This collection contains a variety of business ephemera similar to that found in the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana. The material in the Business Americana Collection is newly acquired ephemera received from many sources including curatorial units, the public, and Smithsonian Institution staff.
Scope and Contents:
An artificial collection of material organized with the same subject headings as the Warshaw Collection, i.e., generally by product type. Additional subject headings will be added as needed. New material, much of it from the second half of the twentieth century, is added regularly to this collection. This collection is sometimes informally called "Warshaw Junior" by the staff and researchers.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged by subject categories.
Biographical / Historical:
This collection contains miscellaneous business ephemera. The material is similar to that found in the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, but no new material is incorporated into the Warshaw Collection. The material in the Archives Center Business Americana Collection is newly acquired ephemera received from many sources, including curatorial units, the public, and Smithsonian staff.
The Fletcher and Horace Henderson Collection contains original scores and band books, loose sheet music, both original and published, from both Fletcher and Horace's libraries, playlists, lyrics, photographs, personal papers and correspondences, newspaper clippings, jazz publications, an oral history manuscript of an interview with Horace, audio tapes, and other personal memorabilia documenting the lives and careers of the two brothers as pianists, band leaders, and arrangers. The majority of the material dates from the mid 1920s to the early 1980s.
Series 1: Fletcher and Horace Henderson's Music ca. 1930s - 1980s Boxes 1-68.
Original band books and scores, lyrics, playlists, loose music, and published music either arranged or used by Fletcher or Horace Henderson during their careers as pianists, band leaders, and arrangers. The series is organized into six subseries: Subseries 1A: Horace's Band Books, Subseries 1B: Loose Music, Subseries 1C: Original Scores, Subseries 1D: Lyrics, Suberies 1E: Playlists, and Suberies 1F: Published Music.
Suberies 1A, ca. 1940s -1980s, boxes 1-21. Horace Henderson Band Books. Each Band Book stands on its own, and is identified by the musician who used it or the location where the music was performed. Some performers include Gail Brochman, Eddie Calhoun, and George Reed. Many of the band books were used for performances at the Trianon Ballroom in Chicago.
Subseries 1B, ca. 1930s - 1980s, boxes 22-58. Music in boxes 22-54 comes from Horace Henderson's band library, and boxes 55-58 from Fletcher Henderson's band library. The music consists of full scores, piano scores, and parts arranged or used by Horace or Fletcher Henderson. Arranged alphabetically by title; FS - Full Score, PS - Piano Score, and P - Parts. * Indicates an overlap between loose music, and music known to have been performed at the Trianon Ballroom in Chicago. **Indicates an overlap between Horace and Fletcher's Libraries. The music is arranged alphabetically by music title.
Subseries 1C, ca. 1930s - 1940s, boxes 59-60. Original scores arranged by Fletcher Henderson, many for Benny Goodman and other bandleaders, including AHoneysuckle Rose@, AKing Porter's Stomp@, and AStealin' Apples@. There is also a complete band book written and arranged by Fletcher. Arranged alphabetically by title.
Subseries 1D, ca. 1940s - 1980s, box 61. Original lyrics used in performances by Horace Henderson's bands. Arranged alphabetically by title where identified.
Subseries 1E, ca. 1940s - 1980s, boxes 62-63. Playlists compiled in preparation for performances by Horace Henderson's orchestras, listing titles played at various performances. Un-arranged.
Subseries 1F, ca. 1920s-1980s, boxes 64-68. Published sheet music and books for piano/vocal parts. Includes art music, method books, popular music, fake books, and music book covers. Folders are arranged by type of publication, and the music is arranged alphabetically by title within each folder.
Series 2: Photographs, ca. 1920s - 1980s Boxes 69-70.
Photographs documenting the lives of both Fletcher and Horace Henderson's personal lives and careers. Photographs are arranged by category including Fletcher Henderson Candids with Friends, Horace Henderson Candids, Performance Marquees, and both brothers with their orchestra. Some unique pictures include portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Henderson (Fletcher and Horace's parents), candids of Fletcher with Benny Goodman, and Horace with Lena Horne.
Series 3: Personal Papers and Correspondences, ca. 1920s - 1980s Boxes 71-78. Programs and broadsides, newspaper articles, letters, essays, publications, and other personal documents tracing the lives of Horace and Fletcher, as well as some personal items of their parents. The series is divided into six subseries: Subseries 3A: Programs and Broadsides, Subseries 3B: Newspaper Articles and Clippings, Subseries 3C: Personal Papers and Correspondences, Subseries 3D: Miscellaneous Publishings, Subseries 3E: Transcript of an Oral History Interview, and Subseries 3F: Henderson Family Scrapbook.
Subseries 3A, ca 1930s - 1980s Boxes 71-72. Contains broadsides and ad clippings promoting both Horace and Fletcher's performances, along with programs for various jazz festivals. There are also three sets of Las Vegas Programs, advertising the weekly happenings during the years Horace was performing there, mainly at the Riviera Hotel and Casino (1959-1961). These include; Ken's Spotlight Las Vegas, Fabulous Las Vegas Magazine, On The Go, and other miscellaneous circulations. Arranged by category (Fletcher's broadsides, Horace's broadsides, Programs), and by date within each set of publications or programs.
Subseries 3B, ca. 1950s - 1980s, Boxes 73 & 78. Contains newspapers, articles, and clippings, ranging from 1951 to 1986, documenting the lives of Fletcher, Horace, and some of their contemporaries (ie: Duke Ellington) through the eyes of the media. Arranged by categories; reference to Fletcher, Horace, or Miscellaneous. Box 73 contains the oversized articles.
Subseries 3C, ca. 1920s-1980s, Box 74. Contains letters, contracts, and other personal documents of Fletcher, Horace, and their parents. Also contains a copied photo collection of Horace, a manuscript of AHorace Henderson Presents his Interpretation of Jazz@, and an essay (author unknown) about Fletcher's influence on jazz.
Subseries 3D, ca. 1960s - 1980s, Box 75. Contains miscellaneous publishings collected from the various locations Horace lived and worked. Includes weekly circulations from Denver and the surrounding area where Horace lived from the mid sixties until his death, along with various music magazines that he subscribed to (ADownbeat@, AInternational Musician@). Arranged by date within each category.
Subseries 3E, ca. 1975, box 76. Contains the original transcript of the Oral History Interview of Horace Henderson, for the Smithsonian Institution, performed by Tom MacCluskey on April 9-12, 1975.
Subseries 3F, box 77. Contains a Henderson Family Scrapbook which includes photographs of Fletcher's and Horace's father and mother, and various newspaper clippings commending the careers of Mr. Henderson, Horace, and Fletcher. The scrapbook's original order has been maintained.
Series 4: Audio Tape Recordings ca.1970s - 1980s Boxes 79-80.
Contains a collection of recordings of live performances of Horace's orchestra in various Denver area locations such as the Esquire Supper Club and the Petroleum Club. Also includes a sample tape, a brief Atest@ recording by Horace and Angel, a radio tribute to Horace, and a few miscellaneous mix tapes. The tapes are arranged by date when available. Box 79 contains the original copies, and box 80 contains the duplicates.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into four series.
Series 1: Horace and Fletcher Henderson's Music, 1954-1955
Series 2: Photographs, 1942-1977
Series 3: Horace and Fletcher Henderson's Personal Papers, 1937-1987
Series 4: Horace Henderson Audio Tapes, 1978-1983, undated
Biographical / Historical:
Fletcher Hamilton Henderson, Jr. (a.k.a. Smack) was born on December 18, 1897 in Cuthbert, Georgia. He was born into a middle class black family, and as a child studied European art music with his mother, a piano teacher. His sister later became the head of the music department at the Tuskeegee Institute in Alabama, and his younger brother, Horace, would eventually follow in his footsteps as a jazz musician, arranger, and band leader. Horace W. Henderson (a.k.a. Little Smack) was born on November 22, 1904. He also studied piano with his mother and sister, and like his brother, began formal music training as a teenager. Fletcher Henderson attended Atlanta University where he earned a degree in chemistry and math in 1919.
In 1920, Fletcher Henderson moved to New York City to find a job as a chemist. Because employment in this field was hard to come by, especially for African Americans, he began working as a song demonstrator for the Pace Hardy Music Company. Shortly after Fletcher Henderson's arrival Harry Pace founded Pace Phonograph Corporation to produce records on the Black Swan label in 1921. Fletcher joined Pace's music team and was responsible for contracting and leading a jazz bands to accompany the label's singers.
In 1924, Fletcher's orchestra, under the direction of Don Redman, began to perform at Club Alabam (sic) on New York City's Broadway Avenue. That same year he and the band was offered a job performing at the Roseland Ballroom, where the band remained for ten years and gained national fame. His band was no different than the hundreds of dance bands, springing up across the country in response to the growing demand for social dance music, such as Count Basie's Orchestra, King Oliver and his Dixie Syncopators, and McKinney's Cotton Pickers. Don Redman left the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra in 1927 to direct McKinney's Cotton Pickers. However the music collaboration of Redman and Henderson had by then established what would become the "standard" big band arrangement for several decades, specifically the dynamic interplay between the brass and reed sections of the orchestra that included interspersed solos made famous by such esteemed soloists of the band as Louis Armstrong and Coleman Hawkins. Some of the band's most notable recordings made between 1924 and 1925 include Copenhagen and Sugarfoot Stomp.
By this time Horace Henderson had formed his own college jazz band in 1924, The Wilberforce Collegians, after transferring from Atlanta University to Wilberforce University to pursue a music degree. His older brother sent him arrangements and piano parts used by the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra for performances by the Collegians. Later that year Horace Henderson left the university to travel and perform with his band in New York City. His newly formed band included such notable musicians as Benny Carter and Ben Webster. While in New York he also began playing as a guest musician in his brother's band and learning from such legends of jazz as Coleman Hawkins, Buster Bailey, Louis Armstrong, and Don Redman that were working for the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra. During a Smithsonian Institution sponsored oral history interview with Tom MacCluskey, Horace recalled late night jam sessions at Hawkins' (Hawk) apartment where they would play through pieces from "Fletch's" library and analyze each individual's performance. We would "stop and discuss what had transpired during that session, you know, that particular tune. And man, that was a lesson...It was a session that was actually to help everybody, so that they would try things out and take another tune, and use these particular little points that Hawk would tell 'em.'"
Until the 1930s, the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra was the principal model for big jazz bands. However, his management of the band and its finances led to frequent band break-ups. In 1934, severe financial problems forced Fletcher to sell some of his best arrangements to Benny Goodman. Horace Henderson and others suggested Goodman's rapid rise in popularity among swing bands for white audiences was largely due to Fletcher Henderson's innovative band arrangements. Fletcher Henderson continued to lead bands until 1939 when he joined Goodman's orchestra as a full time staff arranger. In 1941 he returned to band leading and arranging, but suffered a severe stroke in 1950. Fletcher was partially paralyzed from the stroke, and died on December 29, 1952.
Horace, also, formed many bands throughout the 1930s and 40s, and became a sideman for leaders such as Don Redman (1931-33) and, most notably, his brother. He was a pianist and arranger for Fletch's band intermittently between 1931 and 1947. During this time, Horace spent a lot of time in Chicago with Fletcher's band at the Grand Terrace, and formed his own band at Swingland. Horace also worked as a freelance arranger for Benny Goodman, Charlie Barnet, and Earl Hines3. From November 1942 through August 1943, Horace was the leader of the 732nd Military Police Band in Joliet, Illinois. The position was first offered to Louis Armstrong, who turned it down and recommended Horace for the position. After leaving the army, he played with Fletcher's band for two years. Horace began writing for Charlie Barnet in 1944, where he first came across Lena Horne. During a job at the Paramount, Charlie had Called Horace to say that his vocalist had laryngitis, and he needed a new singer. Horace went to the Apollo in Harlem in search of some talent, and they sent him to the Regent where he could find Lena Horne. She joined Charlie's show the next day, and from there went on to fame. Horace joined her for an extended tour as a pianist and arranger, and later worked with Billie Holiday3.
