Welcome to the Kenneth Spencer Research Library blog! As the special collections and archives library at the University of Kansas, Spencer is home to remarkable and diverse collections of rare and unique items. Explore the blog to learn about the work we do and the materials we collect.
Check the blog each Friday for a new “That’s Distinctive!” post. I created this series to provide a lighthearted glimpse into the diverse and unique items at Spencer. “That’s Distinctive!” is meant to show that the library has something for everyone regardless of interest. If you have suggested topics for a future item feature or questions about the collections, you can leave a comment at the bottom of this page. All collections, including those highlighted on the blog, are available for members of the public to explore in the Reading Room during regular hours.
This week on That’s Distinctive! I am sharing some photographs from University Archives. Housing all things KU related, University Archives collects and preserves manuscripts, maps, blueprints, artifacts, photos, and more. The collection houses over a million photographs alone. As with last week’s post, this week’s images come from the library’s digital collections, which can be found on the “Find Collections” page of Spencer’s website. While not nearly all of the photos from University Archives are digitized, there are a ton to browse in the online collection.
The images shared this week show various scenes from inside KU Libraries. KU Libraries consist of six locations across campus: Watson (which is turning 100 years old), Anschutz, Spencer, Spahr Engineering, Art & Architecture, and Music & Dance. With over 5.6 million items on campus and even more available online, the libraries offer a wide variety of materials that serve users – especially KU students, faculty, and staff – and help them reach their goals. The Libraries’ mission is to “advance research, teaching, and learning at the intersection of people and ideas.” So while I boast that Spencer has something for everyone, every library on campus has something to offer.
Library bookstacks, probably in Watson Library, 1954. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 32/0 1954 Prints: University of Kansas Libraries (Photos). Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
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Two views of the Undergraduate Reading Room at Watson Library, 1955. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 32/0 1955 Prints: University of Kansas Libraries (Photos). Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
Bookshelves for reserve materials, probably in Watson Library, 1996. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 32/0 1996 Prints: University of Kansas Libraries (Photos). Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
Check the blog each Friday for a new “That’s Distinctive!” post. I created this series to provide a lighthearted glimpse into the diverse and unique items at Spencer. “That’s Distinctive!” is meant to show that the library has something for everyone regardless of interest. If you have suggested topics for a future item feature or questions about the collections, you can leave a comment at the bottom of this page. All collections, including those highlighted on the blog, are available for members of the public to explore in the Reading Room during regular hours.
This week on That’s Distinctive! I am sharing items from the Lawrence Journal-World photograph collection. Spencer Research Library holds the newspaper’s physical photograph collection, which contains about 545 boxes of negatives and an additional 113 boxes of prints. The collection spans the 1950s through 2001. Topics in the collection include athletics, anniversary celebrations, weather events, agriculture, organizational meetings, and more. The collection is organized chronologically by date rather than topic, which can make sorting through the photos an adventure for patrons.
The images shared today are from our digital collections, which can be found on the “Find Collections” page of Spencer’s website. The library has many digital collections available online for patrons to view from anywhere they please. Per the website, “KU Libraries Digital Collections provide free, public access to thousands of objects digitized from across Spencer’s holdings, including photographs, documents, and audiovisual materials.”
Bell Telephone employee Claude Milliken, March 1955. Lawrence Journal-World Photograph Collection. Call Number: RH PH LJW. Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
Kevin Heck with Ringing Bros. circus elephants, September-October 1954. Lawrence Journal-World Photograph Collection. Call Number: RH PH LJW. Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
Three-year-old Chris Hunsinger looking at prizes during the Douglas County Derby, June 1957. Lawrence Journal-World Photograph Collection. Call Number: RH PH LJW. Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).
This weekend, alumni will gather to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Douthart and Grace Pearson Scholarship Halls on the KU campus. While Douthart was slated from the beginning as a scholarship hall, it appears that Grace Pearson was originally conceived as a “general” women’s residence hall and was added to the scholarship hall system a few years after it opened.
