History of the Book 2024

Dickinson Blog for ENGL 222

Month: December 2024 (Page 1 of 3)

The Secrets: To the Readers

December 31, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Ai Lettori: To the Readers

Who were these readers?

I am studying a 1615 English Edition of The Secrets of Alexis. The book was originally published in Italian under the name De’ Secreti del Reverendo Donno Alessio Piemontese in 1555 (WorldCat). This book was printed by William Stansby in London. It is a book of recipes for medicines, dyes, cosmetics, alchemy, etc. For more information on the physical book or the people who helped make it, please see my previous posts The Secrets of Alexis  and The Secrets of … Who?.

In my last post, I looked at the “To the Reader” and the way the author describes himself in it. This time, I want to look at how he views the reader, or rather, readers. In the Italian, this section is titled “Ai Lettori,” meaning “To the Readers,” the “i” at the end of both words indicating plural readers. With the vast popularity of the book, I feel the Italian offers a more fitting heading.

Alessio spent his life collecting these “secrets,” reaching a point where he was “assured that few other men [had] so many as” him. He had originally kept these recipes secret because out of “ambition and vain glory, to know that which another should be ignorant of.” He changed his mind, however, after a man had died of something he might have cured because he was too proud to share the remedy, and the physician was too vain to let another man help his patient. He wanted these “secrets” made public so that no one else would die in vain. In this way, his target audience is everyone and anyone possible—as many people as possible.

With so many print runs in so many languages, The Secrets of Alexis was certainly successful in reaching a wide audience. In 1894, an article from The Hospital notes how people would carry copies cheaply bound in blue paper with them to country fairs and such from the mid-16th into the early 17th century. This indicates, firstly, that the book was a staple for home remedies and amateur alchemy for almost half a century, and secondly, that historians have used The Secrets study the medical understanding of people at the time of its publication and the peak of its popularity. In a way, the historians are another, though unanticipated, audience of the book.

Charles C. Sellers, c.1970

As for this specific copy, I know for certain of only two owners: Dickinson College and Charles Coleman Sellers. Sellers was born in Overbrook, Pennsylvania March 16th, 1903. He attended Haverford College, graduating in 1925, and then earned his Master of Arts at Harvard the following year. In 1957, he received his doctorate from Temple University. He worked as a historian and a librarian for various libraries and institutions. These include Wesleyan University (1937-1949), American Philosophic Society of Philadelphia (1947-1951), Dickinson College (1949-1969), and Waldron Pheonix Belknap Jr. Research Library of American Painting (1956-1958). He was also the editor for the American Colonial Painting (1959), as well as an esteemed author. Much of his work focused on early United States art history. He published three books on Charles Willson Peale in 1947, 1952, and 1969, as well as Benjamin Franklin in Portraiture (1962) Dickinson College: A History (1973), and Patience Wright (1976). Sellers was married twice. His first wife was actress Helen Earle Gilbert (m. 1932-1951), whom this volume was donated in memory of.  In 1952, after Gilbert’s passing, Sellers married Barbra S. Roberts.

This book was donated at some point between his first wife’s passing in 1951 and his own passing in 1980. There does not appear to be any further information on Sellers and how he got The Secrets, what he thought about it, when or why he donated it to the college, etc. It seems that because he worked in the archives, he felt such fanfare for his own donations were unnecessary, much to my dismay.

I imagine Sellers was not the first nor only owner of this book because it was printed nearly three centuries before he was born. Moreover, I noticed pencil markings on several pages, drawing attention to specific recipes. These markings may have been made by Sellers, but because of a trend I noticed in these recipes—that more than a third of them relate to sexual issues (menstruation, pregnancy, boils on the groin, etc.)—I think the book may have been read by someone researching or interested in the history of people’s understanding of sexual health. This would most certainly not be the audience that Alessio intended The Secrets for because these recipes were supposedly added in later additions, likely by a publisher or William Ward while he was translating the work to English (Martins). Also, I think this “other reader” was a woman because they underlined “in the nature of” referring to a woman, highlighting the difference in the way men and women were described in this remedy.

Interestingly, the pencil markings are mostly in the second part of the book, meaning more recipes relating to sexual health in the third part were not marked. The other recipes marked look at various topics: serpents, lizards, dogs, sunblock, warts, wild beasts, “marvelous dreams” etc. It is possible that these recipes were marked because they seemed a little impractical or impossible and the reader was amused by them. Branches put in a person’s ears, for example, do not prevent sunburn on the top of a person’s head. The trend I noticed above might actually be coincidence, and so many of these recipes were marked because there was so much faulty understanding about this topic, especially about women. A toad tied to a woman’s neck will not end her menstruation quicker, nor will any herb make a woman more likely to bear sons than daughters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

“Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980).” Dickinson College Archives & Special Collections, 2005. https://archives.dickinson.edu/people/charles-coleman-sellers-1903-1980. Accessed 2 December 2024

“De’ secreti del reverendo Donno Alessio Piemontese. Prima [-terza] parte.” Internet Archive, 2 March 2018. https://archive.org/details/BIUSante_pharma_res018694/m ode/2up. Accessed 2 December 2024

Martins, Julia. “The Secrets.” Cems KCL Blog, 14 July 2023. https://kingsearlymodern.co.uk/ key-texts/the-secrets. Accessed 21 November 2024

Ruscelli, Girolamo. The Secrets of Alexis [Pseud.]: Containing Many Excellent Remedies against Divers Diseases, Wounds, and Other Accidents. With the Manner to Make Distillations, Parfumes … and Meltings … Newly corrected and Amended, and also Somewhat more enlarged in certaine places, Which wanted in the former editions., Printed by W. Stansby for R. Meighen, 1615. 1

“The Secrets of Alexis.” The Hospital vol. 16,407 (1894): 313.

  1. This is the citation for the edition of The Secrets I worked with based on the Dickinson College Library Catalogue, which, like many catalogues, accredits the book to Ruscelli.