Horace moved to Denver with his wife, Angel, in the late 1960s. The Horace Henderson Combo performed at many nightclubs and resorts in the Denver area, including Estes Park, the Broadmoor Hotel, and the Petroleum Club. He began playing the organ in 1970 because the clubs didn't want to pay for four or five piece bands, and with an organ to replace the piano, a bass player was no longer necessary3. Horace continued to lead bands in the Denver area until his death on August 29, 1988.
Although both brothers had a major impact on the future of jazz, Horace is often thought of merely as a shadow to his more celebrated brother. Fletcher Henderson's career as a pianist, bandleader, and arranger is one of the most important in jazz history. Bands of leaders such as Count Basie, Charlie Barnet, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, and Benny Goodman all played arrangements, which were either written or influenced by Fletcher Henderson. Fletcher constantly surrounded himself with the most talented musicians of his era, and patterned the basic formula, which were imitated throughout the big band era.
However, at least thirty of Fletcher's arrangements, many for Benny Goodman, are accredited as Horace's work. His arrangement Hot and Anxious was based on the traditional riff that later became the basis for Glenn Miller's In the Mood. Christopher Columbus is the most notable example of Horace's potent piano style, which is often noted to be stronger than his brother's. Although the brothers had differences, Horace insists that they did not involve music. Fletcher's style and success had a huge influence on Horace's career, and he was incredibly grateful for all his brother taught him. In an interview in April of 1975, he was quoted as saying, "I idolize his way of thinking because he was successful. You don't fight success, you join it." 3
Sources
1. Biographical information derived from The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, edited by Barry Kernfeld (New York: Macmillan Press Ltd, 1988).
2. The Pace Phonograph corporation was the first African-American-owned recording company in the United States. Historical information derived from The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Black Music; Biographical Dictionary of Afro-American and African Musicians, by Eileen Southern (USA: Greenwood Press, 1982).
3. Interview with Horace Henderson, April 2-12, 1975, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.
Provenance:
The Fletcher and Horace Henderson collection was acquired by the museum in December of 2001, donated by Barbara and Barry Lewis.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Topic:
Music -- 20th century -- United States Search this
Genre/Form:
Audiocassettes
Audiotapes
Manuscripts -- Music -- 20th century
Parts (musical)
Photographs -- 20th century
Citation:
Fletcher and Horace Henderson Music and Photographs, 1930s-1980s, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
The Rockwell Kent papers measure 88.0 linear feet and date from circa 1840 to 1993 with the bulk of the collection dating from 1935 to 1961. The collection provides comprehensive coverage of Kent's career as a painter, illustrator, designer, writer, lecturer, traveler, political activist, and dairy farmer.
Scope and Content Note:
The Rockwell Kent papers measure 88 linear feet and date from circa 1840 to 1993 with the bulk of the collection dating from 1935 to 1961. The collection provides comprehensive coverage of Kent's career as a painter, illustrator, designer, writer, lecturer, traveler, political activist, and dairy farmer.
Circumstances surrounding the acquisition of the papers are highlighted in an article by Garnett McCoy ("The Rockwell Kent Papers," in the Archives of American Art Journal, 12, no. 1 [January 1972]: 1-9), recommended reading for researchers interested in the collection. The collection is remarkably complete, for in the mid 1920s Kent began keeping carbon copies of all outgoing letters, eventually employing a secretary (who became his third wife and continued her office duties for the remainder of Kent's life).
Series 1: Alphabetical Files contain Kent's personal and professional correspondence, along with business records of the dairy farm and associated enterprises; also included are printed matter on a wide variety of topics and promotional literature relating to organizations and causes of interest to him. Voluminous correspondence with his three wives, five children, and other relatives, as well as with literally hundreds of friends, both lifelong and of brief duration, illuminates Kent's private life and contributes to understanding of his complex character. Among the many correspondents of note are: his art teachers William Merritt Chase, Robert Henri, and Kenneth Hayes Miller; fellow artists Tom Cleland, Arthur B. Davies, James Fitzgerald, Hugo Gellert, Harry Gottleib, Marsden Hartley, Charles Keller, and Ruth Reeves; collectors Duncan Phillips and Dan Burne Jones; critics J. E. Chamberlain and Walter Pach; and dealers Charles Daniel, Felix Wildenstein, and Macbeth Galleries. Kent corresponded with such diverse people as Arctic explorers Peter Freuchen, Knud Rasmussen, and Vilhjalmar Steffanson; composer Carl Ruggles and songwriters Lee Hays and Pete Seeger; civil rights pioneers Paul Robeson and Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois; writers Bayard Boyesen, Scott and Helen Nearing, and Louis Untermeyer; and art historian and print curator Carl Zigrosser.
Kent's interest and involvement in the labor movement are reflected in correspondence with officials and members of a wide variety and large number of unions and related organizations, among them: the Farmers' Educational and Cooperative Union of America, Farmers' Union of the New York Milk Shed, International Workers Order, National Maritime Union, and United Office and Professional Workers of America. Of special interest is his participation, often in leadership roles, in various attempts to organize artists. Files on the American Artists' Congress, Artists League of America, The Artists Union, United American Artists, and United Scenic Artists contain particularly valuable material on the movement.
A supporter of New Deal efforts to aid artists, Kent was actively interested in the various programs and often was critical of their limitations; he advocated continuing federal aid to artists after the Depression abated. The Kent papers include correspondence with the Federal Arts Project, Federal Fine Arts Project, Federal Writers Project, and the War Department, as well as correspondence with the Citizens' Committee for Government Art Projects and President Franklin D. Roosevelt on the subject.
Kent's professional correspondence documents exhibitions, sales, consignments, and reproduction of prints and paintings. He kept meticulous records of his advertising commissions and illustration work. Detailed correspondence with publishers and printers indicates Kent's involvement in the technical aspects of production and provides a good overview of the publishing industry during the mid-twentieth century.
Business records of Asgaard Farm include records of the dairy and transfer of ownership to its employees, tax and employee information, and documents concerning several related business ventures such as distributor ships for grain, feed, and farm implements.
Series 2: Writings consists of notes, drafts, and completed manuscripts by Rockwell Kent, mainly articles, statements, speeches, poems, introductions, and reviews. The Kent Collection given to Friendship House, Moscow, in 1960, was augmented later by a set of his publications and the illustrated manuscripts of many of his monographs. Also included are a small number of manuscripts by other authors.
Series 3: Artwork consists mainly of drawings and sketches by Kent; also included are works on paper by other artists, many of whom are unidentified, and by children.
Series 4: Printed Matter consists of clippings, exhibition catalogs and announcements, brochures, broadsides, programs, and newsletters. These include items by and about Kent and his family, as well as articles written and/or illustrated by him, and reviews of his books. There is also material on a variety of subjects and causes of interest to him. Additional printed matter is included among the alphabetical files, mainly as attachments to correspondence.
Series 5: Miscellaneous includes biographical material, legal documents, and memorabilia. Artifacts received with papers include textile samples, a silk scarf, dinnerware, ice bucket, and rubber stamp, all featuring designs by Rockwell Kent. Also with this series are a variety of documents including a phrenological analysis of an ancestor, lists of supplies for expeditions, a hand-drawn map of an unidentified place, and technical notes regarding art materials and techniques.
Series 6: Photographs includes photographs of Kent, his family and friends, travel, and art number that over one thousand. Also included here are several albums of family and travel photographs.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into six series. Series 1 is arranged alphabetically. The arrangement of the remaining series is explained in each series description. Note that sealed materials that became available in 2000 were microfilmed separately on reels 5740-5741, but have integrated into this finding aid.
Missing Title
Series 1: Alphabetical Files, circa 1900-1971, undated (Reels 5153-5249, 5256, 5740-5741)
Series 2: Writings, 1906-1978, undated (Reels 5249-5252, 5741)
Series 3: Art Work, 1910-1972, undated (Reels 5252, 5741)
Series 4: Printed Matter, 1905-1993, undated (Reels 5252-5254)
Series 5: Miscellaneous, 1859-1969, undated (Reels 5254, 5741)
Series 6: Photographs, circa 1840-1970, undated (Reels 5254-5255, 5741)
Biographical Note:
Rockwell Kent (1882-1971), an energetic and multitalented man, pursued many interests and careers during his very long and active life. At various times he was an architect, draftsman, carpenter, unskilled laborer, painter, illustrator, printmaker, commercial artist, designer, traveler/explorer, writer, professional lecturer, dairy farmer, and political activist.
While studying architecture at Columbia University, Kent enrolled in William Merritt Chase's summer school at Shinnecock Hills, Long Island. He then redirected his career ambitions toward painting and continued to study with Chase in New York. Kent spent a summer working and living with Abbott H. Thayer in Dublin, New Hampshire, and attended the New York School of Art, where Robert Henri and Kenneth Hayes Miller were his teachers.
Critically and financially, Kent was a successful artist. He was very well known for his illustration work--particularly limited editions of the classics, bookplates, and Christmas cards. He was a prolific printmaker, and his prints and paintings were acquired by many major museums and private collectors. During the post-World War II era, Kent's political sympathies resulted in the loss of commissions, and his adherence to artistic conservatism and outspoken opposition to modern art led to disfavor within art circles. After many years of declining reputation in this country and unsuccessful attempts to find a home for the Kent Collection, Kent gave his unsold paintings--the majority of his oeuvre--to the Soviet Union, where he continued to be immensely popular.
An avid traveler, Kent was especially fascinated by remote, Arctic lands and often stayed for extended periods of time to paint, write, and become acquainted with the local inhabitants. Between 1918 and 1935, he wrote and illustrated several popular books about his experiences in Alaska, Tierra del Fuego, and Greenland. In the 1930s and 1940s, Kent was much in demand as a lecturer, making several nationwide tours under the management of a professional lecture bureau; he spoke mainly about his travels, but among his standard lectures were some on "art for the people."
In 1927, Kent purchased Asgaard Farm at AuSable Forks, New York, in the Adirondacks, where he lived for the remainder of his life, operating a modern dairy farm on a modest scale for many years.
As a young man, Kent met Rufus Weeks, became committed to social justice, and joined the Socialist Party. Throughout his life, he supported left-wing causes and was a member or officer of many organizations promoting world peace and harmonious relations with the Soviet Union, civil rights, civil liberties, antifascism, and organized labor. Kent was frequently featured as a celebrity sponsor or speaker at fund-raising events for these causes. In 1948, he ran unsuccessfully as the American Labor Party's candidate for Congress. Kent's unpopular political views eventually led to the dissolution of his dairy business, resulted in a summons to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and prompted the U.S. State Department to deny him a passport, an action that subsequently was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Kent wrote two autobiographies, This Is My Own (1940) and It's Me, O Lord (1955). In 1969, he was the subject of an oral history interview conducted by Paul Cummings for the Archives of American Art.
Provenance:
In 1969, Rockwell Kent donated his papers to the Archives of American Art; textile samples were received in 1979, and his widow gave additional papers in 1971 and 1996. Letters to Rockwell Kent from wives Frances and Sally, sealed during Sally Kent Gorton's lifetime, became available for research after her death in 2000, and further material was donated to the Archives of American Art in 2001 by the Estate of Sally Kent [Shirley Johnstone] Gorton.
Restrictions:
The microfilm of this collection has been digitized and is available online via AAA's website. Use of material not microfilmed or digitized requires an appointment.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
The papers of historian Henry P. Whitehead measure 156.91 linear feet and date from 1843 to 2010 (bulk 1945-1986). The collection documents Whitehead's careers, as well as his family and personal life. The collection also includes the personal papers of Tomlinson D. Todd, Elizabeth B. Delaney and the Howard Theatre Foundation. The combined collection is comprised of black theatrical memorabilia; materials relating to civil rights activities in the District of Columbia; and the African American experience in general. Included are playbills, sheet music, admission tickets, newspapers, magazines, books, photographs, clippings, flyers, brochures, pamphlets, sound recordings, research files, and other material.
