Putting a Price on History

 Greetings Reader!  Some time back I wrote about how a historic photo of Harriet Tubman was being auctioned by a major dealer.  Happily, the photo, along with other items in the album, was jointly purchased by the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress, you can read about it here https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/smithsonian-library-of-congress-rare-1860s-photo-harriet-tubman-180962818/. 

Can history be rescued again?  This time, it is a humble document--a ledger showing signatures of people who received a piece of mail while incarcerated.  Who's signature?  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Where and when?  The Birmingham Jail in 1963.  Yes, the place where Dr. King wrote "Letter from a Birmingham Jail."  You can read a draft of it and hear him read it here:  https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/letter-birmingham-jail

Fine Books magazine, which brought my attention to this sale, introduces it with the following statement "Black History Month, observed annually in February, recognizes the African-American struggle for freedom and key events that empowered the Civil Rights Movement. In honor of Black History Month and the legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Hake’s will open its February 24-25 auction with a unique and highly important testament to the great civil rights leader’s courage and resolve. Never before seen publicly, the lot consists of four logbook pages from the Birmingham Jail, hand-signed 12 times by Dr. King during his 1963 incarceration."  Really?  Profiting from the record of incarceration of Dr. King is "in honor" of Black History Month.  These words are posted here:  https://www.finebooksmagazine.com/news/mlk-signed-birmingham-jail-logbook-offered-hakes-feb-24-25-auction

So let's look at the auctioneer's listing, which is here:  https://hakes.com/Auction/ItemDetail/244390/LETTER-FROM-A-BIRMINGHAM-JAIL-MARTIN-LUTHER-KING-MULTI-SIGNED-BIRMINGHAM-JAILHOUSE-LOGBOOK-PAGES

The auction link doesn't make a claim about this sale being "in honor" of anything so I'm not sure where Fine Books got that idea, of if there is a printed catalog I haven't seen linked stating this.  Auctioneer Hake's does provide the provenance of the ledger, stating "The oral history passed down through the consigning family states that these pages were salvaged by a jail employee who was instructed to destroy the ledger but had the foresight to preserve these pages, eventually passing them to the family's history buff patriarch where they have been held until now. This offering marks not only their first appearance in commerce but their first public display."

Foresight to preserve the pages...mmhmm.  And proffer them up for sale in the year 2021, in the immediate months after the protests over the killing of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor?

So Internet, let's do this.  These papers documenting how Dr. King was able to stay in touch and communicate with the Civil Rights movement must be preserved at a location that can make digital copies part of the available worldwide curriculum and preserve the physical copies in the highest archival state.

Heading over to social media to start making some noise about this.  Look for me @Bookcharmer on twitter and signal boost if you can. 

The angry archivist Bookcharmer 

Bring Harriet Home

Reader, I've been mulling the topic I'm going to address for awhile but have found new motivation just today.  I've spent the past year and a half as interim director for the special collections and archives unit of my library, which in many ways has expanded my skills as a librarian.  I'm happy to have had this chance to get to know a collection in depth, mostly for the exposure to the amount of art found in archives (illustrations, paintings, photographs....photographs) but have also come to realize just how much information a. never makes it into an archive b. languishes once it does.  More to follow at a later date on point b., but today is all about point a., information that never makes it into an archive.

Being the Interim Director has had the perk of lots of lovely catalogs crossing my desk.  The antiquarian book world knows its audience--it knows we want color photos and lavish pictures (similar rant may ensue about the art history in auction catalogs, but stay focused Rebecca)  and detailed descriptions about provenance, condition, and other juicy book details.  Dealers in antiquarian books and ephemera are also purveyors of letters, posters, postcards, photos, maps, menus...and it is a genteel free for all of what gets sold and where it goes.

To the point:  Swann Galleries has listed for an auction an incredibly rare and previously unknown photo of Harriet Tubman, one of the most significant women in American history.  You can see it here along with another photo that is for sale:

http://www.swanngalleries.com/auctions/2441-african-americana

What's particularly ugly about this is that it is being auctioned.  Auctioned.  Auction.  The image of Harriet Tubman is something that not only should not be sold, but to auction it?

Now come on.  Seller, whoever you are, and Swann Galleries, you cannot tell me you are blind to the deep inherent wrongness of auctioning a photo of Harriet Tubman.  This is an appalling level of insensitivity if not an ugly act of racism and potential erasure of history.  To sell this photo is bad enough, to auction it is reprehensible.