The Many Audiences of An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts Containing their Foundation, Proceedings, and the Succeses of their Missionaries in the British Colonies, to the Year 1728

December 30, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Authors do not write books in a vacuum. As Michel Foucault theorized, authors craft books within a capitalist market framework that guides them to write first and foremost to sell their work, as seen with the previous examinations of David Humphreys’ 1730 book as a material work and historical item (Foucault, 291). In this sense, authors explicitly construct their books for their intended audience, oftentimes prospective buyers. In the case of the 1730 work An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts Containing their Foundation, Proceedings, and the Succeses of their Missionaries in the British Colonies, to the Year 1728 the author addressed British King George II to maintain royal funding for the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. The author, David Humphreys, was an active member of the Society who composed the work on behalf of the organization. The organization organized missionary efforts in the British colonies in North America, evangelizing mainline Anglican Christianity at a time of continued royal concern over Catholicism. As recently as 1700, the English Parliament mandated that all English monarchs be Protestant and explicitly forbade Catholics from ascending to the throne (Act of Settlement).

In the milieu of continued religious fervor and a growing British empire in North America, the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts served the royal goal of advancing Protestantism in the colonies. So important was this Georgian conversion objective that King George II and his predecessor King George I personally funded the Society. In fact, most of the Society’s funding originated from royal coffers, only supplemented by income from a Barbados plantation (Humphreys, vi-vii). Given the financial situation of the Society, Humphreys wrote An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society to justify the organization’s work to its primary donor: King George II. In the introduction, Humphreys clearly states the goal of An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society by noting “It is hoped that the reader upon peru[s]ing the following Papers, will find Cau[s]e to be much plea[s]ed with the unexpected Succe[s]s of [s]o great a Work. E[s]pecially if it is con[s]idered, that this Society hath no publick Income or Revenue.” (iv-v). Humphreys goes so far as record the Society’s missions in North America as “royal intentions” (xxx).

Despite Humphreys’ intention of justifying continued royal funding for the Society’s mission in North America, this copy of An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society’s primary audience became students at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, nearly four thousand miles from London. Between the 1730s and 1760s, Isaac Norris Jr., the son of Philadelphia politician, merchant, and noted book collector in his own right Isaac Norris Sr. acquired An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society. The book passed to Isaac Norris Jr.’s daughter Mary after Isaac’s death in 1766 (Korey, 8). Mary married John Dickinson, the namesake of Dickinson College, who in turn obtained An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society alongside the hundreds of other books Isaac Norris Sr. amassed. John Dickinson donated the work to Dickinson College in 1784 (Korey, 21).

Until 1934, An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society was accessible for Dickinson students and faculty at the normal shelves of the Dickinson College Library. Instead of King George II, young Dickinson College students read An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society. These students (including myself) read the work to learn about the religious demography of early modern North America and how the British elite viewed North America from a religious perspective. Many of these Dickinson students likely studied theology, especially in the nineteenth century as the Second Great Awakening spurred religious fervor on Dickinson College campus in particular (Revival of Religion).

Undoubtedly, numerous students read the book across centuries, as indicated by the poor condition the tome exists in today. No front cover remains, and few parts of the spine endure. There is no physical evidence of repairs to the book, indicating that after its move to the Dickinson College Archives in the 1930s, conservators prioritized repairing/rebinding other more well-known works or those in even worse condition instead. In the future, a new audience may emerge for An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society, possibly scholars focusing on eighteenth century British/North American religious history rather than King George II or Dickinson College students.



Works Cited

“Act of Settlement” UK Parliament. Accessed 1 December 2024.

legislation.gov.uk/aep/Will3/12-13/2/data.pdf.

Foucault, Michel. “What is an Author?.” The Book History Reader, edited by David Finkelstein

and Alistair McCleery, Routledge, 2002.

Humphreys, David. An Historical Account of the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts Containing their Foundation, Proceedings, and the Succeses of their Missionaries in the British Colonies, to the Year 1728. London: The Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, 1730.

Korey, Marie Elena. The Books of Isaac Norris (1701-1766) at Dickinson College. Carlisle, PA, Dickinson College, 1975/1976.

“Revival of Religion.” The Religious Intelligencer, 18 Jan. 1823,

proquest.com/docview/137429704/pageviewPDF/A2297C93E1CB46F4PQ/1?accountid=10506&sourcetype=Magazines. Accessed 15 October 2024.

An Almanack: Audience

December 30, 2024 / / 0 Comments

In my previous two blog posts I discussed both how the written text of An Almanack feels, looks, and functions, as well as exploring its previously known owners Hatty and Alice Bird French. An Almanack is not a real almanac at all but is rather The New England Primer; a children’s literacy pamphlet. The pamphlet too must have been a successful form of teaching language to children as its reader, Alice B. French, would become a doctor with her degree from Boston University in 1877. Even with its misleading title, An Almanack intended to teach children how to read and used religion to do so.  

The book contains a section meant to teach the alphabet and uses biblical references and images to help children connect to the letters. For example, in figure 1, to teach the letter A the book includes an image of Adam and Eve and reads, 

Figure 1 Illustrations and text that accompany the first letters of the alphabet

In ADAM’S Fall We finned all.  

And for the letter B, 

Heaven to find, The Bible Mind. 

This continues for every letter of the alphabet. 

 

The imagery in this alphabet section is very skillful as well, especially for working in a tiny, confined space of an inch and half an inch. This imagery could have been helpful for children learning how to read because images are more appealing and easier to understand than words are, at least when learning a language. I will include images of each of the letters with their drawings and biblical references as they are highly skilled and intriguing to study. (fig. 2) What makes these images particularly interesting is the ability to communicate a story in such a small space and with minimal detail. I also find the difference in font and spacing to emphasize the key portions of the text to be a valuable tool to learning the alphabet in this way. The phrases are also noticeably in a rhyme scheme which could have been to help with the memorization of them, both teaching the alphabet and key biblical stories.  

Figure 2 Illustrations and text that accompany the letters of the alphabet

The book also includes common names of men and women, so that children can learn to spell their names, and actually does specify this use case where the names are located in the text (fig. 3). One of these names is Alice; her sister Hatty does not appear especially due to the odd spelling. This is a fascinating find, as the first pages of An Almanack include the repeated spelling of the girls’ names- perhaps as they practiced their spelling. This to say that the book, at least in the case of the French sisters, reached its intended audience, and may have even been the cause of their learning how to read and write. And with Alice becoming a medical missionary later in her life, teaching through church stories may have been successful in encouraging youth to be church–minded.