Scope and Contents note:
The papers of historian Henry P. Whitehead measure 156.91 linear feet and date from 1843 to 2010 (bulk 1945-1986). The collection includes the personal papers of Henry P. Whitehead, Tomlinson D. Todd, Elizabeth B. Delaney and the Howard Theatre Foundation. The collection is divided into four series.
Series I focuses on Whitehead and includes papers dating from 1843 to his death in 2011. This series includes biographical material including a large amount of appointment books, identification and membership cards, resumes, certificates, and personal and family material.
There is a limited amount of correspondence, which focuses on his personal relationships with family, friends, and general correspondence relating primarily to his work as a local historian.
Also found within Whitehead's papers are countless records from his time employed by the Washington DC government. Materials include memoranda, notes, research material, handbooks, guides, manuals, affirmative action info and records, affirmative action plans, promotion recommendations, recruitment plans and summaries, personnel files (complaints), civil actions and reports related too Whitehead's 37 years of government employment. It reflects the activities of numerous departments, primarily in regards to employment and affirmative action.
There are also a number of files that document Whitehead's involvement in numerous community organizations. Among the organizations in which Whitehead was involved include U Street Festival, Lincoln Corporation, and the U Street Theater Foundation. The papers of the U Street Foundation document the production and establishment of the annual U Street Festival. The Lincoln Theater Foundation and the U Street Theater Foundation papers document the efforts to reopen the Lincoln Theater. Also included are Whitehead's research on the Lincoln as well as old Lincoln Theatre programs. Additionally found within this series are documents and clippings on the economic development within Washington DC particularly in the Shaw/U Street location.
The majority of this series consists of printed material. Printed material in this series includes books, clippings, magazines, newsletters, newspapers, press releases, sheet music, programs as well as promotional material for several Washington DC theaters and organizations. There is a large quantity of theater programs dating from 1900-1986. The majority of the clippings and magazines are theater related topics, coupled with a miscellaneous selection of clippings on topics that presumably captured Whitehead's attention.
Research, notes and writings include a large amount of scrapbooks compiled by Whitehead of mostly photocopied clippings documenting Washington DC history, African American theater history, and general African American history. Five scrapbooks were compiled by an unknown source and were previously housed in the New York Public Library collection. Two scrapbooks are about general theater history one about Frances Starr and one about Margaret Anglin. There is also one scrapbook pertaiing to Mae Hall. Also included are a large amount of research notes and notebooks along with general miscellaneous notes.
There are several photographs of African Americans in the performing arts as well as images of Washington DC and several unidentified men, women, and children.
Audio recordings include 23 cassette from the Alexandria Church of God.
The remainder of the collection consists of the papers of Tomlinson D. Todd, Elizabeth B. Delaney, and those about the Howard Theatre.
The Howard Theatre papers are arranged in Series II and include documents relating to the Washington DC historic Howard Theatre and date from 1910 to 1986. The papers in this series predominantly document the Howard Theatre Foundation's efforts to reestablish and run the Howard Theatre in which Whitehead was the vice president. Records include business correspondence, founding documents, photographs, memoranda, press releases, member lists, financial records, clippings, and scrapbooks of clippings pertaining to the organization and theatre.
The correspondence in the collection include a handful of letters from the Washington DC government along with individuals and organizations. Also included is a large amount of interoffice memoradums.
Administrative records include lawsuits, resolutions, meeting minutes, grant proposals, press releases, memoranda, member lists, studies and reports.
Financial records include check stubs, receipts, invoices, bank statements, expenses, and contribution lists.
Printed material includes original and photocopied clippings relating to the history and coverage of the foundation activities. Mostly promotional material as flyers, brochures, and press releases along with programs. In particular two 1920 Howard Theatre programs.
The scrapbooks of original and photocopied clippings compiled by Whitehead chronicle the history of the theatre and coverage of the foundation activities.
There are three VHS cassette featuring Whitehead discussing the Howard Theatre. Also found in series 2 are numerous stock investment record books belonging to A.E. Lichtman one of the early managers of the Howard Theatre. In addition early correspondence between Lichtman and the Rex Amusement Company concerning operational management issues of the Howard Theatre.
The Tomlinson D. Todd papers are arranged in Series III and date from 1902-1986 they include organization files, collected printed materials, subject files, and personal papers.
The collection includes materials relating to organizations in which there was a relationship to Todd's work and in which he had an interest primarily during the 1940s and 1950s, organizations include the National Negro Congress (ca, 1946-1947); the Congress for Industrial Organizations (1943-1947); National Council of Negro Women (1947-1949); Committee for Racial Democracy in the Nation's Capital (1947-1948).
The subject files include documents from three of Todd's organizations; Institute on Race Relation, Club Internationale, and his radio program "Americans All". As well as printed material from Todd's alma mater Lincoln University.
The largest subject file is "Americans All" which includes radio scripts as well as audio recording of a few programs and public service announcements. Also found are several black and white photographs of Todd at the radio studio.
Printed materials include newspapers, leaflets, convention proceedings, and flyers, There are a large amount of programs ranging from church worship to convention as well as performance.
Also present is a small amount of personal papers, including resumes, certificates, admission tickets, family documents, and travel ephemera from his all expense paid trip to Nigeria.
There are a few photographs of Todd at functions and with notable individuals as well as some family, friends and travel.
Elizabeth's B. Delaney papers are arranged in Series IV and date from 1874-1973.
The papers primarily document her involvement in four organizations, the Grand Oder of Odd Fellow of Kentucky, the Order Eastern Star Kentucky, the State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs of Kentucky and the National Association of Colored Women. There is a small amount of printed material belonging to her son primarily the Alpha Phi Alpha material and Gospel Choral Sheet Music, and books.
The Scrapbook was complied by Whitehead consisting of photocopied clipping documenting the life of Elizabeth B. Delaney.
Arrangement note:
This collection is arranged into four series:
Series 1: Henry P. Whitehead papers
Series 2: Howard Theatre
Series 3: Tomlinson D. Todd
Series 4. Elizabeth B. Delaney
Biographical/Historical note:
Henry Preston Whitehead Jr., was a native of Columbus Ohio. A graduate of Ohio State University, where he also attended law school and was a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. Mr. Whitehead discovered Washington's "Black Broadway" in 1940, when he was a soldier in town on a weekend furlough. As he served in the Army in the South Pacific during World War II. Prior to moving to Washington DC Henry P. Whitehead worked for five years as a liquor inspector. Mr. Whitehead moved to Washington D.C. in 1949 and worked for the Post Office before working for the District of Columbia government where he stayed 21 years. He led several equal employment initiatives during the 1960s and 1970s, and was last employed as associate director of the District's Office of Human Rights. In 1980 after putting in 37 years of government service Mr. Whitehead retired.
Mr. Whitehead was an historian who led efforts to restore Washington's U Street cultural corridor and achieved recognition as an authority on and collector of black theatrical memorabilia. Mr. Whitehead worked to promote and preserve the city's rich African American cultural heritage.
Mr. Whitehead, served as the chairman and president for 10 years of the Howard Theater Foundation Inc., which he helped establish. There he led the effort to include Howard Theatre in the National Register of Historic Places.
Similarly he was an active member of the U Street Festival Foundation. He was an adviser to the Kennedy Center, Anacostia Museum, and other Smithsonian Institution units and contributed materials to their exhibitions. He was also a consultant to historical documentaries broadcast on public television and radio, including PBS's "Duke Ellington's Washington." His writings included "Remembering U Street," a book used for annual festivals in the historic area.
Mr. Whitehead was also the founder and board member of the Lincoln Theatre Foundation.
Henry P. Whitehead Jr. died on January 8th 2002 at the age of 84.
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Anacostia Community Museum on September 1, 2005 by Michael A. Watkins.
Restrictions:
Use of the materials requires an appointment. Please contact the archivist to make an appointment: ACMarchives@si.edu.
Rights:
The Henry P. Whitehead collection is the physical property of the Anacostia Community Museum. Literary and copyright belong to the author/creator or their legal heirs and assigns. Rights to work produced during the normal course of Museum business resides with the Anacostia Community Museum. For further information, and to obtain permission to publish or reproduce, contact the Museum Archives.
The papers of art historian, art critic, author, librarian and educator Ellen Hulda Johnson measure 61.5 linear feet and date from 1872-2018, with the bulk of the material dating from 1921-1992. The papers include biographical materials; personal and family files; personal, professional, and business correspondence; extensive research and writing files; teaching files; subject files; professional and curatorial files; and artists' files. Johnson's papers reflect the full range of her career, interests, and close relationships with many artists. There is a 0.2 linear foot unprocessed addition to this collection donated in 2021 that includes letters to Ellen Johnson from others, letters from Johnson to Carl Gerber, and a sketch by Johnson. Materials date from circa 1956-1991.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of art historian, art critic, author, librarian and educator Ellen Hulda Johnson measure 61.5 linear feet and date from 1872-2018, with the bulk of the material dating from 1921-1992. The papers include biographical materials; personal and family files; personal, professional, and business correspondence; extensive research and writing files; teaching files; subject files; professional and curatorial files; and artists' files. Johnson's papers reflect the full range of her career, interests, and close relationships with many artists. There is a 0.2 linear foot unprocessed addition to this collection donated in 2021 that includes letters to Ellen Johnson from others, letters from Johnson to Carl Gerber, and a sketch by Johnson. Materials date from circa 1956-1991.
Personal papers consist of biographical materials and personal and family files, including "memorabilia" files compiled by Johnson. Correspondence is a mix of personal, business, and professional correspondence. Significant correspondents include David Saunders (who painted a portrait of Johnson), Claes Oldenburg, Jack Tworkov, Robert Venturi, the American Scandinavian Foundation. A folder of correspondence compiled for the Archives includes letters from Alfred Stieglitz, Wendell Wilkie, Carl Milles, Jim Dine, and Alexander Archipenko.
Extensive and comprehensive writing and research project files include articles, lectures, presentations, manuscripts, notes and notebooks, including her class notebooks from courses she attended in Paris in 1935, and additional notes and notebooks on a wide variety of subjects. The numerous articles, lectures, papers, and drafts were written primarily by Johnson for the College Art Association, the Allen Memorial Art Museum bulletin, and numerous additional publications and presentations; but there are also writings by others included in the research files. Major writing projects and related research files cover Scandinavian art, the Ossabaw Island artist's colony, Cezanne, Eva Hesse, John Frederick Kensett, Claes Oldenburg, Picasso, David Saunders, Athena Tacha, Pop Art, and many other topics. Johnson's research files, manuscripts, correspondence, and photographs for major exhibitions, including one on Eva Hesse (1982) and for her published books including American Artists on Art from 1940-1980 (1982), Claes Oldenburg (1971), Fragments Recalled at 80: The Art Memoirs of Ellen H. Johnson (1993), and Modern Art and Object (1976) are arranged with the writing project files. Johnson's bibliographic index cards are found here as well.
The collection contains extensive teaching files for courses taught by Johnson at Oberlin and as a visiting professor at other institutions; professional and curatorial files reflecting her curatorial career at Allen Memorial Art Museum, as a consultant, jury member, and continuing education courses she later attended, including the Baldwin Lecture Series; and 18 linear feet of artist's files assembled by Johnson.
Arrangement:
The Ellen Hulda Johnson papers are arranged into seven series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Personal Papers, circa 1905-2009 (5 linear feet; Boxes 1-2, 56-59)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1927-2009 (5.5 linear feet; Boxes 3-7, 60)
Series 3: Writing and Research Projects, 1872, 1932-1994 (15.5 linear feet; Boxes 7-20, 56, 61-62)
Series 4: Subject Files, 1930-1993 (5 linear feet; Boxes 21-25, 62)
Series 5: Teaching Files, 1928-1989 (6 linear feet; Boxes 26-31, 62)
Series 6: Professional and Curatorial Files, 1936-1991 (6 linear feet; Boxes 32-37, 56)
Series 7: Artists Files, 1935-1992 (18.3 linear feet; Boxes 37-55, 62)
Series 8: Unprocessed Addition, 1956-1991 (0.2 linear feet; Box 63)
Biographical / Historical:
Ellen Hulda Johnson (1910-1992) was an art historian, critic, and professor who worked and taught at Oberlin College in Ohio for most of her career.