At the time it was built, Douthart Hall was the fourth women’s scholarship hall and ninth total in the system. The location had previously been the site of Carruth Hall, the former residence of Chancellors Snow through Lindley, and after 1940 a small student residence hall. An August 1953 KU News Bureau report noted that Douthart was “the gift of the late Miss Lela Douthart and the late Mrs. Ava Douthart Chronister of Kansas City, Kansas, and of Burt Chronister of Kansas City, Kansas. Douthart Hall will be built at the northwest corner of 14th and Louisiana streets.”
1954 construction of Grace Pearson Hall, with newly-built Douthart Hall in the background. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 0/22/26, University General: Buildings: Grace Pearson Hall (Photos). Click image to enlarge.
The first residents of Douthart Hall, 1954-55. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 56/6, Housing: Douthart Hall (Photos). Click image to enlarge.
J.R. Pearson and his wife Gertrude Sellards Pearson generously donated funds for various residence halls at the University of Kansas. Grace Pearson Hall, named in honor of J.R. Pearson’s mother, was built as a reverse copy of Douthart Hall and was situated between Douthart and the KU Faculty Club on Louisiana Street. It was designed to be a 48-student women’s dormitory but, as a KU News Bureau report from 1953 noted, “The new hall will not be a scholarship hall, but whether it will be used for freshman or upper class women has not been determined.” Within a few years it had become a men’s hall and is currently co-ed.
Residents of Grace Pearson Hall, 1978-79. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 56/5, Housing: Grace Pearson Hall (Photos). Click image to enlarge.
Scholarship halls were designed to provide an economical place to live on campus, with residents assuming cooking and cleaning duties to cut costs and foster a cooperative sense of community living. Residents were selected on the basis of need, scholarship, and character. A 1954 KU News Bureau report stated that the first residents received room and board “for about $300 a year less than the outlay for comparable accommodations” and also received $300 scholarships when admitted to a scholarship hall. Originally each scholarship hall also housed a housemother, later replaced by a scholarship hall director.
Resident of Douthart Hall washing dishes, 1987. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 56/6, Housing: Douthart Hall (Photos). Click image to enlarge.
We hope that the former and current residents of Douthart and Grace Pearson Halls who gather in Lawrence this weekend have a wonderful time reminiscing about their experiences living on the Hill.
Douthart Hall (left) and Grace Pearson Hall (right), 1956. University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 0/22/16, University General: Buildings: Douthart Hall (Photos). Click image to enlarge.
Whitney Baker Head, Conservation Services (and former Douthart Hall resident)
Last week was the 161st anniversary of the 1863 raid of Lawrence, Kansas, home to many free-state and abolitionist leaders. In the early hours of Friday, August 21, 1863, Confederate guerilla chief William Clarke Quantrill and 400 of his men rode into town, taking it by surprise. They ransacked homes, looted stores, set fire to homes and businesses, and killed close to 190 men and boys. The focus of this post is just one of the many personal stories from that awful day.
Frederick and Amelia Read were living and working in Lawrence at the time of the Raid. Frederick (1831-1901) immigrated to Lawrence from New York in 1857. It’s possible that he came as a member of one of the last parties of settlers sponsored by the New England Emigrant Aid Society, whose mission was to ensure that Kansas entered the Union as a free state (i.e. one that did not allow slavery). Frederick Read owned and operated a dry goods business for several years. After the Civil War, his wife Amelia (1834-1892) was an agent for the Wheeler & Wilson sewing machine company, working out of the family’s store.
An advertisement for Frederick Read’s store in The Lawrence Tribune, June 18, 1863. Courtesy of Newspapers.com. Click image to enlarge.
An article about the Wheeler & Wilson sewing machine company in The Daily Kansas Tribune, January 13, 1867. Courtesy of Newspapers.com. Click image to enlarge.
At the time of the Raid, Frederick and Amelia were very likely grieving the deaths of their two young daughters. In researching this post, I found the following article in the Lawrence Republican on May 3, 1860: “In this city, on Monday morning, April 30th, ADDIE L., only child of F.W. & Amelia A. Read, aged one year, eleven months and twenty-two days.” I also found, in the Complete Tombstone Census of Douglas County, Kansas, this record of the couple’s second loss: “Died at the residence of Levi Gates in West Lawrence, August 30, 1862, Freddy Rockwell Read, only child of F.W. and Amelia A. Read, aged eleven months.” Both Freddy and Addie were buried in Pioneer Cemetery, now located on the University of Kansas campus. The location of their graves is unknown.
