sheet music cover, “A Lover’s Quarrel.” Words and music by Rene F. Hartley.
Topeka, Kansas: Rene F. Hartley Music Publishing Co., 1922.
Kansas Sheet Music Collection. Call Number: RH E165. Click image to enlarge.

“A Lover’s Quarrel”

Often you’ll find, Sweethearts so fine,
True to each other but quarreling
When some things gone wrong.
Yes in their love play,
and just then you’ll hear one of them saying…..

Chorus:
It’s just a lover’s quarrel, yes just a lover’s quarrel,
Like all lovers have, but some so many more.
Hush now don’t you cry,
Dear now don’t you sigh,
‘Cause you know for you I’d die.
Long live the day, yes while at work and play,
For you and your winning way,
Right from the start you won my heart,
Now we must never part
Just over a lover’s quarrel.

Don’t say you’re through, that makes me blue,
When I love you and you only.
Still I know you’re mad,
And I’m feeling sad,
Now please gladden my heart dear by saying…..

Sheet music cover, “You Have Always Been the Same to Me.”
Words and music by Louis Weber, for his parents on their 64th wedding anniversary.
Kansas City, Kansas: Weber Brothers, 1912. Kansas Sheet Music Collection.
Call Number: RH E165. Click image to enlarge.

“You Have Always Been the Same to Me”

Many years ago my darling,
I remember well the day,
When I first began to love you,
Sixty years have passed away.
We have been so happy darling,
Now our locks are white, you see,
But our loves been growing stronger.
You have always been the same to me

Chorus:
You have always been the same to me.
You have always been the same to me.
When we reach the golden city
You will always be the same to me.

Many sorrows crossed our pathway,
But our lives were one sweet strain.
We have borne our lot together,
Sharing one another’s pain.
Soon we’ll close life’s pleasant journey,
Soon that city we shall see.
In that home of endless pleasure
You will always be the same to me.

Where the mocking birds are singing,
And the stars their vigils keep,
There beneath the sod my darling,
We shall sweetly sleep.
In the dawning of the morning
We shall ever happy be,
And through all the endless ages
You will always be the same to me.

Kathy Lafferty
Public Services

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 21,700 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

Happy birthday, Boy Scouts of America! The organization was founded on February 8, 1910.

Legendary KU basketball coach Phog Allen with a local Eagle Scout, June 27, 1958.
Lawrence Journal-World Photo Collection, University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG LJW 66/22 Forrest C. Allen 1958: Athletic Department: Coaches and Staff (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt, Megan Sims, and Abbey Ulrich
Public Services Student Assistants

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 20,100 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

This week’s photo was selected in honor of Kansas Day, which is observed each year on January 29th to celebrate the Sunflower State’s admission into the Union on that date in 1861.

Girls in sunflower costumes on a float in the Kansas Relays Parade, 1949.
University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 71/2 1949 Prints: Student Activities:
Kansas Relays (Photos). Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Want to learn more about the events that led up to Kansas becoming the thirty-fourth state? Explore hundreds of personal letters, diaries, photos, and maps from the period 1854 to 1861 at Territorial Kansas Online.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt, Megan Sims, and Abbey Ulrich
Public Services Student Assistants

Okay, so you didn’t win 1.5 billion dollars in the recent Powerball drawing, but you still have the chance to turn your love of books into a nice little rainy day fund. This year KU Libraries is celebrating the 6oth anniversary of the Snyder Book Collecting Contest. To help mark this banner year, the contest will offer even larger prizes than usual.

Winners will be selected in both graduate and undergraduate divisions, with the following cash awards:

• First Prize: $1000
• Second Prize: $600
• Honorable Mention: $300

Each winner will also receive a gift card in the following amounts from contest co-sponsor Jayhawk Ink, a division of KU Bookstore:

• First Prize: $200
• Second Prize: $100
• Honorable Mention: $50

Start combing your shelves, though, since entries are due by 5 p.m. Friday, February 19, 2016. The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony on Thursday, April 14th, 2016.

The contest was established by Elizabeth M. Snyder in 1957 to cultivate and recognize undergraduate and graduate students’ interest in collecting books.

In recent years, the rules have expanded to include digital objects and non-print materials. You can learn more about the contest and how to enter by visiting https://lib.ku.edu/snyder/. There you’ll also find a handy FAQ as well as selected essays, bibliographies, and a sample collection to help you on your way.

In need of further inspiration? Take a glance at some of the evocative titles of winning collections from the past fifteen years. What might you title your collection?

• Clandestine Publications, by Resha S. Cardone, 1st place Graduate Division, 2002
• Writing for No One: Zines and the Literature Underground,  by Joe Morgan, 1st place Undergraduate Division, 2004
• On Being and Becoming a ‘Total Woman:’ Bestselling Books on Christian Marriage, 1972 to 1979, by Jennifer Heller, 1st place Graduate Division, 2004
• Binding Times: Central American and Caribbean Literature Created in Crisis, by Erin S. Finzer, 1st place Graduate Division, 2005
• Out of Season: Collecting Hemingway In Our Time as the Su[m] Also Rises, by Todd Giles, 1st place Graduate Division, 2007
• The Mythology of Mozart, by Bailey Pike, 1st place Undergraduate Division, 20o8
• High and Low: Commix, Art and Their Influence, by Thayer Bray, 1st place Undergraduate Division, 2009
• Return With Us Now: The Rise of the Old Time Radio Hobby, by Ryan Ellett, 1st place Graduate Division, 2010
• A Genre of One’s Own: Constructing Science Fiction as a Space for Feminist Discourse, by Meagan Kane, 1st place Undergraduate Division, 2011
  
• The Evolution of Scientific Knowledge: Vintage and Antique Textbooks of the Natural and Physical Sciences, by Laci Gerhart, 1st place Graduate Division, 2012
• Language and Linguistics: How Words Changed My Life,  by Allie Alvis, 1st place Undergraduate Division, 2012
• Discovering Hollywood’s Mysteries: Juvenile Literature from Cinema’s Golden Age, by Baiba Sedriks, 1st place Graduate Division, 2013
• A Decade of Yarncraft, by Emma Fahrlander , 1st place Undergraduate Division, 2014
• Southern Appalachia: Historic and Imagined, by Clarissa Nemeth, 1st place Graduate Division, 2015

 Clarissa Nemeth, with her collection “Southern Appalachia: Historic and Imagined.”
Nemeth won first place in the Graduate Division in the 59th Annual Snyder Book Collecting Contest (2015)