Ellen Hulda Johnson was born in 1910 in Warren, Pennsylvania. She received her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in art history at Oberlin in 1933 and 1935. She worked briefly at the Toledo Museum of Art before returning to Oberlin as the art librarian. In 1940 she started Oberlin's art rental program, the first of its kind in the country. She was appointed to the faculty in 1948 and taught nineteenth and twentieth century art, American art from colonial times to the present, contemporary art, and Scandinavian art. She was a member of the Allen Memorial Art Museum's acquisition committee and was appointed honorary curator of modern art in 1973. She remained at Oberlin her entire career, retiring from teaching in 1977.
Johnson was a scholar of Cézanne, Claes Oldenburg, Eva Hesse, Pablo Picasso, Edvard Munch, John F. Kensett and other modern masters, as well as Scandinavian art. In 1962 she wrote the first important article on Claes Oldenburg and, in 1970, assisted curator Athena Tacha commission his first permanent large sculpture (3-Way Plug) for the grounds of the Allen Memorial Art Museum. She was the first to show the black-striped paintings that established Frank Stella's reputation. Her efforts in promoting acquisitions of young contemporary artists helped make the Allen Memorial Art Museum a leading institution in contemporary art. Her Oberlin lectures on modern art became so popular that they had to be held in the college's largest auditorium and influenced generations of students, many of whom went on to signficant positions in the field. A new wing of the museum designed by Robert Venturi opened in 1977 and was named in honor of Johnson.
Johnson was the author of numerous articles, books, and exhibition catalogs including Cezanne (Penquin, 1967); Claes Oldenburg (Penquin, 1971); American Artists on Art from 1940-1980 (Harper and Row, 1982); and Modern Art and the Object (Thames and Hudson, 1976).
In 1968, Johnson purchased the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Weltzheimer house in Oberlin, and spent a considerable part of her time and money restoring the building where she lived the rest of her life. She bequethed the house and her significant art collection to Oberlin upon her death in 1992.
Related Materials:
Papers of Ellen H. Johnson, 1933-1992, are also located at Oberlin College Archives.
Separated Materials:
Shortly after aquisition, the Archives transferred Ellen Hulda Johnson's vertical file (16 linear feet) of clippings, press releases, and exhibition announcements to the library of the Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery.
Provenance:
The Ellen Hulda Johnson papers were donated in 1994, 1998, 2019 and 2021 by the estate of Ellen Hulda Johnson via exectutor Athena Tacha.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Washington D.C. Center. Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Ellen Hulda Johnson papers, 1872-2018, bulk 1921-1992. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
The processing of this collection received Federal support from the Smithsonian Collections Care and Preservation Fund, administered by the National Collections Program and the Smithsonian Collections Advisory Committee.
The papers of Joseph Cornell (1903-1972) measure approximately 24.9 linear feet and date from 1804 to 1986 with the bulk of the material dating from 1939-1972. The collection documents the life, work, interests, and creative activities of the self-taught artist, who was best known for his shadow box constructions, assemblages, and collages. Papers include correspondence, diaries, source material, notes, writings, photographs, printed material, two- and three-dimensional ephemera, art works, and books, as well as a limited amount of legal and financial records, and some miscellaneous personal and family papers. The collection also includes the papers of his sister, Betty Cornell Benton, relating to the handling of Cornell's estate and the personal papers of his brother, Robert Cornell.
Scope and Content Note:
The Joseph Cornell papers measure approximately 24.9 linear feet and date from 1804 to 1986, with the bulk of the material dating from 1939-1972. The collection documents the life, work, interests, and creative activities of the self-taught artist, who was best known for his shadow box constructions, assemblages, and collages. Papers include correspondence, diaries, source material, notes, writings, photographs, printed material, two- and three-dimensional ephemera, art works, and books, as well as a limited amount of legal and financial records, and some miscellaneous personal and family papers (which comprise a series of biographical material). The collection also includes the papers of his sister, Betty Cornell Benton, relating to the handling of Cornell's estate and the personal papers of his brother, Robert Cornell.
Cornell's correspondence is typically with family, friends, artists, dealers, collectors, galleries, museums, admirers, individuals whom he admired, "helpers," and various charitable institutions. Correspondence generally concerns the creation, exhibition, sale, and reception of Cornell's art work; his "explorations" and other research and collecting activities; his preoccupations with certain individuals and motifs; his usual practices of giving gifts of art work to those he liked or admired and making donations to charities in aid of those less fortunate; and his relationships and shared interests with family, friends, and colleagues. Also found is correspondence between and amongst various other members of the Cornell family, including, most notably, Robert Cornell's letters to his sisters, Elizabeth (typically addressed as Nell) and Helen.
Dating from 1941 to 1972, Cornell's diaries span almost the entirety of his career as an artist, which began in earnest when he left his job at the Traphagen textile studio in 1940 to pursue art full-time and ended with his death in 1972. The diaries record his day-to-day experiences (usually comprising his thoughts, feelings, impressions, and ideas); and reflect on his various art projects (boxes, films, and collages) and creative activities ("explorations," and various other research, collecting, and publishing ventures). They also explore many of the themes and underlying concerns of his art work; and document his intense preoccupations with certain individuals, his wide-ranging interests, and the interconnectedness of his ideas and activities. Cornell's style of writing in the diaries tends to be stream-of-conscious with entries being composed of phrases, rather than complete sentences and with the progression of passages being more poetic and associative than either logical or narrative. He tended to compose by hand, occasionally typing up his notes into more formal entries, and also to use abbreviations for oft-repeated words and initials for individuals. At times, his handwriting can be difficult to read, and his references can be difficult to decipher. It was also common practice for him to review or revisit previous entries at various points in time, often making revisions or comments on them with dated annotations in the margins or on the reverse side of a page.
Cornell's source material is largely comprised of files of newspaper and magazine clippings, cutouts, notes, writings, book excerpts, photostats (or stats), prints, postcards, art reproductions, and other printed material. Some files are devoted to people (ballerinas, actresses, singers, artists, and writers) and topics (astronomy, romantic and modern ballet, birds, films, literature, music, plants, and science, among others). Other files relate to specific art works, "explorations," publishing projects, and exhibitions. Source material documents Cornell's preoccupation with certain individuals (past and present), events, subjects, and motifs; the development of some of his major "explorations" and their influence on his various artistic and commercial projects; and his work on certain box constructions and collages, publishing ventures, and exhibition catalogues. Source material also sheds light on Cornell's efforts to gain access to the past; his interest in the symbolism of images and objects; the linkages he found between seemingly unrelated things; and the connections between his many creative endeavors.
Ephemera and artifacts include various objects, mementos, and items of memorabilia, some of which were accumulated by Cornell (in much the same way that he collected his source material) and some of which are of uncertain origin. For Cornell, items such as these were not merely inanimate objects, but were instead evocative of past worlds and capable of bringing the past into the present (an idea which he often expressed in his diaries as the "metaphysique d'ephemera"). He seems to have used some of these items in a layout he designed for Good Housekeeping. Other items may have been used as source material for some of his box constructions.
The collection also houses photographs of Cornell, his family, art work, other artists, and friends, as well as photographs taken by various individuals and publicity photographs from the New York City Ballet. Also found are scattered works of art, including collage fragments and Rorschachs (or ink blot drawings) by Cornell, collages by Cornell's sister, Betty Cornell Benton, on which he collaborated, and a box by Christine Kaufman, which was a gift to Cornell. The books in the collection most likely comprise the remainder of Cornell's library, which was transferred to the Joseph Cornell Study Center, and include some that seem to have belonged to his sister, Betty. Printed material includes various publications and clippings collected by Cornell apart from that which he collected as source material. Writings about Cornell include an article by the poet, Mina Loy, and copies of various theses, presentations, and articles by graduate students in art history received by Benton (who assisted them in their research).
The Joseph Cornell Estate Papers consist of correspondence relating to Betty Cornell Benton's administration of the part of Cornell's estate for which she was responsible and legal documents relating to her various legal disputes with the executors of the estate, as well as a limited amount of printed material, some of which was originally accumulated by Cornell and subsequently shared with Benton, and miscellaneous papers belonging to Benton and their mother, Helen S. Cornell. Estate Papers provide insight on the exhibition and sale of Cornell art works after his death; the disposition of his belongings (including art work, papers, books, records, and source material); and Benton's efforts to foster and safeguard the memory and legacy of Cornell. The Robert Cornell Papers include correspondence, writings, art works, photographs, printed material, and scattered financial and personal records, documenting the full and creative life Robert led despite being confined to a wheelchair. Their inclusion in the collection suggests the family's effort to foster Robert's memory.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into eleven series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1918-1972, 1975 (Box 1; 0.8 linear feet)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1909-1982 (Boxes 1-5, OV 31; 4.3 linear feet)
Series 3: Diaries, 1941-1973 (Boxes 6-10; 5 linear feet)
Series 4: Source Material, 1804-1972 (Boxes 11-18, 25-28, OV 29; 8.5 linear feet)
Series 5: Ephemera and Artifacts, 1858-1946 (Boxes 18, 23; 0.8 linear feet)
Series 6: Photographs, circa 1905-1972 (Boxes 18, 28, OV 30; 0.3 linear feet)
Series 7: Art Works, circa 1966-1971 (Boxes 19, 23; 0.2 linear feet)
Series 8: Books and Printed Material, 1806-1968 (Boxes 19, 23; 0.5 linear feet)
Series 9: Writings about Cornell, 1950, circa 1975-1980 (Box 19; 0.3 linear feet)
Series 10: Joseph Cornell Estate Papers, circa 1911, 1944-1986 (Boxes 19-22; 3.5 linear feet)
Series 11: Robert Cornell Papers, 1924-1965 (Boxes 24, 28; 0.4 linear feet)
Biographical Note:
Joseph Cornell, assemblagist, collagist, and filmmaker, was born on December 24, 1903 in Nyack, New York. He was the oldest son of Joseph I. Cornell, a textile salesman and designer, and Helen Storms Cornell, and had two younger sisters, Elizabeth (b. 1905), nicknamed Nell and later Betty, and Helen (b. 1906), and a younger brother, Robert (b. 1910), who suffered from cerebral palsy. Cornell shared close relationships with his siblings, and was especially attached to his brother whom he took care of as an adult. His fondest childhood memories included family Christmas celebrations, outings to Manhattan where he saw vaudeville shows and strolled around Times Square, and trips to Coney Island where he encountered penny arcade machines. These childhood memories, among others, inspired some of the themes later explored in his art work.
After his father's death in 1917, Cornell was sent to study at the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. He remained there for four years, but left without receiving a diploma. During this time, the family moved from Nyack to Bayside, Queens, where they lived in a series of rented houses. Cornell rejoined his family in 1921, at which time he went to work as a salesman in the Manhattan office of a textile wholesaler, the William Whitman Company. He joined the Christian Science church in the mid-1920s, and in 1929, the family bought a house at 37-08 Utopia Parkway in Flushing, where he resided for the rest of his life, living there with his mother and brother after both his sisters married and moved away.
During the 1920s, Cornell developed his passion for walking the city streets and taking in their sights, sounds, and impressions; browsing in the secondhand bookshops along Fourth Avenue; and collecting material such as books, prints, postcards, and printed and three-dimensional ephemera. He cultivated his growing interest in culture and the arts by attending opera and ballet performances, seeing plays (the 1922 play Rain, which starred Jeanne Eagels, was among his favorites), visiting galleries and museums, reading, and going to the movies.