Figure 3
List of common names of women, with the intention of teaching children to spell their names

In doing research for this section, I was finally able to find the gift plate that accompanies books given to the Dickinson archives documenting who donated the book. In the case of An Almanack, the Thompson family and Thompson’s Bookstore donated the book to the archives (fig. 4). Thompson’s Bookstore was a shop in Carlisle listed in the Carlisle directory from 1980. The store was located at 56 West High St. and was one of four bookstores in town (fig. 5 & 6). Thompson’s Bookstore however is not in the Carlisle directory from 1985, so the shop closed at some point in the years between 1980 and1985. The building that formerly housed Thompson’s Bookstore in town is now Georgie Lou’s Retro Candy.  

Figure 6
The former location of Thompson’s Bookstore on a modern map

Figure 5
Thompson’s Bookstore information in the Carlisle Directory of 1980

Figure 4
The gift plate for An Almanack

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What is interesting about the gift plate itself is the design; the archives only used it between 1973 and 1987. In 1987, Dickinson had an international competition asking for a gift plate redesign. So, no books that entered the archives after the year 1987 would have the retired design that is on An Almanacks gift plate. An Almanack was likely to enter the Dickinson archival collection between 1973 and 1985 based on the timeline of the bookstore and the gift plate. The Dickinson archivist James Gerencser too shared that when Thompson’s Bookstore closed, they had an auction of the books that remained. Whether the archives bought this book at auction for the archives, or the Thompson family truly gifted it is unknown. Regardless the book entered the collection after previously being a part of Thompson’s Bookstore in Carlisle. 

An Almanack is a unique little book. Its title does not encompass the text that is within it, and within its pages the book can be contradictory. There are multiple publication dates, multiple title pages, multiple authors, and multiple publishers; which makes the book an interesting collaboration between authors across time. The handwriting left behind helped in gain insight into how the previous owners read this book, and their accomplishments in life showed just how effective this text may have been. The Dickinson archives are incredibly lucky to have An Almanack in its collection.  

 

Works Referenced  

AncestryLibrary. Ancestry.com, ancestrylibrary.com. Accessed 2 Nov. 2024. 

Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections. Dickinson College, archives.dickinson.edu/. 

Newman, H. (1843). An almanack containing an account of the Coelestial Motions, Aspects, &c. For the year of the Christian Empire, 1691. Ira Webster. 

Charles Sellers, Barbara Roberts, and the Future of Our Books

December 24, 2024 / / 0 Comments

            In my earlier two posts about Moby Dick; Or the Whale with illustrations from Rockwell Kent I have given a description of the physical copy and written about its position in the life of the novel more broadly. That is, this edition of Moby Dick popularized the novel and brought it to the attention of readers worldwide. This blog post returns to the copy in the Dickinson College archive. While there is much we can learn from writing about this edition more broadly it is impossible to ignore the differences between specific copies and what that can tell us about its individual history. This one, for instance, holds the signature of “Barbara S. Roberts” on the inside cover.

Roberts was the second wife of long-time Dickinson College librarian and historian Charles Coleman Sellers. Sellers’ attended Haverford College for his undergraduate degree before matriculating to Harvard University where he earned his Master of Arts. From 1937-1949 he served as the bibliographic librarian as Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut before joining the Dickinson College faculty as the curator of our Dickinsoniana collection, our archival materials. Sellers became the librarian of the college in 1956. He earned his doctorate from Temple in 1957 and would retire as Librarian Emeritus with the rank of Professor and college historian at which point he wrote Dickinson College: A History. Seller was incredibly dedicated to Dickinson; a memo put out by the President of the college following his death states that instead of flowers people should donate to the “Charles Coleman Sellers Endowment Fund in care of Dickinson College.” Sellers also won the Bancroft prize for his work on Charles William Peal. (Dickinson College Archives).

Following Sellers’ death his nephews Nicholas and Peter Sellers donated the entirety of his 2,500-book collection to Dickinson College. Archival documents note that about 40% of the Sellers’ collection was made up of duplicate copies, and according to an appraisal done by The Americanist: Scholarly and Antiquarian Books located in Pottstown, PA, the total value of the collections sat at $13,500, though, we have two appraisals: one which puts the value of Sellers’ books at $27,117. This is a significant discrepancy, and there appears to be no reason for this. The Americanist completed both documents in April 1980. Perhaps, the more valuable appraisal includes the value of the shelves, or other items in the Sellers’ library, or the lower value is after the College sold the duplicate copies to friends of the library. Imagine the potential learning lost by this decision.

One should not neglect the role of Barbara Roberts in the curation of this collection. Indeed, at its core, this story is a tale of two people who enjoyed literature and valued the physical culture of the written word. Barbara Sellers’ obituary describes her as a “woman who attempted and accomplished things.” For many years she owned a bookshop and tended it with “business-like acumen and with acute attention to excellence in books.” Charles Sellers’ will leaves the entirety of his collection to his wife. I, personally, would not leave my books to just anyone, and I do not even own anything valuable, thus Sellers’ actions demonstrate his opinion of his wife’s expertise. Indeed, the Will states that the collection is hers to do with as she pleases.

            Of course, Roberts owned more than just this copy of Moby Dick, so any number of the books within the collection are hers though many sources from our files place sole ownership of the collection on Charles Sellers.

What this points to is the dedication of the Sellers’ family to the archival trade and the collection of the physical culture of literature. Over the course of this semester our class has focused largely on the efforts of the artisans that turn texts into books. Yet, we must also think about those who owned these elements of material culture. It takes more than just artisans to maintain these critically important elements of our collective literary culture.

            Further, we should also question the scope of our lives in relation to our books. I am writing this post in December 2024. 94 years ago, Barbara Roberts signed her name on the inside cover of this copy. Could she have possibly imagined that almost 100 years later, over 50 years after her death, someone studying works from her collection? That the course of her life as a collector serves as inspiration for generations of students with literary interests?

I’ll end this post with two final notes: First, a thank you to the Sellers’ family for providing me with the opportunity to work with this book. Second, perhaps this story can pose a question to all of us: What will our books become once we are gone?

Works Cited

Banks, Sam. Letter to The College Community. February 11, 1980. Folder 1. Charles Coleman Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

Banks, Sam. Letter to Nicholas Sellers. March 3, 1980. Nicholas Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

—. Letter to Peter Sellers. March 16, 1980. Peter Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

Barbara Sellers’ Obituary. July 2, 1979. Barbara Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

“Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980).” Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980) | Dickinson College, archives.dickinson.edu/people/charles-coleman-sellers-1903-1980. Accessed 3 Dec. 2024.