The Harriet Tubman home is currently fundraising to have a cash reserve to bid on the photo that should rightly be in the Tubman home already.  For those of you who have done fundraising for cash strapped non-profits, you can imagine the incredible stress this puts on the board and staff.  Just think what else they could do with that 25,000?  But raise it they will and I'm going to help.  Please join me.

1.  Ask Swann Galleries to ask the person who has consigned this item with them to consider donating it to the Harriet Tubman Home.

2.  Ask Swann Galleries their policies on auctioning vital pieces of American history that should transcend ownership by an individual.

3.  Give, give, give.  Even if there is a change of heart by the owner/auctioneer, I'm sure the Tubman Home could use some additional funds.

4.  Signal boost, retweet, write your own post, tell people you know.  Copy in historical societies, filmmakers, historians, writers, photographers, archivists, librarians, your family members.

I have often been surprised when I leaf through those gorgeous catalogs from antiquarian dealers at the things I think "why isn't that in a museum?"  I know, many museums are busting at the seams right now and archivists are wise to not accept collections that they don't have room for or money to process.  But this is one photograph, one rare precious photograph, that so clearly deserves to be in its rightful home.

https://www.womenyoushouldfund.com/projects/bring-harriet-home/

#BringHarrietHome

Love Thy Neighbor

Special election day edition of The Bookcharmer.

The Bookcharmer's thought for today is one she draws from religious traditions:  Love Thy Neighbor.  I will ask my dear friend Winston Delgado to expound on this for me, as his knowledge of the Bible is prodigious and impressive.

Friday was Halloween, which in America still means it is a day in the year when adults bring children to neighboring houses and events in delightful costumes to revel in sweets.  At my library, the annual Halloween parade is one of the best days of the year as the children's librarian leads a parade of costumed children through the building and the library staff joyfully admires their costumes and hands out candies (or in the Bookcharmer's case, pencils and plastic dinosaurs which were just as popular as candy thank you very much!)

We ached with delight to see children dressed as mice, bunnies, bumblebees, princesses, doctors, robots, Iron Man, and pumpkins.  We got to praise the creativity and fearsomeness of scary costumes and swoon over the sweet ones.  We loved our neighbors.

Today, if we can, we vote.  I am well aware that this was not always a privilege allowed my historical sisters.  Indeed, my paternal grandmother who lived to be 100 was a passionate voter as she was 16 years old when the 19th amendment was ratified.

There has been much in the press about the profoundly shocking amount of money dumped into campaigns by distant influences.  But I say to them, you cannot buy the experience of my neighbor coming to my door to ask for my vote in his or her election to city council or water board.  I open my door and we shake hands and I ask my neighbor how he or she will vote on issues I care about.  I thank them for running, ask if they would like a glass of water or other refreshment before they carry on and wish them well.  To meet the people running for office when they come to your own doorstep is a fine thing and I don't believe that can be bought, no matter how much money distant influencers throw at flyers, stupid advertisements, and outrageous editorials.  I know my neighbors.  I see them at the farmers' market, in line for coffee, or at the bookstore.  No one can buy from me the connection that comes from seeing people in office, city, state, or nationally, that I personally voted for.

On the back of my mind since my last post is Ferguson.  I am following several on the ground reporters on twitter, including St. Louis Post Dispatch photographer @kodacohen and St. Louis Alderman @Antonio French. If you aren't already following them, I hope you will and continue to signal boost the situation in Ferguson.

Why is your Bookcharmer, a librarian, writing about these issues?  Because libraries are in an even stronger position to be the repository of memory, we have new tools to document history.  These tools are so powerful that the phrase Activist Archivist is being used.  A fine example of this is the Postville Project in Iowa that documents the immigration raid that occurred in spring of  2008 at the Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Postville. I hope that in the turmoil and fray of what is happening in Ferguson, that organizers know to set aside extra copies of papers and flyers, posters and press releases, and know that libraries can provide an archive to document your work and preserve it.  Ask the libraries supporting the Postville Project and I would bet they will have good advice on how to do this.

I am far from my Midwestern home, but I still love the people of Saint Louis and Ferguson.  What holds our country together isn't money but neighbors, and even states away I consider you my neighbors.  As a librarian, I know that we can come together to share and get to know one another.  This is expressed beautifully by librarian Scott Brown of the Ferguson library in Missouri who posted:



Thank you @ScottyBonner and thank you everyone who shows that you care by voting.

Your neighbor,  The Bookcharmer