TRIAD BLACK LIVES MATTER COMMUNITY PROJECT WINS AWARD
The Triad Black Lives Matter Collection was selected to receive the 2023 Voices of a City Local History Award, an award presented by the Greensboro History Museum for important contributions to local history by individuals or groups. The collection includes photographs and other materials related to the Black Lives Matter movement and the protests following the 2020 murder of George Floyd. The project is coordinated by Stacey Krim, Assistant Professor and Curator of Manuscripts and Cello Music. The purpose of the Triad Black Lives Matters Collection is a community collection the BLM movement, police brutality protests, and race relations in the Triad area of North Carolina.
HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH
UNC Greensboro is No. 1 in the UNC System for total percentage of Hispanic/Latinx enrollment and is rapidly progressing toward federal designation as a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI). “The Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities, founded in 1986, championed the recognition of HSIs by Congress in 1992. This designation allows colleges to access federal grant funding, enhancing their capacity to serve Hispanic students through infrastructure, faculty development, student support, and curriculum enhancement.” (NCCCS)
Each year, UNCG University Libraries celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month by hosting a drop-in event for Hispanic/Latinx students, though any student may attend. Special Collections & University Archives (SCUA) participated in the event, which included representatives from each library department sharing about the resources they offer to students. Aside from a warm welcome to the library, students were offered free coffee and churros as they learned more about the library’s services.
During this year’s event, SCUA offered students the opportunity to make a letterpress print with library staff member, Suzanne Helms, on our tiny Sigwalt Chicago #11 tabletop printing press. The press was a huge hit with students, and the experience provided them with a hands-on connection to printing history. Participants printed the text “¡Sí se puede!” or, in English, “Yes, we can!” In 1972, Dolores Huerta, United Farm Workers of America (UFW) co-founder, coined the phrase and it has subsequently become the motto of several activist groups. Huerta created the slogan during César Chávez’s 25-day fast in Phoenix, Arizona on behalf of UFW members. Readers may also recognize the motto from Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. It is also the message we want to communicate to our students, “Yes, you can succeed in college, and we are here to support you on that journey.”
North Carolina Community Colleges Creating Success (NCCCS). (2023, October 31). North Carolina Community Colleges Shine as Hispanic-serving institutions during Hispanic Heritage month. NCCCS. https://www.nccommunitycolleges.edu/news/north-carolina-community-colleges-shine-as-hispanic-serving-institutions-during-hispanic-heritage-month/
AUDREY SAGE VOLUNTEERS AT THE FAMILY ROOM OF THE TRIAD
The Family Room of the Triad is a Foster Care Resource Center. They provide families that foster and the children in their care with resources they need, such as: beds, clothes, toys, strollers, cribs, blankets, etc. Family Room is a space where children in care often come without anything. They are a space that not only gives them things they need, but also a space to learn and know that they are loved, valued, and important. The UNCG Staff Senate regularly volunteers at the Family Room providing help in organizing, cleaning, and helping with the donations so that when a foster family arrives, everything will be ready to provide them with what they need.
UNCG Staff volunteering at Family Room, October 24, 2023. Pictured from left to right: Allysa Robinson, Staff Senate Service Committee Chair; Audrey Sage, University Libraries; Alice Culclasure, Staff Senator. Photo Credit: Allysa Robinson.
UNCG Class of 1973 50th Reunion Exhibit
Scott Hinshaw prepared an exhibit for the 50th Reunion of the Class of 1973, which took place at the Alumni House on Friday, October 20, and Saturday, October 21, 2023. The exhibit featured a 1973 Class Jacket, yearbook, handbooks, issues of the arts magazine Corradi, and assorted images of student life from the time period. Scott enjoyed talking to the alumni on Saturday and hopes to get oral history interviews for the UNCG Institutional memory Collection with several of them in the coming year. The buffet brunch was excellent and we were so glad that the good folks at the Alumni House invited us to participate!
CURATOR’S TALK: A HISTORY OF UNCG THROUGH 25 OBJECTS
On November 8th 2023 in Hodges Reading Room (Jackson Library), SCUA hosted a curator’s talk by University Archivist Erin Lawrimore to accompany the exhibit she designed: “A History of UNCG through 25 Objects.” From Charles McIver’s death mask to University-branded face masks, this exhibit uses items from University Archives to explore many of the key people and events that have impacted the evolution of UNC Greensboro from its opening in 1892 through today. During the curator’s talk, Erin discussed how items were chosen for the exhibit, how our past informs campus life today, and how University Archives continues to document UNCG today.