In 1931, Cornell began to frequent the Julien Levy Gallery, where he encountered Surrealist art for perhaps the first time. Around this time, he created his first works of art - a series of black-and-white collages composed from cutouts of nineteenth-century engravings - inspired by Max Ernst's collages, in particular his collage-novel, La Femme 100 tetes (1929). Cornell went on to create three-dimensional works of art such as pill boxes and a glass bell series (consisting of objects arranged under a bell jar). His work, including several collages and a glass bell, was first exhibited as part of the groundbreaking "Surrealisme" show at the Levy Gallery in January 1932. He also designed the cover of the show announcement. His first one-man show at the gallery, "The Objects of Joseph Cornell," followed in the fall of 1932. (It was seven years before his next solo show.) By this time, Cornell had been laid off from his job at Whitman's. He was out of work for several years before getting a job as a textile designer at the Traphagen Commercial Textile Studio in 1934. During the next several years, he continued to work on his art at night.
Around this time, Cornell began collecting movies and movie stills, and embarked upon various film-related projects. In 1933, he wrote a scenario for a silent movie, Monsieur Phot. A few years later, he made his first film, Rose Hobart (1936), comprised of re-edited footage from the B-movie, East of Borneo (1931), which starred the actress, Rose Hobart. And he began work on a trilogy of collage-films - The Children's Party, Cotillion, and The Midnight Party (circa 1937). He then took a break from making films until the mid-1950s, but continued to collect film-related material, which he began to incorporate into his other art work.
In 1936, Cornell constructed his first glass-fronted shadow box, Untitled (Soap Bubble Set), which was included that same year in the "Fantastic Art, Dada and Surrealism" exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, along with a cabinet box and several glass bells. In creating some of his other early boxes, he began the practice of using photo reproductions of images which he located in books and magazines, or in the Picture Collection at the New York Public Library, among other places. In his tribute boxes to actresses (1930s), he made use of publicity shots, and in the box, Dressing Room for Gilles (1939), he employed a photostat (or stat) of a reproduction of Jean-Antoine Watteau's painting, Gilles (1718).
Over the years, Cornell came into contact with various figures of the art, dance, and literary worlds. In the 1930s and 1940s, he met the artists, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp, and Salvador Dali, and befriended the artists, Lee Miller and Dorothea Tanning. His formative friendships during 1940s were with the artist, Pavel Tchelitchew, the writers, Charles Henri Ford (founder of the avant-garde periodical, View), Parker Tyler, and Donald Windham, and the balletomane, Lincoln Kirstein (founder of Dance Index). His other friends included the artists, Roberto Matta Echaurren and Robert Motherwell, the dancer and actress, Tilly Losch, and the poets, Mina Loy and Marianne Moore. In the 1950s, he associated with artists from the Abstract Expressionist movement, including Willem de Kooning, Jack Tworkov, and Mark Rothko. Beginning in the mid-1950s, he befriended many young artists, including Lee Bontecou and Carolee Schneeman, and young actresses, including Lois Smith, Gwen Van Dam, and Suzanne Miller, whom he sought to appear in his films. And in the early 1960s, he met the Pop artists, Robert Indiana, James Rosenquist, and Andy Warhol.
Beginning in 1940, Cornell developed a keen interest in dance, particularly ballet. Ballerinas from the Romantic era, such as Marie Taglioni and Fanny Cerrito, especially captured his imagination, inspiring such works as the box, Taglioni's Jewel Casket (1940), and the Portrait of Ondine "exploration," which comprised a portfolio of material relating to Cerrito and her famous role in the ballet, Ondine. Cornell was also fascinated with the modern counterparts of the Romantic ballerinas. In 1940, he befriended the Russian ballet dancer, Tamara Toumanova, and over the years produced many works in homage to her, including swan boxes (inspired by her role in Swan Lake), boxes made with scraps from her costumes, and scrapbooks of clippings, stats, and memorabilia. In 1949, he became enamored of the French dancer, Renee "Zizi" Jeanmarie, after seeing her perform in Carmen and meeting her backstage, and he created several dance-related boxes in her honor. In 1957, he met the ballerina, Allegra Kent. After meeting again in 1964, they became friends, and she served as the subject of several works based on images reproduced from a Parmigianino painting.
In December 1940, Cornell left his job at the Traphagen textile studio to pursue art full-time. He set up a workshop in the basement of the house on Utopia Parkway, which served as a combination studio and storage space. While he spent most days at home, he continued to make regular trips into Manhattan to wander around the city, visit with friends, and hunt for material. Around this time, he began to keep a diary, recording his day-to-day experiences (usually comprising his thoughts, feelings, impressions, ideas) on scraps of paper (including used envelopes, paper bags, napkins, and ticket stubs, among other fragments). He would then type up some of these notes into more formal diary entries, but most of them remained, in his word, "scribblings." Diary keeping eventually became one of his primary activities, along with box construction, collage, research, and collecting.
By this time, his art work was beginning to sell, yet he was not able to live from these sales alone. During the 1940s, he primarily supported himself by doing freelance work for magazines such as Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Good Housekeeping, supplying illustrations from his picture collection and designing covers and layouts. He also regularly contributed pieces to View and Dance Index. His notable contributions to View included "Enchanted Wanderer: Excerpt from a Journey Album for Hedy Lamarr" (December 1941), "Story Without a Name - for Max Ernst" (April 1942), and "The Crystal Cage [portrait of Berenice]" (January 1943). His projects for Dance Index included various collage-covers, essays, and thematic issues, such as the Summer 1944 issue, which comprised a 22-page tribute to the Romantic ballerinas, Taglioni, Carlotta Grisi, Cerrito, and Fanny Elssler. To supplement his income, Cornell also held brief positions at an electronics plant, the Allied Control Company, Inc. (in 1943), and at a nursery, the Garden Centre (in 1944).
In 1942, Cornell created one of his more memorable works, Medici Slot Machine, embarking upon a large series of Medici boxes in which he utilized reproductions of portraits by Italian Renaissance artists, such as Sofonisba Anguissola and Pinturicchio. His other boxes from this time period explored themes ranging from ballet, as in A Pantry Ballet (for Jacques Offenbach) (1942), to doomed love, as in Paolo and Francesca (1943-48), to nature, as in the Sand Boxes (1940s) and Sand Fountains (1950s). Cornell often created boxes in series, producing variations on a theme with variants that differed significantly or only slightly. Over the years, series included: Pink Palaces, Pharmacies, Habitats, Aviaries, Dovecotes, Hotels, Observatories, and Night Skies, among others.
In late 1945, Cornell joined the Hugo Gallery, which was run by Alexander Iolas, and a year later mounted the show, "Romantic Museum at the Hugo Gallery: Portraits of Women by Joseph Cornell" (December 1946). He designed the exhibition catalog for this show, which consisted of portraits - box constructions, objects, and "dossiers" - of the opera singers, Giuditta Pasta and Maria Malibran, the ballerinas, Taglioni and Cerrito, and the actresses, Eleanora Duse, Jeanne Eagels, Greta Garbo, and Jennifer Jones, and which also featured one of his most famous boxes, Untitled (Penny Arcade Portrait of Lauren Bacall) (1945-46).
In 1949, Cornell joined the Egan Gallery, which was run by Charles Egan. Around this time, he began creating his series of Aviary boxes, which explored the symbolism of birds and birdcages. He showed twenty-six of these box constructions in his first exhibition at the Egan Gallery, "Aviary by Joseph Cornell" (December 1949-January 1950). He created other series of whitewashed boxes, including the Dovecote series and a small group relating to the poet, Emily Dickinson. He then went on to explore the themes of astronomy and celestial navigation in the Observatory, Night Skies, and Hotel series. Works from these series were featured in his two remaining shows at the Egan Gallery, "Night Songs and Other Work" (December 1950-January 1951) and "Night Voyage" (February-March 1953). In the fall of 1953, sparked by seeing the painting, Figure Seated in a Cafe (1914), Cornell embarked upon a major series of bird constructions dedicated to the Cubist artist, Juan Gris. Notably, these were the only boxes he explicitly dedicated to another artist.
Over the next couple of years, Cornell's work was exhibited across the country. In 1955, he joined the Stable Gallery, which was run by Eleanor Ward. His first one-man show there, in the winter of 1955-56, was "Winter Night Skies," which featured various box constructions based on constellations. During the mid-1950s, he embarked upon a series of Sand Fountains (vertical standing boxes featuring a broken glass and sand that flowed through it when turned upside down), elaborating upon his earlier Sand Boxes (1940s). These boxes along with some of his other latest works, including the Bleriot boxes and the Space Object boxes (which comprised his final box series), were exhibited in his second and last show at the Stable Gallery, "Selected Works" (December 1957).
After leaving the Stable Gallery, Cornell had several dealers handle his work rather than allowing any one to assume too much control. Dealers included Richard Feigen (in Chicago and then in New York) and Irving Blum (in California), among others. Throughout his career, Cornell never liked selling his boxes. He was always reluctant to let his work go and became increasingly uneasy about the growing status of his work as a commodity. He preferred instead to make gifts of his art work to friends and individuals he admired (especially female ones).
In the mid-1950s, Cornell returned to making films. Rather than just splicing together found images as he had in his films of the 1930s, he began to collaborate with others to shoot original footage. He worked with the experimental filmmaker, Stan Brakhage, on two films, one about the Third Ave El which was about to be torn down ( Wonder Ring or Gnir Rednow) and the other about an old house in Cornell's neighborhood that was slated for demolition ( Centuries of June). Cornell then went on to make nine films with the filmmaker, Rudy Burckhardt, including Aviary, A Legend for Fountains, and Nymphlight, among others. In the late 1960s, he enlisted the help of Larry Jordan, who was also a filmmaker, in completing the trilogy of collage-films that he had begun in the 1930s.
Along with creating works of art and making films, Cornell was involved in a host of other creative endeavors throughout his career as an artist. These included: keeping a diary, which was for him another medium for exploring and expressing the themes, ideas, and concerns recurrent in his art work; carrying out "explorations," which typically involved conducting research, collecting material, and compiling files on persons or topics of interest to him; and other projects, such as publishing pamphlets (or brochures) dedicated to the nineteenth-century opera singers, Malibran and Giulia Grisi. Cornell's "explorations" clearly informed his artwork, but they were also works of art in and of themselves. He continually sought to share this work with an audience and twice had the opportunity to do so, when he exhibited versions of his Portrait of Ondine "exploration" at the Museum of Modern Art in 1945 and at the Wittenborn Bookstore in 1956.
Around the mid-1950s, Cornell returned to making collages as independent works of art. Unlike his earlier ones, which were composed from cutouts of black-and-white engravings, his latest collages were made with color images cut out of contemporary magazines and books. In these collages, he explored many of the same themes and preoccupations of his box constructions, including birds, as in Couleur de Peche (1967) and Untitled (Vierge Vivace) (1970), children's games, as in the Penny Arcade series (1960s), and actresses, as in The Sister Shades (1956). Towards the end of his career, collage became his principal medium.
By this time, Cornell was taking fewer trips into Manhattan. Instead, he spent more time at home or traveled only so far as downtown Flushing, where he frequented the public library, hunted for material in stores, such as Woolworth's, and passed time in the coffee-shops on Main Street. From this time on, he kept his diary with increasing regularity, taking down notations with more frequency and creating entries of greater length.
In 1961, fourteen of Cornell's boxes, including Medici Slot Machine, were exhibited as part of the "The Art of Assemblage" show at the Museum of Modern Art. As his biographer notes, Cornell came to view this show "as a turning point in his creative life," marking the "[fall] off in his work" that took place in the sixties (Solomon 271-2). He continued to work on boxes that he had begun long before, but, after this time, rarely if ever constructed new ones. Instead, he focused on making collages and became increasingly concerned with other projects, such as organizing his basement workshop, for which he hired various "helpers" or assistants (mostly young women) over the years. He also became more and more prone to obsessions (or preoccupations, as he called them) with various young women that he encountered both in fantasy (actresses on stage or in films) and in real life (working girls in the city, "teeners" on Main Street, or his female visitors and "helpers" at home). These preoccupations infused his diary writings, and inspired the keeping of "dossiers" on particular individuals and the creation of various collages dedicated to others, including most notably the Penny Arcade series dedicated to Joyce Hunter (or "Tina," as he referred to her in his writings).