The Americanist. Appraisal of Sellers’ Collection. April 24, 1980. Folder 1. Charles Coleman Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

The Americanist. Appraisal of Sellers’ Collection. April 25, 1980. Folder 1. Charles Coleman Sellers File. Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA. 2 December 2024.

The young and devout audience of Divine Songs for Children

December 22, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Divine Songs for Children, or more specifically, its full title Divine Songs Attempted in Easy Language For the Use of Children, reveals its intended audience plainly and immediately.

Printed by Archibald Loudon in 1812, Divine Songs is aimed at young, religious readers.  The context of the book is straightforward; it has a title page, twenty-eight hymns, and lastly the Ten Commandments.  There is nothing else.  The children who would have used this book are not interested in anything else, more information or filler is boring to most children.  One exception to this is illustrations.  There is only one illustration in the book (a frontispiece); it is small, only taking up about a third of the page.  Likely no other illustrations were added to keep production costs down, and the final price low as well.

Keeping in mind the intended audience, Divine Songs was likely not very expensive.  This is further supported by the modest craftsmanship of the book itself.  It is simply bound; no boards were used, it is only held together with stitching.  The text printed throughout the book was not done meticulously.  The margins are irregular.  On some pages, the text goes fully to the bottom of the page with no lower margin.  On others, the text starts immediately at the top.  The same inconsistency occurs with the size of the gutter.  Considering that Divine Songs was deliberately made like this for its audience, its uncomplicated craftsmanship likely allowed the price to be kept relatively low.  This way, the book could be realistically accessed by children.

The book is very small, measuring 10.25cm x 6.8cm x 0.2cm.  To visualize, when closed Divine Songs is a little shorter than the size of my hand.  I have not tried it myself, but I imagine any pocket that can fit my hand would very easily fit Divine Songs.  It is currently in a fragile state (212 years will do that to any boardless book), so I would not recommend anyone try it.  However, being pocket-sized would have applied itself well to a life of travel, perhaps back and forth between church and home?  

Hymns are songs meant to be sung in worship and are very commonly used during official services.  Divine Songs has twenty-eight hymns printed in it.  Some songs are more broad, such as “A general song of praise to God” and “Heaven and Hell.”  Others are a lot more specific and likely personal to a child, such as “Love between Brothers and Sisters.”  It has something for every occasion.  The book was very likely intended to be owned and read by a child and brought back and forth from home to church or school.  Hence the content and the small and easily portable size.

We know from the title that Divine Songs Attempted in Easy Language For the Use of Children was intended to be used by religious children.  But looking further at the author, Isaac Watts can give us a more specific understanding.  Isaac Watts was a protestant minister, born in England in 1674, he is sometimes known as the “father of English hymnody” (Watts).  Given that he is a very well-known protestant, the book was probably made for other protestants.  However, the Church of England did not approve of hymns until 1820 (Divine Songs was published in 1812), so Anglicans likely will not purchase the book (Hymn).

We have an idea of the type of person who would have owned Divine Songs.  Unfortunately, we do not have information on who this owner actually was.  There is a name written in the book, very likely the name of the owner, but it cannot be read with certainty.  I have talked more in-depth about Sarah in a previous blog post.

 

Works Cited

“Hymn.” Encyclopædia Britannica Online, Encyclopædia Britannica Inc, 2020.

“Watts, Isaac.” Encyclopædia Britannica Online, Encyclopædia Britannica Inc, 2020.

 

From Stains to Story: How the Disrepair of a Cookbook Became a Guide to Previous Ownership

December 20, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Cookbooks hold stories beyond simple annotations or dog-eared pages. Each stain holds a memory, each inscription is a recipe, and every modification is a history waiting to be uncovered. Anyone who cooks or bakes regularly is likely making changes or additions to their recipes, which calls for immediate and specific notations within the physical book. Dickinson’s edition of The Frugal Housewife by Lydia Maria Child is not an outlier. As a book in extreme disrepair and one where every page has a stain or note, this cookbook was well-loved.  

Child’s intended audience for this book is made explicit in its full title: The Frugal Housewife: Dedicated to Those Who Are Not Ashamed of Economy. The cookbook is intended for housewives in the mid-nineteenth century who are looking for cheap, easy, quick recipes and remedies. In other front matter, Child makes a note that this fourth edition includes an additional section titled “Hints to People of Moderate Fortune.” She states that her intentions for the book are “written from the same motive, viz: an honest and independent wish to be useful.” This book intends to be useful and frugal, evident in both the long title and additional note.  

This 1831 edition did, in fact, reach multiple frugal housewives. From what I can tell, I think the cookbook reached at least three different owners. The first owner is Mrs. Mary Webb Cady. She made many notes and additional recipes throughout the entirety of the cookbook, writing and stamping her name across much of the front matter. She was either very possessive of this book and the many additions she made, or she was simply ensuring that she never lost the book (Figure 2). A detailed internet search revealed a woman named Mary Webb who married Mr. Hiram Cady (Figure 1). While I cannot be certain that this Mary Cady is the same owner, her name and signatures line up, and the timeline would make sense, as she was born in 1806 in New York. Unfortunately, I cannot find much further information on her. Due to the era and societal norms, we can assume that Mrs. Cady was a housewife, and her many notes and additional recipes throughout the book show that she spent significant time cooking and baking.  

Figure 1: Marriage Note in the Cady Family Bible

Figure 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I assume another owner also possessed this cookbook after Mrs. Cady due to a separate handwriting and darker pencil used for some drawings and recipes. While most of the additions to the book are in the same handwriting and light-colored pencil, and the many recipes match with the handwriting of the signatures, there are a couple of signatures at the very back of the book in much darker, less discernable handwriting. This makes me assume that there was indeed a second owner of this edition of The Frugal  Housewife, but they either did not own the book for long or did not use it nearly as much as the previous owner due to their general lack of marginalia.  

Figure 3: Recipe on top of page is Mrs. Cady’s, Recipe on bottom of page is our unknown owner’s

In a discussion with Malinda Triller-Doran, an archivist and librarian at the Dickinson College Archives, I learned that this book’s passage to the Dickinson Archives is not fully clear, but it is assumed to be part of the large donation from Charles Coleman Sellers’s Library. Charles Coleman Sellers was a librarian and curator for Dickinson College on and off between 1949 and his death in 1980. Sellers was also an author and librarian at other institutions as well, and his biography in the Archives states, “Sellers is best known in the Dickinson community for his Dickinson College: A History, published in conjunction with the bicentennial celebration of the College in 1973.”