Only the Reads’ youngest child – their son Lathrop – survived to adulthood.
Almost exactly one year after Freddy’s death, the Reads experienced significant losses during Quantrill’s Raid. Frederick escaped physical harm, but raiders looted and burned his store. Amelia was somehow able to save the family’s house from being set on fire, but she couldn’t stop the raiders from robbing the home.
There are multiple published descriptions of the Reads’ home during the Raid. One can be found in The Lawrence Massacre by a Band of Missouri Ruffians Under Quantrell [sic], published in 1865 by J. S. Boughton. Spencer Research Library has a copy of the volume; it’s also available online. Note that this account mentions daughter Addie by name, but it was her sister Freddy who had “died a few months before.”
The residence of F. W. Read was probably visited by more squads than any other place, as it is situated in the heart of the city. Seven different bands called there that morning…The next squad were for stealing, after demanding as they all did fire arms at first, they wanted money next and then helped themselves to whatever they could find. They found in the back side of a bureau drawer a little box containing a pair of gold and coral armlets [elsewhere described as bracelets] used to loop up the dress at the shoulder of their little girl Addie who had died a few months before. Mrs. Read begged very hard that he would please not take them as they had been her little dead child’s and she wanted them to remember her by, the brute replied with an oath “Damn your dead baby, she’ll never need them again.”
The heartbreaking story of the bracelets and the ambrotype below were the inspiration for this post. The ambrotype is part of Spencer’s Leonard Hollmann Photograph Collection. It’s identified as a post-mortem image of Freddy Rockwell Read, likely because it’s accompanied by a copy of the child’s obituary (quoted above). However, given the information I found while researching this post, I now believe that is incorrect.
The deceased girl in this ambrotype has been identified as Freddy Rockwell Read, who died at eleven months old in 1862. Leonard Hollmann Photograph Collection. Call Number: RH PH 536, Box 64, Folder 1. Click image to enlarge.
The child in the ambrotype looks to be about two years old, the age Addie was when she died. Thus, I believe the child in the ambrotype has been previously misidentified and is the Reads’ oldest child Addie. It’s still unclear who the bracelets belonged to.
Spencer Research Library and the Gordon Parks Center have collaborated to create a pop-up display and small exhibition on the life, journey, and friendship of Gordon Parks and Langston Hughes.
The Gordon Parks Center in Fort Scott, with support from Humanities Kansas, curated an exhibition in 2023 exploring the connections between these two Kansas artistic luminaries and their local connections to the state.
Two pages from A Poet and His Camera by Gordon Parks, 1968. Call Number: RH C9010. Click image to enlarge.
Oftentimes, when we think of Black artistic movements, we often think of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s or the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. What is easy to overlook is the strong Kansas connection to both movements. Likewise, when we think of Kansas art and artists, it is easy to think of pastoral landscapes that capture the natural beauty of the prairie landscape and poetic descriptions of wildflowers and controlled burns. The linking of Kansas artists to these larger artistic movements that give rise to underrepresented voices in the world of arts and letters is not always so apparent. One of the most famous artists of the state is John Steuart Curry, the hand behind the Tragic Prelude mural painted in the rotunda of the capitol building in Topeka. But, did you know that another work by Curry, The Fugitive, was featured in an exhibition titled An Art Commentary on Lynching in 1935? Of the 38 artists whose work was included in the New York exhibition, Curry’s work was used on the cover of the exhibition catalog, designed to bring attention to the need for a nationwide anti-lynching law.