After Robert's death in February 1965, Cornell created a series of collages in his memory, many of which incorporated his brother's drawings of animal characters. In January 1966, he exhibited some of these collages, alongside a selection of Robert's drawings, in a show at the Robert Schoelkopf Gallery, "Robert Cornell: Memorial Exhibition." In 1967, there were two retrospective exhibitions of Cornell's work, "An Exhibition of Works by Joseph Cornell" at the Pasadena Art Museum and "Joseph Cornell" at the Guggenheim Museum. By now, Cornell was receiving considerable public recognition for his work. He had received his first profile (by Howard Griffin) in the December 1957 issue of Art News and, ten years later, was treated to a 12-page spread (by David Bourdon) in the December 1967 issue of Life magazine. He was also the recipient of various prizes for his art work, including the M.V Kohnstamm Prize at the Art Institute of Chicago's "62nd American Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture" in 1957 and the winning prize in India's first Triennale of Contemporary World Art in 1968.
In the last years of his life (especially from the time of his mother's death in the fall of 1966), Cornell suffered from severe depression and loneliness, and withdrew even further from the outside world. However, he still maintained relationships with various young friends and artists, who frequently visited Utopia Parkway and/or served as one of his assistants. He became more and more interested in sharing his work with a younger audience and his last two exhibitions in 1972 were expressly for children, "A Joseph Cornell Exhibition for Children" at the Cooper Union School of Art and Architecture and "Joseph Cornell - Collages and Boxes" at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York.
Cornell continued to work until the end of his life, "refurbishing" earlier boxes and creating memorial collages. Following prostate surgery in June 1972, he spent several months recuperating with family in Westhampton before returning to Utopia Parkway in November. He died of heart failure at home on December 29, 1972.
The biographical note draws heavily from Deborah Solomon's biography, Utopia Parkway: The Life and Work of Joseph Cornell (New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 1997), and Diane Waldman's book, Joseph Cornell: Master of Dreams (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 2002).
Related Material:
The Archives holds several collections of different provenance that relate to Joseph Cornell, including the small collections of Allison Delarue (comprised of two letters from Cornell, available on reel 2803), Muriel Streeter Schwartz (comprised of two letters from Cornell, available on reel 4283), Wayne Andrews (comprised of letters from Cornell and printed material), and Marion Netter (comprised of items received from Cornell). In addition, photographs of Cornell can be found amongst the Hans Namuth photographs and papers. Also found within the Archives is a transcribed interview of Cornell's sister, Elizabeth Cornell Benton, conducted on April 21, 1976 as part of the oral history program.
Separated Material:
The bulk of Cornell's source material resides in the Joseph Cornell Study Center, Smithsonian American Art Museum, along with his library and record collection. Cornell's sister, Betty Cornell Benton, donated a portion of this material directly to SAAM (then known as the National Museum of American Art), occasioning the creation of the Study Center circa 1978. The bulk of the source material and library that she donated to AAA, including approximately 66 linear feet of three-dimensional and non-textual source material and 50 linear feet of books, was transferred to the Study Center in 1994 and 1995.
Originals of loaned material returned to the donor after microfilming include: some unidentified and miscellaneous correspondence; significant correspondence between Joseph Cornell and Helen S. Cornell; significant correspondence between Helen S. Cornell, family members and others; and some of Joseph Cornell's family correspondence and general correspondence from the Robert Cornell papers. The loaned material is available on microfilm reels 1055-1058 but is not described further in the Series Descriptions/Container Listing of this finding aid.
Provenance:
The Joseph Cornell papers were donated and microfilmed in several installments from 1974 to 1989 by Joseph Cornell's sister, Betty Cornell Benton. Most, but not all, of the correspondence, which was loaned for microfilming in 1974, was subsequently donated in 1989. Additional material was donated in 2004 by the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation.
Restrictions:
Use of the original papers requires an appointment.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
National Museum of American History (U.S.). Division of Politics and Reform Search this
Extent:
2 Cubic feet (6 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Photographs
Scrapbooks
Programs
Date:
circa 1924-1981.
Scope and Contents note:
This collection primarily documents Kenneth R. Harding's work as an executive at the Democratic National Congressional Committee and in the position of Sergeant at Arms of the United States House of Representatives. The collection includes photographs of politicians and foreign dignitaries, programs, printed materials, scrapbooks, correspondence, and campaign memorabilia. Materials are arranged in four series.
Series 1: Professional, 1924-1981, undated, contains pamphlets, records, correspondence, and photographs documenting Harding's work with the Democratic National Congressional Committee and as the Sergeant at Arms of the House of Representatives. Materials are arranged alphabetically by subject.
Series 2: Elections, 1937-1978, undated, contains printed documents and statistical analyses for various locations and election cycles. Much of this was probably collected during Harding's work with the Democratic National Congressional Committee. Materials are arranged chronologically.
Series 3: Photographs, 1949-1980s, contains photographs of various figures, including United States presidents and foreign and domestic dignitaries. Most date from the period in which Harding worked as Sergeant at Arms of the House of Representatives. Materials are arranged alphabetically by subject.
Series 4: Clippings, 1956-1981, contains newspaper clippings. Although some mention Harding directly, many do not. Materials are arranged chronologically.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into four series.
Series 1: Professional Materials, 1924-1981, undated
Series 2: Elections, 1937-1978, undated
Series 3: Photographs, 1949-1980s
Series 4: Newspaper Clippings, 1956-1981
Biographical/Historical note:
Kenneth R. Harding was born in Medina, New York, to Victor Hunt Harding and Edith Falk Harding on March 28, 1914. Having foregone an undergraduate degree, Harding moved straight into law school, receiving his J.D. in 1937 from The George Washington University Law School. Shortly after finishing law school, in 1938, he married his first wife, Jane Wedderburn Harding.
In 1938, Harding took a position as a bank examiner in San Francisco, California. In the years before World War II, however, he was drawn away from that work to serve with the United States Navy. After this period and a 10-year stretch in the Air Force Reserve, he retired with the rank of colonel.
After retiring from military service, Harding transitioned into political work. Following in the footsteps of his father, a political science professor at Stanford University and former regional campaign manager for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harding took a position at the Democratic National Congressional Committee, of which his father was Chief Executive. In the aftermath of his father's death, he was, having worked with the Committee for eight years, promoted to Chief Executive. In this position, which he held from 1954-1972, he distinguished himself as a leader in the Democratic campaign effort. With a reputation for knowing the situation of almost any race, he was responsible for distributing funds to candidates to support their election efforts. He served during the tenure of four House Speakers. During this time, he also took up work as the Assistant Sergeant at Arms for the House of Representatives, his father having held a similar post for two brief periods.
Upon election to the position of House Sergeant at Arms (on October 1, 1972), Harding stepped away from his role at the Democratic National Congressional Committee. In his new position, he served as the chief officer responsible for the maintenance and security of the House side of the Capitol Building and all House office buildings, serving, ex officio, as co-chief of the Capitol Police. In this role, he worked to ban self-guided tours of the Capitol Building and to prohibit vendors from setting up near the Capitol Reflecting Pool. Concurrent with these duties, he was also responsible for maintaining the decorum of the House of Representatives, greeting officials upon arrival and escorting them to the appropriate chambers. In this role, he met and worked with a large number of national and international politicians and heads of state, including the presidents in office during his tenure.
Upon retirement in February of 1980, he moved to Ormund Beach, Florida. He passed away in 2007.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Harding to the Daytona Beach Community College in 1980. In 1998 the College returned the collection to the donor because of space reasons. Harding then donated the collection to the Division of Political History, National Museum of American History. The Division transferred the archival portion of the collection to the Archives Center in 2005.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Papers and audiovisual materials documenting Russo's career in music.
Scope and Contents:
The collection includes Russo's original and published music scores, parts and arrangements; audiovisual materials including recordings of broadcasts of Russo's radio show, performances of Russo's compositions, including performances by Duke Ellington, and film and video recordings of Russo's productions in theater and opera; and personal papers such as correspondence, photographs, scrapbooks, publicity files, contracts, etc. Among the most significant items in the collection are experimental jazz arrangements for Stan Kenton in the late 1940s-early 1950s, undated arrangements for Gerry Mulligan, Russo's original arrangement of Duke Ellington's Sacred Concert, scores to his first and second symphonies, and scores and libretti to several early rock operas. The photographs include images of persons such as Ellington, Kenton, and Billy Strayhorn, and photographs by jazz photographers Herman Leonard and William Claxton. 2007 addendum includes correspondence, mostly between Russo and his family; eighteen diaries for 1946-1967 (not all years are present) with sparse entries, some in Italian; and additional music manuscripts, parts, scores and libretti.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into nine series.
Series 1: William Russo's Music
Series 2: Teaching Notes
Series 3: Correspondence
Series 4: Publicity, Programs, and Reviews
Series 5: Posters and Artwork
Series 6: Photographs
Series 7: Books and Lecture Notebooks
Series 8: Memorabilia
Series 9: Audiovisual Materials
Biographical / Historical:
William Russo, renowned American jazz composer, arranger, and founder of the Chicago Jazz Ensemble, had a music career that spanned five decades and included performance, conducting and composition. During his career he worked with such diverse talents as Duke Ellington, Billy Strayhorn, Leonard Bernstein, Cannonball Adderly, Yehuidi Menuhin, Dizzy Gillespie, Seiji Ozawa, and Billie Holiday. Although critics acknowledged Russo mainly for his pioneering contributions to the big-band jazz canon, his talents extended to a far wider range of musical styles, creating groundbreaking jazz scores, rock operas, classical works, film scores, and educational textbooks on jazz orchestration and arrangement. In all, he composed over 200 pieces for jazz orchestra with more than 25 recordings of his work. In 1990, Russo received a Lifetime Achievement award from NARAS, the organization that presents the Grammy Awards.
As a young trombonist, Russo studied with Lennie Tristano, the pianist and theorist who became a leader in the progressive jazz movement. During the late 1940s, Russo led the revolutionary Experiment in Jazz band. At age 21, he became one of the chief composers/arrangers for the Stan Kenton Orchestra, one of the most innovative and influential jazz orchestras of the postwar era. In his four years with Kenton, Russo penned such classic Kenton works as "23° North – 82° West," and "Frank Speaking."
Russo made several major jazz recordings under his own name before his classical "Symphony No. 2 in C (TITANS)" received a Koussevitsky award in 1959; it was performed by the New York Philharmonic that same year under Leonard Bernstein, who had commissioned the work. This award marked Russo's "official" entry into the world of classical music. Russo continued to write major symphonic works throughout his career, including his 1992 grand opera, "Dubrovsky."
After his tenure with Kenton, in the early 1950s, Russo led his own successful bands, The Russo Orchestra in New York, and the London Jazz Orchestra, before returning to Chicago to form the Chicago Jazz Ensemble in 1065. With the Ensemble, he presented Duke Ellington's "First Concert of Sacred Music" in 1967. This was one of the rare times when Ellington allowed one of his compositions to be arranged and performed by a jazz orchestra other than his own, and was a reflection of Ellington's respect for Russo. Shortly after this performance, Russo composed a rock cantata, "The Civil War," that led him into the field of rock opera. After concentrating on classical music again in the 1970s, in the late 1980s, Russo began to re-explore the history of jazz through his revived Chicago Jazz Ensemble. In 1995, the Chicago Jazz Ensemble made history with the first-ever complete live performance of Gil Evans' and Miles Davis' "Sketches of Spain" in its original form. Recent Russo works that premiered in Chicago included "Chicago Suite No. 1," and "Chicago Suite No. 2," a recording that was published posthumously in the spring of 2003.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
William Russo Transcription and Arrangement of Duke Ellington's First Concert of Sacred Music, 1967-1968 (AC0406)
Provenance:
Bequeathed to the Smithsonian by William Russo. Papers collected after Russo's death in 2003. The 2007 addendum sent by Russo's sister and daughter were also part of the bequest.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but an oil painting is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The papers of popular songwriter Harry Warren, three time Academy Award winner and prolific contributer to the American songbook.