Figure 4: Image of Charles Coleman Sellers

Ms. Triller-Doran informed me that after he died in 1980, he donated his collection/personal library to Dickinson. It is presumed that The Frugal Housewife was one of these donated books based on the timeline it was donated and the general lack of information on its journey to Dickinson. Only two other cookbooks lie in the archives: The Cook’s Oracle and Housekeeper’s Manual by William Kitchiner (published 1830) and American Domestic Cookery, Formed on Principles of Economy, for the Use of Private Families by Maria Eliza Ketelby Rundell (published 1822), neither of which are recorded to be a part of Sellers’ donation. While The Frugal Housewife’s journey to Dickinson remains unclear, it continues to hold significant history and information about its previous adventures.  

This edition of The Frugal Housewife has not been rebound and is completely falling apart. Most of the pages are no longer tied or glued together, and the front and back covers have completely fallen off. It is now held together by a gentle string around the entirety of the book and must be untied to open and re-tied once the reader is done. This indicates that the book is either not used much anymore (as there is no reason to rebind it) or the disrepair has happened more recently than one would think. If it has not been rebound yet, we may be able to assume that it did not need to be rebound until quite recently. A book this old and well-used is expected to be run down, and the fact that it was owned by a librarian for the last century or so makes me assume that the reason for its current state of disrepair is that the librarians who have looked after it had not wanted to interfere in the history of the book itself. Rebinding it may have been frowned upon since it would hide the historicity of the book’s frequent use, which is made evident by its disrepair, or may have simply been too expensive. We can assume much about this edition of The Frugal Housewife by its disorder, stains, marginal notes, and added recipes. What many may view as ruin or destruction has only added to the value and intrigue this cookbook holds.  

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited 

“Brief Life History of Mary.” FamilySearch.Org, ancestors.familysearch.org/en/LD5F-34T/mary-webb-1806-1876. Accessed 1 Dec. 2024.  

“Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980).” Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980) | Dickinson College, archives.dickinson.edu/people/charles-coleman-sellers-1903-1980. Accessed 1 Dec. 2024.  

Triller-Doran, Malinda. Personal Interview. 26 November 2024. 

Audience: Intended Readers and Prior Owners of A Selection of One Hundred and Forty of the Most Favourite English, Scotch, Irish, and American Songs

December 20, 2024 / / 0 Comments

A Selection of One Hundred and Forty of the Most Favourite English, Scotch, Irish, and American Songs is no insignificant part of the early publishing world of Carlisle, PA, considering its connections to publisher Archibald Loudon. I’ve discussed Archibald Loudon and the physical book in-depth in previous blog posts, however, here I want to uncover the intended and actual readers of the book. (Here are links to the previous posts: 

Loudon was aware of current publishing trends (Fretz 64)—so, it’s not unreasonable to say that he might be able to provide insight into the wider reading audience of Carlisle. He dedicated himself, for example, to subjects like the arts, including theater, poetry, and song. He lived and worked during a time when the town was forming its initial artistic legacy. In fact, he likely wanted a stake in the already-rapid growth of Carlisle. Early Carlisle was a standout amongst the landscape of Pennsylvania, though you wouldn’t know it today. Historian Judith Ridner describes it as “a sizable and significant place” with urban features that were considered unique in the eighteenth century (2). It functioned as a “migration gateway” that grew into a bustling center for “divergent interests” (3), and there is something to be said about the fact that “divergent interests” describes Loudon’s publishing history perfectly. 

His writing, editing, and publishing cover a significant number of Carlisle histories and issues, especially white settler interactions with and violence against Native populations. (The Carlisle Indian Industrial School, a boarding school for Indigenous American children intent on erasing their cultural history as they grew into adulthood with a history of violent institutional tactics, was later founded in the nineteenth century.) Loudon extensively participated in Carlisle’s long history of literature recording the colonization of/expansion into Native American land. His Scottish immigrant family had personal violent conflict with local Indigenous peoples when first settling in the U.S. (Hunter). This further exemplifies Loudon’s personal, political, and business stakes in his publishing history. By publishing the work of a local poet, Isabella Oliver, Loudon demonstrated a proactive attempt at shaping the landscape of Carlisle’s creative arts.

 A Selection, then, is a venture into compiling songs relevant to him and his Scottish-American history, as well as representing the larger population of Carlisle. Early Carlisle has a deep history of Scottish and Irish immigrants settling in or near the town (Ridner 8-9). I have been unable to uncover much detail about the publication history or reasoning behind this particular book of Loudon’s—he never published other songbooks—but his wide variety of artistic publications speaks partially for itself. (I’m working under the speculation that Loudon had at least some small part in the selection of songs in A Selection, rather than republishing one other compilation. My blog post titled “Origins,” describes how I came to this conclusion.) Assuming the majority of his publications came from personal interest mixed with the intent of success, the focus on Scottish-American and Irish-American music fits neatly as an answer to the question of the book’s intended audience. Loudon likely knew that he could rely on the audience of the immigrant population of Pennsylvania. Ridner focuses intently on the intersecting cultural groups of historical Carlisle, investigating the ways that “similar regional affiliations linked settlement patterns and ethnic identity among the mid-Atlantic’s Euro-American colonists” (7). Loudon’s publication of A Selection is a prime example of appealing to cultural identities similar to his own, a group which made up a large portion of the Carlisle population during his time. They were one of the largest immigrant groups in the eighteenth century traveling to British North America, and by far the predominant ethnic group of early Carlisle (8). Loudon sought monetary and cultural success both by the advantage of belonging to this group, and by seeking to appeal to it. 

Beyond this community, however, he intended to introduce these artistic pursuits to the wider Carlisle and Pennsylvania colonist public. His consistent patronage of artists in Carlisle, particularly those of the same ethnic group, speaks clearly to this hypothesis. It’s a strong piece of evidence in support of the role he wanted to take on as what historian Eric Fretz calls an “early disseminator of culture” (Fretz 61), particularly Scots-Irish and Euro-American culture. Fretz holds a high opinion of Loudon, made clear by the credit he gives to his artistic and publishing dreams—and can also be read as insight into Loudon’s intended Pennsylvania audiences. Fretz’s admiration may resemble the respect given by other Carlisle citizens, publishers, and art-lovers at the time, despite his strictly local influence. However, I’m unable to find information on the life or cultural identity of Eric Fretz beyond his interest in Loudon, so this should be taken with a grain of salt. 