Two of the most recognized artists of the Harlem Renaissance and Black Arts Movement have roots in Kansas. This is no coincidence. Kansas in the early 20th century fostered a certain creative intelligence in these young men that would translate to and be understood by a large audience. Both Hughes and Parks grew up in working class families. Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, just across the state line from Baxter Springs, Kansas. Before his first birthday, he was living between Topeka and Lawrence. Locally, he attended Pinckney School and lived on Alabama Street in West Lawrence (now referred to as Old West Lawrence). He worked for a time as a newsie, selling the Saturday Evening Post and briefly the Appeal to Reason, a socialist newspaper published out of Girard, Kansas. He stopped delivering the Appeal after being told by the local editor of the former that the latter would get him into trouble. His introduction to the social issues discussed in the Appeal would shape a sense of solidarity with working class folks. Fifty miles away from Hughes’ birthplace is the childhood home of Gordon Parks, born in Fort Scott, Kansas, where his father was a tenant farmer. While Hughes was an only child, Parks was the youngest of fifteen.
Both Parks’ and Hughes’ earliest writings were inspired by memories of their Kansas childhoods and drew upon stories about people they knew. Hughes’ first novel, Not Without Laughter, is based on his upbringing in Lawrence. In his first autobiography, The Big Sea, he reflected on the ideas that would become Not Without Laughter. He wanted to write about a typical Black family in the Midwest and about people he had known in Kansas. Yet, he felt like his family and upbringing was not typical. “I gave myself aunts that I didn’t have, modeled after other children’s aunts whom I had known,” Hughes wrote. “But I put in a real cyclone that had blown my grandmother’s front porch away.”
Langston Hughes opens Not Without Laughter with a storm. He styled Aunt Hager after aunts of his childhood friends in Lawrence, but the storm was very real. Call Number: RH B1855. Click image to enlarge.
Parks drew on his own childhood while writing his first novel, The Learning Tree. Though set in the fictional town of Cherokee Flats with fictional characters, it closely resembled Fort Scott. When Parks later directed a film based on the story, he shot it on location in Fort Scott.
Kansas was not without racial bigotry. Both Hughes and Parks talked openly about being the subject of ridicule and name-calling and feeling fearful of violence. Despite the unpleasant realities faced during their childhoods, Kansas remained an important part of their lives. In Half Past Autumn, a retrospective of Parks’ work, he calls the state his touchstone:
“I looked back to the heaven and hell of Kansas and asked some questions…My memories gave me some straight talk. The important thing is not so much what you suffered or didn’t suffer, but how you put that learning to use.”
“There had been infinitely beautiful things to celebrate – golden twilights, dawns, rivers aglow in sunlight, moons climbing over Poppa’s barns, orange autumns, trees bending under storms and silent snow. But marring the beauty was the graveyard where, even in death, whites lay rigidly from Blacks. Twenty-odd years had passed when, with these things lying in my memory, I returned to Kansas and went by horseback to lock them firmly with my camera. Spring was wrapped around the prairies. Nothing much has changed – certainly not the graveyard.”
A photo contact sheet of Gordon Parks visiting the Tallgrass Prairie with Patricia DuBose Duncan in 1979. Some photos also show Patricia’s son Don. Patricia DuBose Duncan Papers. Call Number: RH MS-P 535, Box 8, Folder 47. Click image to enlarge.
Langston Hughes returned to visit Lawrence after many years as well. Later in life, he was invited to speak at the University of Kansas, which he had visited as a small child. During one of his return visits, Hughes donated a collection of personal books and manuscripts to KU Libraries.
On page 22 of his first autobiography The Big Sea, Langston Hughes talks about selling the Appeal to Reason. He also talks about attending KU football games, only blocks from his house. Call Number: RH C7423. Click image to enlarge.
Throughout this summer, Spencer Library will feature a panel-display exhibit from the Gordon Parks Center accompanied with archival materials from the Kansas Collection to tell the stories of Langston Hughes and Gordon Parks and show the impact of their time growing up in Kansas on their life and careers. Their cultural expression through visual art, performing arts, literature, films, and music preserves our history, retells our stories for the next generation, and inspires our futures.
The exhibition will be on display through August 16, 2024, in the reception area of Spencer Research Library. The library and exhibit are free and open to everyone. You can visit our website to plan your visit.