Scope and Contents:
The Harry Warren Papers consists of original music manuscripts, scores, song sheets, commercial sheet music, bound scores, scripts, business records, correspondence (business, personal and fan), clippings, magazines, photographs, cassette tapes, LP records, posters and programs and personal memorabilia. The material documents the personal life and professional career of composer, songwriter and lyricist Harry Warren from 1894 to 1981 and to a lesser extent the operation of his Four Jays Music Corporation, circa 1954-2000. The bulk of the collection covers the years 1927-1980. The collection is organized into eight series.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into eight series.
Series 1: Music Manuscripts, 1928-1987
Subseries 1.1: Original Holographic Theatre and Motion Picture Music Manuscripts, 1930-1960
With the possible exception of Irving Berlin, no one has contributed as much material to the canon of American popular song in the 20th century as Harry Warren (1893-1981). Warren was born in Brooklyn, New York, December 24, 1893, to Italian immigrant parents. His birth name was Salvatore Anthony Guaragna. By the time he graduated from grade school, he was known as "Harry Warren". He legally changed his name in 1938. He was educated in the public schools of New York but had no formal musical training. He taught himself to play the organ and piano and also sang in the church choir. Both Warren's sister and brother were performers so the theatrical world was not unknown to him. He worked as an actor and assistant director for the Vitagraph film studio in New York and played mood music for actress Corinne Griffith. During World War I, Warren served in the United States Navy at Montauk Point, New York. For a few weeks after the war, he worked as an insurance examiner for The Travellers Agency.
In December 1918, Warren married Josephine Wensler (1897-1993). Their first child was a son named Harry Warren, Jr. (1920-1937). In 1920, Warren became a song plugger for the music publishing firm of Stark & Cowan. Warren continued writing and in 1922 along with lyricist Edgar Leslie produced his first song hit, "Rose of the Rio Grande." From that point on, Warren composed a continuous stream of hits introduced by such artists as Paul Whiteman and others. By 1925, a second child, Joan (1924-1991), nicknamed "Cookie", was born. Warren continued his success with such songs as "I Love My Baby (My Baby Loves Me)," "In My Gondola" and the very popular 1928 hit "Nagasaki."
By 1929, Warren was the director of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). He held that position until 1933. He also served on the ASCAP Board of Directors. During this time Warren worked with various musicians including Gus Kahn, Bert Kalmer, and Harry Ruby. In 1930, he wrote his first motion picture score for the film Spring is Here. Al Jolson asked him to compose a song for the show, Wonder Bar (1931). During the 1930s, Warren composed three other Broadway shows, Sweet and Low (1930), Crazy Quilt (1931) featuring Fanny Brice, and Laugh Parade (1931) starring Ed Wynn.
In 1932, Warren was hired by Warner Brothers Studios to help write songs for the Dick Powell, Ruby Keeler film 42nd Street (1933). Along with lyricist, Al Dubin, Warren wrote such hits as "We're in the Money" and "The Shadow Waltz". Warren continued composing memorable songs for motion pictures such as Gold Diggers of 1933, The Singing Marine (1937), and Footlight Parade (1933). Gold Diggers of 1935 included Warren's first Academy Award winning song, "Lullaby of Broadway". Warren made cameo appearances in a few films during his stay at Warner Brothers. He and lyricist Dubin can be seen in 42nd Street, Go Into Your Dance (1935), and A Very Honorable Guy (1934). He also appeared in a Vitaphone short entitled Harry Warren: America's Foremost Composer.
Warren left Warner Brothers for 20th Century Fox in 1940. At Fox he helped compose the scores for such motion pictures as, Sun Valley Serenade (1941), Orchestra Wives (1942), and The Gangs All Here (1943) that included the Carmen Miranda standard, "The Lady in the Tutti-Frutti Hat". During this period, he worked with lyricists Ralph Rainger, Mack Gordon and Leo Robin, and others. Hello Frisco, Hello (1943) garnered Warren his second Academy Award for the song, "You'll Never Know". While at Fox, Warren composed "Chattanooga Choo Choo" a song that became the first gold record in the history of the recording industry.
In 1945, legendary musical film producer Arthur Freed at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer courted Warren for his MGM production unit. Freed quipped that Warren would have the office right next door to his--and he did. For Warren the offer to write music at the studio that practically invented the movie musical was irresistible and he left 20th Century Fox for MGM. He joined Freed in writing the songs for Yolanda and the Thief (1945) starring Fred Astaire and Freed's protégée Lucille Bremer. The film was directed by the incomparable Vincent Minnelli. His next high profile score was for The Harvey Girls (1946) composed with renowned lyricist Johnny Mercer. The picture starred Judy Garland and John Hodiak. Directed by George Sidney, it was a major success, due in part to Warren's tuneful "On the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe". This song brought Warren his third and what would be his final Academy Award.
While at MGM, Warren worked with lyricists Mack Gordon, Ralph Blane, and others. In 1948, he and Blane composed the song score for Freed and director Rouben Mamoulian's ambitious film adaptation of Eugene O'Neills stage play Ah Wilderness entitled Summer Holiday (1948) starring Mickey Rooney and Gloria DeHaven. This is reported to have been Warren's favorite film assignment, but the film was not an unqualified success. Warren remained at MGM until the 1950s composing for such films as The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), starring Astaire and Rogers, Summer Stock (1950), starring Judy Garland and Gene Kelly and his final film for MGM, Skirts Ahoy! (1952), starring Esther Williams and Vivian Blane. After leaving MGM, Warren wrote the score for the Bing Crosby film, Just for You at Paramount. Warren also served on the Board of Directors for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Warren went on to write the music for two Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin films, The Caddy (1953) for which he composed "That's Amore", Artists and Models (1955) and for three Jerry Lewis films, Rock-a-Bye Baby (1958), Cinderfella (1960), and The Ladies Man (1961). Warren also composed instrumental pieces one being a "Mass in Honor of St. Anthony".
Warren returned to Broadway in 1956 with the musical Shangri-La, based on the novel Lost Horizon. The show was not a success and closed after fewer than thirty performances. He composed the title song for the Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr film, An Affair to Remember (1957); this song brought him his last nomination for an Academy Award. The song was later used in the motion picture Sleepless in Seattle (1993) starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.
During the 1950s, Warren started his own music publishing company, Four Jays Music Corporation. After writing the songs for The Ladies Man, Warren retired from films but continued to write for piano, even composing the song for the Miss Oklahoma Pageant. His last film effort was to compose one song for the motion-picture Rosie (1968). During the last years of his life Warren composed and ran his music publishing business, but remained largely forgotten as the man who had composed a great deal of America's musical heritage.
With the resurgence in the appreciation of the movie musical in the early 1970s, the tunes composed during Warren's heyday were back in vogue, brought on in a large part by the phenomenal success of MGM's That's Entertainment! (1974). In 1980, he was asked to compose the musical numbers for an upcoming movie musical entitled, Manhattan Melody but it was never produced.
1980 brought the Warren name back to the marquees of Broadway with the David Merrick production of 42nd St.. The full budgeted big Broadway musical used the basic storyline from the 1933 film and drew upon the whole of the Warren and Dubin catalogue for the score. The production proved to be wildly popular, running in excess of five years on Broadway. Warren died in California on September 22, 1981. He was interred in the Sanctuary of Tenderness at Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles beside his wife and son. After Warren's death, his daughter Joan "Cookie" Warren Jones administered the music publishing company until her death in 1991.
Key:
OF = Original Film, RV = Reference Video, MV = Master Video
Separated Materials:
The Division of Cultural History (now Division of Cultural and Community Life) has three dimensional objects related to Harry Warren.
Provenance:
Donated to the Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution by Julia Riva and Jophe Jones, granddaughters of Harry Warren, on December 15, 2000.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but the audiovisual materials are stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Researchers must use reference copies of audio-visual materials. When no reference copy existsContact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
10.7 Linear feet ((partially microfilmed on 6 reels))
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Place:
United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945
United States -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945
Date:
1900-1979
Scope and Contents:
Correspondence; diaries; business records; printed material; photographs; and miscellaneous items.
Reel NDA 27: Correspondence with Forbes Watson, Olin Dows, Edward B. Rowan and others about Carter's career as an artist and as a supervisor in the Federal Arts Project in Ohio; and several personal letters from Charles Campbell.
Reel N68-19: Memorabilia, including old letters, clippings, family records, and early family photographs.
Reel N70-40: Clippings and other printed material regarding Carter's Holbrook grandparents.
Reels N733-N734: Correspondence with art dealers, with museum directors, relating to exhibitions and specific paintings, and his involvement with the Federal Art Project, 1927-1966.
Reel 85: Clippings; catalogs; journal reproductions of Carter's work; and correspondence relating to Carter's supervision of the painting of post office murals in Portsmouth and Ravenna, Ohio and to the Municipal collection of Cleveland Art project under the Treasury Section and Federal Art Project; also discussion of three exhibits organized by Carter and toured by the Smithsonian Institution during 1966-1970. Correspondents include Edward Rowan, Holger Cahill, and Charles Campbell.
UNMICROFILMED: Family and business correspondence relating to his painting; business files containing correspondence and printed material; exhibition catalogs; photographs of works of art; passports and other travel documents; annotated calendars, 1969-1971; diary entries, Jan.-Apr. 1929; bills and receipts; and printed material.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter, designer, director of Federal Art Project; Cleveland, Ohio.
Provenance:
Material on reels NDA27 and N68-19 lent by Carter, 1964 and 1968; remainder donated by Carter, 1969-1979.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Microfilmed materials must be consulted on microfilm. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Papers documenting Cheatham's career as a jazz trumpeter. The papers include passports, appointment and address books; photographs, both personal and professional; a transcript of an interview of Cheatham; sheet music, including parts for various instruments; home movies from Cheatham's travels; awards and certificates; printed material including posters, programs, clippings.
Scope and Contents:
The Adolphus "Doc" Cheatham Papers contain publications, photographs, correspondence, memorabilia, autobiographical materials, music, awards, and audio and visual recordings documenting his life and career as a big band and jazz trumpeter.
The collection is 11 cubic feet and is organized into five series: Series 1: Publications, Series 2: Photographs and Artwork, Series 3: Personal Papers and Memorabilia, Series 4: Music and Awards, and Series 5: Audioviusal Materials. The majority of the material dates from the mid-1930s to the late 1990s.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into five series.
Series 1: Publications, circa 1950s-1990s
Series 2: Photographs and Artwork, 1930s-1990s
Series 3: Personal Papers and Memorabilia, circa 1930s-1990s
Series 4: Music and Awards, circa 1940s-1990s
'
Series 5: Audiovisual Materials, circa 1930s-1990s
Biographical / Historical:
Adolphus "Doc" Cheatham (1905-1997) was born in Nashville, Tennessee. He grew up playing trumpet and saxophone in the pit orchestra of the Bijou Theater where he accompanied such blues artists as Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith. His first professional break was with Marion Hardy's band for the Sunshine Sammy Revue.
After touring with Hardy's band in 1924, Cheatham taught himself to read music and moved to Chicago, where he became acquainted with Louis Armstrong. Under the influence of Armstrong, Cheatham decided to play trumpet exclusively and eventually subbed for Armstrong. While in Chicago, Cheatham also worked with Wilbur De Paris and Chick Webb. Between 1927 and 1930 he toured Europe as the lead trumpet player for Sam Wooding.
When Cheatham returned to the United States in 1930, he joined Marion Hardy's Alabamians, but eventually took a position in McKinney's Cotton Pickers. In 1933 he joined Cab Calloway's Orchestra and toured with him for nine years, including a tour of South America. Cheatham took a few months off in 1933 but soon found himself in recording studios with such jazz legends as Count Basie and Billie Holiday. During recording sessions and performances throughout the 1940s Cheatham continued to develop his skills as a trumpet soloist in big bands and smaller ensembles.