Ridner explains her desire to study the intricacies of Carlisle history as a way to provide insight into the larger history of American development through the micro-history of Carlisle development (3-4). Archibald Loudon serves a similar purpose for the history of Carlisle development—his micro-history is reflective of Carlisle publishing trends and colonial interests, from widespread perceptions of Indigenous communities to a high valuation of theater, poetry, and music, and trade. 

“Chas H.”

Though Carlisle’s early history paints a relatively clear picture of Loudon’s intended audience for A Collection, there’s a mystery remaining that I’m quite fond of: the names written on the inside covers of the Dickinson College Archives’ copy of the book. I’ve been stumbling through research, trying to discern the cursive letters of the surnames of the elusive “Chas. H” and “George W” that previously owned the book. (I’ve included images here of the signatures as they appear on the inside covers.) I’ve concentrated my online searching to Carlisle, PA, when researching the potential surnames for “Charles” and “George.” A notable lead I possessed in this search is George’s note of the year he acquired the book: 1838 (see second image). I’ve tried to put these results in conversation with the limited information I can glean from the alumni records of Dickinson College. While I haven’t found any definitive matches for the folks who wrote their names in the book, there are a couple alumni with name similarities. Charles Kuhn was a part of the class of 1802, but did not graduate, and there is no further information about him.

“George W” “his Book 1838” “song Book 1838”

As for the “George W” who owned the book in 1838, George W. Corner became a trustee of Dickinson College post-graduation, and was a part of the class of 1841 (Reed). Unfortunately, it’s impossible to say whether the book was donated by someone who attended the college or not, due to a lack of record on how it came to the Archives, and digging up family trees online has proven to be unproductive when the cursive letters are unclear. However, I did find something I previously missed: what looks like “1842” written in pencil, underneath “Chas. H.” The fragments found in this copy may not form a complete story, but they give hints at a timeline of the book’s ownership. The names and dates written inside are an indication that despite Loudon’s small area of influence, audiences of A Selection passed the little book around.

 

 

 

Bibliography:

 

A Selection of One Hundred and Forty of the Most Favourite English, Scotch, Irish, and American Songs. 1806. SC 398 87 S698.

Dickinson College Archives & Special Collections.

 

Fretz, Eric. “Archibald Loudon of Carlisle: Disseminator of Early American Culture.” Cumberland County History, vol. VII, no. 2.,

pp. 61-67. Cumberland County Historical Society.

 

Reed, George L. Alumni Record Dickinson College. Dickinson College, 1905.

 

​​Ridner, Judith. “Introduction.” A Town In-Between: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and the Early Mid-Atlantic Interior, University of

Pennsylvania Press, 2010, pp. 1–11. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt3fhb4h.5. 

 

(Image Credits: taken by iPhone, by author, inside the Dickinson College Special Collections.)

Who Was the Modern Cook?

December 19, 2024 / / 0 Comments

French Cookery: The Modern Cook, by Charles Elme Francatelli, is a cookbook that was published in 1846. This book was the first of Francatelli’s four cookbooks. Francatelli was an important chef in London during this time. He was educated at the Parisian College of Cooking (Flantzer, 2018). Francatelli also served as the chef for Queen Victoria for about two years and was known for having a strong effect on the cooking community. I went more in-depth about Francatelli’s life, education, experiences, and influences in my past blog post. This specific book that I have been studying and researching is now in the possession of the Dickinson College Archives in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. In this blog post, I will go in-depth about who used this book and how it came to be a part of Dickinson’s Archives collection. I have written two prior blogs about the history and composition of this book that I would recommend reading along with this one (blog post 1 and blog post 2)!

French Cookery: The Modern Cook was primarily used by upper-middle-class families;  this was Francatelli’s intention. On the title page of the book, he specified it was “adapted, as well for the largest establishments as for the use of private families” (See Figure 1). The title page tells us that this book was meant for familial and restaurant use; however, it isn’t clear which class of people it was meant for. The actual recipes had to be examined to be able to answer, “Who used this book?”  Each recipe is of very high quality and includes expensive ingredients. Bishop uses a great example of the recipes for Lamb’s ears (Bishop, 2018). This book includes three separate recipes, all with expensive ingredients such as a full lamb, cayenne, parmesan, and veal. Because the ingredients used were difficult to obtain, those making these recipes needed the money and resources to access them. As I discussed in my previous post, Francatelli’s next two cookbooks were marketed toward lower-class families and the staff of the upper class. The intended purpose of those books was indicated in their titles: A Plain Cookery Book for the Working Class (1852) and The Cooks Guide and Housekeepers and Butlers Assistants (1861). His fourth cookbook was for confectionary foods and wasn’t marketed for a specific class of people. This book reached its intended audience; the recipes weren’t accessible to lower-class people as they couldn’t afford the ingredients.

This specific copy of French Cookery: The Modern Cook, had at least two owners. This book was donated to Dickinson College only five years after its publication; the first owner was Mrs. B. Stilingfleck. This name was an approximation by the Dickinson College archivists; her signature was included on the title page (see Figure 1). The signature has faded a bit, and there is an ink bleed over the last name. There was no information on her in the Dickinson College records or online. A few dogeared pages in the cookbook tell us this cookbook was used, including a traditional filet recipe and a tapioca pudding recipe (more information about this is in my first blog post, linked above). The second known owner was William Armstrong Graham. His name is on the gift plate inside the cover; he donated the book in 1851(see Figure 2). He was an alum of Dickinson College, class of 1844, and went on to study at the Princeton Theological School, eventually becoming a member of the clergy of the Presbyterian church (I found this information through the help of the archivists and “House Divided,” a Dickinson College resource about the civil war). Dickinson College at this time had two societies that were dedicated to conversations around literature, as well as gathering books (a lot of the material that makes up the Archives currently). Graham donated this copy to the Union Philosophical Society. John Fletcher Hurst, class of 1854, accepted this book into the Union Philosophical Society’s collection. Hurst, a member of the Union Philosophical Society, went to work in law for a while after graduation but ultimately became a Methodist Bishop and became the Bishop of Washington, DC. He is most notable for founding American University in Washington, DC (House Divided). I asked the archivists if there was any more information about Graham’s donation or if there was a record of more donations from him. Unfortunately, due to a fire in 1904 that burned down Denny Hall (an academic building at Dickinson College), most of the records from the Union Philosophical Society were lost; Denny Hall was where they stored all their records. Due to these two snafus, there is no information about Graham’s relation to the Union Philosophical Society or any other potential donations he may have given them.