In addition to learning more about the physical exhibit, ILRS graduate student Kate Newman introduced an accompanying web exhibit (https://uncglibraries.com/25objects/) that she created as part of a practicum experience.
GHOSTS OF THE G
SCUA special collections specialist Carolyn Shankle’s popular campus ghost tours were featured in a as a “UNCG Top 5” story: https://www.uncg.edu/news/the-ghosts-of-the-g/
ERIN LAWRIMORE HELPS UNVEIL A NEW HISTORICAL MARKER HONORING UNCG ALUMNA VIRIGINIA TUCKER AND OTHER “HUMAN COMPUTERS.”
A new historical marker honoring North Carolinians who worked as “human computers” for NASA was unveiled outside of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh on September 22, 2023.
As part of the unveiling ceremony, UNC Greensboro University Archivist Erin Lawrimore shared information about Virginia Tucker, a 1930 graduate of the North Carolina College for Women (now UNCG) and one of the first human computers hired by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), the predecessor to NASA. In 1935, Tucker and four other women formed the first “Computer Pool” at the Langley Aeronautical Laboratory.
By 1946, Tucker was promoted to Overall Supervisor for Computing at Langley. In that position, she trained approximately 400 women and placed them in the computing sections across the facility. She also recruited college women from across the South to work with computers. It is believed that the school now known as UNC Greensboro was the alma mater of the largest number of human computers.
The new historic marker is the result of efforts by students in Meredith College’s Spring 2020 Public History course who conducted research to identify Meredith alumnae and other North Carolinians who worked in these fields. The students completed a formal proposal for these contributions to be recognized on a state highway historical marker.
AUTHOR READING WITH LISA TOLBERT
On October 16, 2023 SCUA co-sponsored a reception for Dr. Lisa Tolbert, Professor of History at UNCG. Tolbert’s new book Beyond Piggly Wiggly: Inventing the American Self-Service Store, analyzes the importance of the Piggly Wiggly grocery store chain in the invention of self-service and explores the role of small business entrepreneurs who invented the first self-service stores in a grassroots social process.
LETTERS FROM SCUA: THE FLORABELLE SAGA
On October 2, 2023, Curator of Manuscripts Stacey Krim hosted the latest edition of “Letters from SCUA.” Stacy discovered correspondence about a student who was expelled in 1923 from the North Carolina College for Women (now UNCG). As Stacey led viewers through her story, different staff members read letters to and from college president Julius Foust, Florabelle, her mother, father, and a family friend.
You can watch the event on SCUA’s youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5UGBGTlmBE&t=2003s.
BOOTLEGGING IN THE OUTER BANKS
Read University Archivist Erin Lawrimore’s article feature in the Fall 2023 issue of Carolina Brew Scene at this link: https://issuu.com/apg-enc/docs/cbs-100623-issuu/18.
PRESENTATIONS
SCUA staff made presentations for a number of events this fall.
- Inside the Closed Stacks: Collections of Distinction in Special Collections and University Archives. UNCG Libraries Research and Application Webinar. Stacey Krim and Kathelene Smith. September 29, 2023.
- It Was a Train Wreck: Calamitous and Scandalous Tales from the UNCG Archives. Society of American Archivists Archives Month. October 5, 2023.
- And Now That You Don’t Have to Be Perfect, You Can Be Good: Flexible Strategies for Digitization as Preservation. David Gwynn, Stacey Krim, Beth Ann Koelsch. North Carolina Preservation Consortium Conference. November 6, 2023.
- North Carolina Literary Map. North Carolina Writers Network Conference. Patrick Dollar. November 3-5, 2023.
- In Their Own Words: High Impact Teaching with Oral Histories. Oral History Association Annual Meeting. Kathelene Smith, Beth Ann Koelsch, Stacey Krim. October 21, 2023.
- It Was a Dark and Stormy Night: The Origins of the Gothic Novel. Kathelene Smith. Century Book Club, Asheboro, NC. October 11, 2023.
AND FINALLY…SCUA has stickers and they are available in the Hodges Reading Room! Collect them all!