The eventual decline of big bands in the 1950s led Cheatham to explore Latin music. As a result, he performed with Marcelino Guerra, Perez Prado, and Machitos Band. Cheatham reunited with Wilbur De Paris in 1957 for a tour of Africa and in the following year he toured Europe with Sammy Price. In 1960 he returned to Africa with Herbie Mann and later moved to New York where he led his own band.
During the 1960s Cheatham decided to build on his past music influences to improve himself as a soloist and improviser. Consequently, he gained an international reputation as a trumpet soloist. It was at this time that he also began singing on his recordings. Throughout the rest of his career he remained in high demand on the concert and festival circuit.
Cheatham continued performing and recording into the 1990s. Every Sunday for the last years of his life he played at Sweet Basil, his "hangout" club in New York. In 1996 he recorded an album with then newcomer Nicholas Payton. However, the morning after a 1997 concert with Payton in Washington, D.C. Cheatham suffered a fatal stroke. He did not live to see his collaboration with Payton receive a Grammy for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance in 1998.
Separated Materials:
The Division of Culture and the Arts (now Division of Cultural and Community Life) holds related artifacts: a trumpet, trumpet mutes, bowtie, and pair of glasses.
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Archives Center by Amanda N. Cheatham, widow of Doc Cheatham, June, 2002.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
National Museum of American History (U.S.). Division of Community Life Search this
Extent:
1 Cubic foot (3 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Photographs
Date:
ca. 1930s-1940s
Summary:
Publicity photographs and postcards of entertainers, mostly jazz musicians and leaders of dance bands, etc., and related memorabilia.
Scope and Contents note:
The collection contains primarily publicity photographs: a mixture of prints from original negatives, prints from copy negatives, etc. Most are 8" x 10" or 5" x 7", some smaller, and some are postcard size or smaller (these include Areal photo@ postcards, i.e., original photographic images printed on special silver gelatin paper). A few photomechanical images are included, as well as a few letters from celebrities to Mr. Bukowski, 1938-1939. The earliest item noted in the collection is a 1933 Christmas card. Several examples of Gene Krupa=s novelty pin, consisting of crossed drumsticks and a miniature phonograph record, are included. The actual number of items in each folder is shown in the Container List; items are conventional silver gelatin photoprints unless otherwise identified. There is also a scrapbook containing news clippings, photographs, and other memorabilia, with a list, affixed to the back cover, of bands which Mr. Bukowski heard in person. Although some of the photographs bear autographs with generic, somewhat impersonal messages, many are addressed personally to the collector and are fine examples of the interaction between celebrity and fan. The notation Asigned@ in the Container List identifies items autographed by performers.
Most of the subjects are musicians and entertainers associated with big jazz and popular music bands of the period; however, most of the images are studio publicity portraits of individual bandleaders and stars, rather than pictures of entire bands. Photographers represented include Bruno of Hollywood and Maurice Seymour, although many others are not identified.
Publicity photographs often were not archivally processed, and many photoprints in the collection show evidence of fading and yellowing from inadequate fixation or washing. Prints which are in exceptionally good condition are noted in the Container List.
Mr. Bukowski formed this collection in the 1930s and 1940s, but he added a few related items in the 1980s and 1990s.
Arrangement:
Collection is arranged into one series.
Biographical/Historical note:
Henry S. Bukowski collected these pictures and other memorabilia during the 1930s and 1940s as a fan of big band music. He began his collection while in grammar school through library research, by locating bands active in New York City, then sending them penny postcards to request autographed publicity pictures. He also listened to late-night radio broadcasts and copied the addresses of bands based in other parts of the country. AOut went my penny postcards,@ he notes. After hearing trombonist Tommy Dorsey=s band at a local ballroom at age fourteen, he became interested in the instrument, and his older brothers Bernie and Ted bought him his first trombone from a pawnshop for ten dollars. When he was old enough, he frequented the New Haven Arena and the State Theatre in Hartford, Connecticut to hear bands in person. These bands and the admission prices he paid (25 to 99 cents) are listed in his scrapbook. Mr. Bukowski maintained an avid interest in popular Abig band@ jazz and swing music as both a fan and a player, and eventually served with a U.S. Army band for three and a half years after being drafted.
Mr. Bukowski was born on April 11, 1922 in Wallingford, Connecticut, the youngest of nine children. He was married to Mildred Moss for forty-eight years until her death October 15, 2000; they had no children. In a letter of September 1, 2001, he reported that he had one surviving sibling, a brother in Wallingford.
Source
Letter, 2 pp., in Archives Center collection control file. The Archives Center is grateful to Mr. Bukowski for his generous gift as well as his thoughtfulness in providing the above information.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Henry S. Bukowski, 1984.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research and access on site by appointment. Unprotected photographs must be handled with gloves.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Most of the photographs presumably are under copyright, but they were made and widely distributed for free publication.
Ellington, Mercer Kennedy, 1919-1996 (musician) Search this
Extent:
1.33 Cubic feet (4 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Audiotapes
Photographs
Clippings
Programs
Correspondence
Television scripts
Date:
1924-1990
Scope and Contents:
Photographs, event programs, periodicals, cassette audio tapes, correspondence, TV program scripts and pamphlets documenting Duke Ellington's career as a musician, 1924-1974, and his legacy after his death.
Arrangement:
Divided into five series.
Series 1; Photographs, 1964-1968
Series 2: Publications, 1944-1990
Series 3: Memorabilia, 1965-1981
Series 4: Correspondence and sketches, 1958-1990
Series 5; Cassette audio tapes, 1924-1933
Biographical / Historical:
Businessman and Ellington enthusiast, Robert Udkoff was born in Chicago and first heard Duke Ellington perform at Chicago's Oriental Theater in 1928. In 1932 he established a cordial relationship with Ellington that lasted until Ellington's death in 1974.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Robert Udkoff, 1991, January 29.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Scrapbook, photograph album, published family book, photographic prints, and news clippings related to Virginia Mead's family.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists of a scrapbook, a photograph album, and a published family book with Chinese text and reproductions of portrait photographs. The scrapbook and album contain clippings and memorabilia from the Lee family, which had emigrated from China to New York, and miscellaneous unmounted photographs. This material dates primarily from the 1920s to the 1940s, although a few items are as late as 1970. Most of the persons in the photographs are not identified, although travel pictures in such places as Hawaii and Haiti are captioned. However, a few newspaper clippings in the collection in which photographs apparently depict members of the Lee and Shue families and/or the articles relate to them.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into one series.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Alison Shue (Mrs. John) Lee and Mrs. Poon Lam Mok (Grace Lee) of New York, through Virginia (Mrs. Robert H.) Mead of Washington, D.C., 1994.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. The scrapbooks are in fragile condition. See repository for more details about handling.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The collection consists of seven series, the largest, Series 1, being the postcards. The largest categories in this series are the geographic, both United States and foreign, and greeting cards. The most important and probably the most interesting of the geographic cards are from Maryland as they give us an historic view of the state. This is particularly true of the large number of cards depicting Baltimore and its buildings, parks, schools, etc. There are several cards showing the Great Fire of February 7, 1904 and postcards such as this are a valuable historic resource.
The greeting cards are primarily from the "golden age" of postcards and were sent or given on many occasions. There are large numbers of Christmas, Easter and Valentines Day cards, but there are also substantial numbers of cards for days that we no longer associate with card giving such as Decoration Day (now known as Memorial Day) and Washington's Birthday (though these cards are included under political figures in Box 8).
There are a number of postcards depicting various Popes and other religious themes such as the Lord's Prayer. Some of the postcards of Rome have cartouches of a Pope in the center of the pictures and were sent by a monsignor to someone in Baltimore.
Many cards show various means of transportation such as airplanes, boats and ships, and railroads and streetcars. Another interesting category is "novelty" with a number of postcards with pictures of women with real hair. Throughout the collection there are other novelty cards on wood and leather.
The other series are smaller, though all consist of ephemera collected by Mrs. Litzinger. Series 2, Oversize Postcards, and Series 3, Greeting Cards are the largest and those most directly related to the primary collection. These series are organized in the same manner as Series 1.
Series 4 consists of paper dolls, another popular collectible in the early part of the century. Series 5 consists of scraps which were chromolithographed pictures which were either cut out of printed sheets of pictures and designs or punched out of die cut sheets. The designs were then used to make early greeting cards or were placed in albums called scrap books. Sometimes scraps and postcards were included in the same album. Series 6 consists of trade cards which were used to advertise various businesses. Sometimes these were in the form of postcards and sometimes the designs were cut out to make scraps, so it is easy to see how these various types of ephemera are inter-related. Series 7 consists of a small number of miscellaneous items such as metal prints the size of postcards, religious cards, political birthday cards, magazine clippings, plastic cards, invitations and bicentennial souvenirs.
Arrangement:
Collection arranged into seven series.
Biographical / Historical:
This collection of postcards and other ephemera was assembled by Beatrice Litzinger who lived her entire life in and around Baltimore, Maryland. The collection is particularly rich in view cards from both Baltimore and Maryland.
The collection also has a large number of greeting cards from the "golden age." It was acquired by the Archives Center in February, 1997 from Joseph Litzinger, the widower of Beatrice Litzinger who died in 1995. We know little about Mrs. Litzinger or how she acquired her collection as it came to the Archives Center after she died by way of a nun with whom she had become friendly and was returning to Ireland. Her husband was quite elderly and had moved to California though he indicated that Mrs. Litzinger had wanted her collection to come to the Smithsonian. The collection was donated by him to the Smithsonian in memory of his wife.
It is believed that Mrs. Litzinger started to collect postcards when she was young. She continued to collect throughout her life. She purchased some of the postcards, and others were mailed to her or given to her by friends. A large portion of the modern geographic postcards came by way of an extended family of friends and neighbors who traveled extensively. Mrs. Litzinger was deeply religious and a devout Catholic and the collection has a substantial number of religious postcards including some sent to her by a writer we believe was her parish priest on trips to Rome.
General:
Picture postcards were immensely popular at the beginning of the twentieth century. They were a novelty at a time when large numbers of people of moderate means began to travel. They became souvenirs of trips and an easy way for travelers to communicate with friends and relatives left behind. At the same time, the low cost of stamps and postcards combined with colorful and imaginative pictures and greetings made them a convenient way to send greetings at holidays and for other special events such as birthdays.
Postal regulations did not allow private postcards until the 1890's. Though the dates varied from country to country, in the United States these were first allowed in 1898. The period 1901-1907 is known as the undivided back era. Until 1907 the picture or design was on the front and only the address was to appear on the back, forcing the message to be written on or around the image. On March 1, 1907 postcards with divided backs for address and message were allowed in the United States, though they had been permitted in England as early as 1902. This was the beginning of the divided back era and the "golden age" of postcards which continued until 1915.
During this period, collecting postcards and other ephemera became a very popular pastime. Often they were placed in scrapbooks and albums. The subject range of postcards is almost limitless and various categories, such as view cards, greeting cards, humor or novelties, were collected. Often the postcards were printed in sets or series and many were designed by famous artists. Postcard collecting in the United States was given the name deltiology and is still a popular hobby.
Most of the postcards during the "golden age" were printed in Europe, primarily in Germany, where the printing technology was considered the best. The start of World War I ended this importation and from 1915 printing was concentrated in England and the United States. White border cards were developed at this time and they were popular until 1930, though greeting card publication declined and only view cards remained popular. From 1930 until 1945 ( or, variously, 1955 or 1960) linen postcards were published, using a type of paper that had the look and uneven feel of linen. Photochrome postcards, which tend to be slick and glossy, were introduced in 1939 and are still in use today. During the entire period, starting around 1900, real photographs, which could be matte or glossy, color or black and white, or hand tinted, were used.
View cards have been the most popular type of card collected. In addition to being souvenirs of places traveled, they offer historic references to buildings and places which have changed or may no longer exist.
Related Materials:
Materials at the Archives Center
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, ca. 1724-1977 (AC0060)
Lou Newman Collection of Baseball Memorabilia (AC0696)
Provenance:
Gift of Joseph Litzinger in memory of his wife, Beatrice Litzinger.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