The Archivists of Dickinson College who helped me examine this copy of French Cookery: The Modern Cook didn’t notice any repairs to this book. It doesn’t look like the book has been rebound. Seemingly, this is the original binding because of the broken binding (see Figure 3) and the gold-etched illustrations on the cover and spine that match the illustrations in the book (see Figures 3 and 4). As for repairs, all of the pages look consistent with one another, and none of them look as if they’ve been altered since their printing. The book was in a good enough condition when donated to not need repairs. Even now, the book is still in pretty good condition; it is separating from the spine, but all the pages are still readable with no significant damage (see Figure 5).

There are some unanswered questions about this copy of French Cookery: The Modern Cook. It is nearly impossible to know for sure who had the book after Mrs. B. Stilingfleck and how William Armstrong Graham came to have it. We also do not know if this book was a part of multiple donations from Graham or if this was a stand-alone donation. I don’t know for sure that this copy didn’t go through repairs of any kind. Despite all that I don’t know about this book, I have learned a lot through the limited resources I’ve had access to. The Archivists have given me resources and rich information about the production, afterlife, and history of French Cookery: the Modern Cook.

 

 

Works Cited

Bishop, Amy. “The Booker T. Washington-W.E.B. Du Bois Debate.” Cardinal Tales Highlights from 2018, Iowa State University Digital Press, 7 July 2021, iastate.pressbooks.pub/cardinaltales1/chapter/rare-book-highlights-.

“Graham, William Armstrong,” House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/5768.Susan, and Susan. “Charles Elmé Francatelli, Maitre d’hôtel and Chief Cook in Ordinary to Queen Victoria.” Unofficial Royalty, 9 Aug. 2024, www.unofficialroyalty.com/charles-elme-francatelli/.

“Hurst, John Fletcher,” House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/5951.

Remillard, Lynne. Union Philosophical Society, chronicles.dickinson.edu/studentwork/1934/social/unionphilsociety.html. Accessed 29 Nov. 2024.

Susan, and Susan. “Charles Elmé Francatelli, Maitre d’hôtel and Chief Cook in Ordinary to Queen Victoria.” Unofficial Royalty, 9 Aug. 2024, www.unofficialroyalty.com/charles-elme-francatelli/.

The Mystery of E. Biddle

December 19, 2024 / / 0 Comments

There are two inscriptions in Baedeker’s Great Britain. One reads, “EM Biddle, July 6, 1907.” The other, “Aug 1956 EM Biddle – Gift.” The library sticker behind the front cover of the Baedeker reads, “Presented by Edward M. Biddle.”

However, a closer look on the first inscription casts some doubt. Is that “M” really an M, or is it actually a “W”? The other Ms are clearly distinguished from the other letters. Could this mean that the original owner of this Baedeker’s was a different Biddle than the one who gifted it to the Dickinson Archives?

To try and find answers, I asked the archivists for some help in tracking down the possible Biddles. We found a file on one Edward Macfunn Biddle. It included an entry for him in the Dickinson Alumni catalogue; apparently, he was at Dickinson from 1901-1904, after which he attended Yale. There is also a list of Biddle alumni at the college, which included no less than three E.M. Biddles, and one E.W. Biddle.

There is also an article on Edward M. Biddle in the file, written for The Dickinson Alumnus. According to this excerpt, his father was E.W. Biddle, a Judge and former president of the Dickinson Board of Trustees. Edward M. became a legal adviser and was an active member of his community. The most important part of this excerpt reads: “As a traveler he has been in Europe a number of times, has visited South America, as well as extended regions of the United States.” This of course indicates a possible use or ownership of this Baedeker’s guidebook, a fact exacerbated by its publication in 1906, soon after his graduation from Yale. This largely eliminates the possibility of the first inscription in the guidebook being “E.W. Biddle” as opposed to the initially-assumed “E.M. Biddle”… except that E.W. was alive until 1931, when he died unexpectedly at 79. According to the Dickinson College Archives, E.W. was practicing law until 1895, at which point he became the president judge in the Cumberland County Court of Common Pleas. I have already noted the condition of my copy of Baedeker’s Great Britain – it has no annotations or inscriptions within it beyond the two at the beginning of the book, and there is very little wear beyond aging. The only clear indication of use is the broken bookmark, which could be because of age but also because of repetitive use. It is entirely possible to consider that E.W. purchased this book as a way to experience some form of travel from the comfort of his home. He also could have purchased the book as a gift for his son E.M. for graduating from Yale, which he did in 1906, and we know that he travelled. Uncertainty abounds.

The other two Biddles in the directory, both ambiguously labelled only “Biddle, Edward M.” could be ruled out, as they graduated from Dickinson in 1886 and 1852; but they might have purchased the guidebook as another form of stationary travel. Although this Baedeker’s was donated by the E.M. Biddle who graduated in 1904, the Biddle family legacy is present enough in Dickinson college that E.M. could have inherited this book from another family member and then just donated it to the archives.

Because E.M. donated this Baedeker to the archives, I thought that it might be useful to see what other books he might have donated. If these books were also travel books or possessed handwriting that could distinguish the handwriting in the initial inscription of this book, it could help in getting a concrete answer about who owned and read this book. I was able to concretely discover three other books, one of which is Baedeker’s Berlin guidebook, a book about the U.S. Senate called Sketches of Debate in the First Senate of the United States, in 1789-90-91 by William Maclay, and another called The Book of the Homeless by Edith Wharton. This could indicate his ownership over the guidebooks, but we are in the same dilemma as when we started: were these previously owned by a different Biddle?

I also found that in the same year E.M. donated these books to the college, Dickinson purchased the “Biddle House,” which is now used by the Registrar’s Office and the Career Center. This generates some questions – why sell the house but not the books? Perhaps because the Biddle family was moving away; perhaps they needed some money but couldn’t be bothered to as for money over books. The mystery of the “E. Biddle” written in this book is tentatively solved, but unless one could find the receipt of purchase for this Baedeker’s the ambiguity lives on.

 

Works Cited:

Dickinson College Archives on Edward W. Biddle

https://archives.dickinson.edu/people/edward-w-biddle-1852-1931

 

Dickinson College Archives on Edward M. Biddle

https://archives.dickinson.edu/image-archive/edward-macfunn-biddle-1933

 

Dickinson College Archives on the Biddle House

https://archives.dickinson.edu/image-archive/biddle-house-c1900

One Last Gift from Dr. Edwin Willoughby

December 19, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Fig. 1 Edwin E. Willoughby, courtesy of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation

Since John Lichfield first printed George Sandys’ Ovid’s Metamorphoses Englished, Mythologiz’d, and Represented in Figures in 1632, the copy held within the Dickinson College Archives & Special Collections has travelled across oceans, finding its way to the United States at some unknown time after its publication in Oxford. As a travel writer who spent time in the Virginia colonies in the 1620s, Sandys may have had hopes that his work would make its way to the Americas, but he likely never imagined it would end up at a small liberal arts college in Pennsylvania after being owned by an alumnus who happened to be the Chief Bibliographer of the Folger Shakespeare Library.

Based on the book’s front matter, Sandys envisioned an elite, well-read audience for his work. With both a dedication and panegyric addressed to King Charles I and an address to Queen Henrietta Maria, Sandys positioned his work as worthy of the very top of English society. As a translation of a classic work, with countless other references to different myths peppered throughout, the book also assumes a learned audience with some degree of knowledge of the classics. It is unlikely that anyone without prior knowledge of Ovid and his works would be inclined to pick up Sandys’ translation. Readers would not be familiar with the text itself unless they were familiar with Metamorphosis and its myths, whether that be in Latin or in English. 

Fig. 2 The bookplate bearing Dr. Willoughby’s name.

In regards to education level, Ovid’s Metamorphoses Englished, Mythologiz’d, and Represented in Figures reached its intended audience in its last owner, Edwin E. Willoughby, before arriving at Dickinson College. The history of this book’s ownership in England is unknown; the name “Thomas Chadwick” appears on the title page alongside the year 1780, but this inscription does not indicate where Mr. Chadwick lived. He could have been from England, or he could have lived in the American colonies amidst the American Revolutionary War. As there is no information on him, we likely will never know. But we know for certain that this copy must have been in the United States by October of 1959, when Edwin E. Willoughby passed away with Ovid’s Metamorphoses in his possession. Dr. Willoughby was the Chief Bibliographer of the Folger Shakespeare Library from 1935-1958 and focused his scholarship on the print history of Shakespeare’s work and the history of the King James Bible (“Edwin Eliott Willoughby (1899-1959) | Dickinson College”). The bookplate pasted into the cover of Ovid’s Metamorphoses identifies this particular book as part of the gift Dr. Willoughby’s sister, Dr. Frances Willoughby, made to Dickinson in memory of her brother (See Figure 2).

During his career, Dr. Willoughby acquired many rare books for his own personal collection and sent a number to the library at his alma mater, Dickinson College. In their file on Dr. Willoughby, the Archives possesses multiple memos from college librarians thanking Dr. Willoughby for gifting copies of various works. On one occasion, while working as the Chief Bibliographer at the Folger Shakespeare Library, he gifted the college a 1608 “Black letter” edition of the Geneva Bible and c. 1611-1613 copy of the “Great She” Bible (See Figures 3 and 4). The large gift Frances Willoughby made in honor of her brother in 1960 was the last in a long series of philanthropic donations started by Dr. Willoughby himself decades prior. 

Fig. 3 The notecard recording Dr. Willoughby’s gift of a Geneva Bible.

Fig. 4 The notecard recording Dr. Willoughby’s gift of a “Great She” Bible

Notably, there are no records of Frances Willoughby donating this particular edition, the 1632 Ovid’s Metamorphoses Englished, Mythologiz’d, and Represented in Figures, in any of Dickinson’s archival records. There are a few documents that mention Ovid’s Metamorphoses by name as part of the Willoughby gift, but they all designate it as the 1626 edition (See Figure 5). The Dickinson College Archives & Special Collections does not own the 1626 edition of Sandys’ translation, which I confirmed by checking the catalog of the archives’ physical holdings. This left me with two possible explanations to this discrepancy; one was that at some point Dickinson did own a 1626 edition, and that acquisition was highlighted in the documentation, but was excised from the archives in the years since. The alternative is that either Dr. Frances Willoughby or the librarians cataloging the gift mistook this 1632 edition of the text for the 1626 edition and recorded it incorrectly. I consulted with our archivists, Jim Gerencser and Malinda Triller-Doran, and the three of us were in agreement that the latter explanation was far more likely. Had a 1626 edition of Sandys’ Ovid’s Metamorphoses been excised, it would have been under Jim’s direction, and he explained that he would have never gotten rid of a rare book that was part of the Willoughby collection. 

Fig. 5 Document mentioning Sandys’ 1626 translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses as part of the collection donated to the Dickinson College Library in 1960.

Jim’s insight meant that a copy of the 1626 edition likely never existed in the Dickinson College Archives, so at some point in the donation and cataloging process, someone made an error. Had it been simply the wrong year that was recorded, one might not dwell too long on it, as human error is common and there were no computers in 1960 to keep the streamlined catalogs that the archives have today. But it was more than just the year—all archival documents record the full information for the 1626 edition, which include the publisher and location of publication (William Stansby, London) and the complete title, Ovid’s Metamorphoses English’d. John Lichfield published the 1632 edition in Oxford and it had a much longer title which signified its status as an illustrated translation. Furthermore, this information is all located on the title page of the text. One would only have to open the book to realize that the copy in the archives’ possession was the 1632 illustrated edition, not Sandys’ 1626 translation. I cannot account for this mistake, nor can Jim and Malinda, but it demonstrates the incredible responsibility book collectors, conservationists, archivists, and librarians have when it comes to the texts they preside over. Making mistakes is human, and easy, but misrecorded information can also affect the work and research of future students and scholars. Fortunately, the online catalog correctly lists the 1632 edition as the version that Dickinson College holds in the archives.

 

Works Cited

“Edwin Eliott Willoughby (1899-1959) | Dickinson College.” Dickinson.edu, 2019, archives.dickinson.edu/people/edwin-eliott-willoughby-1899-1959. Accessed 1 Dec. 2024.

Gerencser, Jim and Malinda Triller-Doran. Personal Interview. 2 December 2024. 

 

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