Author Archives: Amy Vilz

Preservation Week: April 22 to 28

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The American Library Association, Society of American Archivists, Library of Congress and other organizations have started the Preservation Week initiative to

raise awareness about collecting and preservation, to connect the general public to preservation information and expertise, and to emphasize the close relationships among personal, family, community, and public collections and their preservation.*

Are you a genealogist?  Do you have family photos, diaries, old books, or other collectibles and memorabilia?  Here are a few resources to help you take care of those items and organize your research.

Organizing Family Papers

Conducting an Oral History Interview

How to care for Books 

How to care for Photographs

How to care for Textiles, Quilts, and Clothing

Caring for Paper and Works of Art on Paper [Drawings, Watercolors, etc.]

*From SAA Preservation Week website.

A Mirror of Fair Women

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There was a group of painters who became identified specifically with the painting of beautiful women rather than the general concept of beauty in art….  It is in this spirit, the masculine appreciation of feminine appearance, that the 1890s and the turn of the century witnessed the publication of several books dedicated to the beauty of women in art….

Among these books was Theodore Child’s A Mirror of Fair Women: Studies in Beauty and Elegance, published by Harper and Brothers in 1892.  The D’Youville College Archives holds a selection of engravings and etchings from this work, some of which can be viewed here:

Spring, from The Birth of Venus, by Botticelli

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*Quote taken from Bailey Van Hook’s Angels of Art: Women and Art in American Society, 1876-1914.  Published by Penn State Press, 2004, pp.165.


 

Endpapers

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The Prairie, 1827.
end – papers n.

the blank leaves at the beginning and end of a book, pasted to the inside front and back covers and first and last pages.

Before books were mass-produced, it was common for endpapers to include maps, marbling, or other ornament.  Endpapers are functional and serve to help support and strenthen the book, but they can also be quite beautiful.  These examples are from books held in the D’Youville College Archives:

 

Although today most endpapers are blank, children’s books, in particular picture books, often still contain ornamented endpapers:

Call it Courage, 1941. Endpapers illustrated by Armstrong Sperry.
The Forge in the Forest, 1925. Endpapers illustrated by Boris Artzybasheff.


 

William G. Fargo

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William G. Fargo mansion, 1872

William G. Fargo mansion, 1872

The William G. Fargo mansion at 51 Niagara was adjacent to what is now the D’Youville campus (Fargo Avenue is named after William Fargo).  Fargo was born May 20, 1818 in Pompey, New York, and “commenced life financially at the bottom of the ladder,”¹  working as a grocery clerk and express messenger.  In 1851, he started Wells Fargo and Company with Henry Wells.  He served as mayor of Buffalo, 1862-1866, and from 1868 to his death in 1881, was president of American Express.

Fargo built his mansion in 1872; it was demolished a mere 29 years later in 1901.  At over 20,000 square feet, the home was expensive to maintain.  Fargo’s wife died in 1890 and the house was vacant thereafter.  In today’s dollars, it is estimated to have cost almost $10 million to build and furnish the home.

For more information and interior images on the William G. Fargo mansion, visit the Western New York Heritage.

Sources:

1 “Close of a Busy Career,” The New York Times, August 4, 1881.
2 “Fargo Estate: Then and Now,” Western New York Heritage
3 Image of Fargo home, D’Youville College Archives, Picture Gallery: A02.


 

College Photographs Finding Aid

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The D’Youville College Archives has an extensive collection of photographs documenting commencements, buildings, student activities, and the beginnings of the College.  Fortunately, former College Archivist Sister Mary Kathleen Duggan created an index to each photo with descriptive captions and dates (thank you Sister!).  This Picture Gallery Index is now available online.

Search the index 2 ways:

1.  Keyword search by using the Ctrl-F function [hold the “control” key and hit “f”].

2.  Browse the index by category.  The index is organized in 5 series: Beginnings, Commencements, Baccalaureate Ceremonies, Buildings, and Student Activities.

Groundbreaking of Mary Agnes Hall, 1967.

Any questions on using the index or to access images described in the index, contact the Archives at 829.8155 or vilza@dyc.edu.


 

Ah, Venice!

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plate 20

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The D’Youville College Archives holds 70 prints of late 19th century Venice.  These images were the work of Ferdinando Ongania (1842-1911).  Ongania was an Italian publisher, and owned the Münster bookshop in the Piazza San Marco, Venice.  Over the course of his career, he published 43 works on Venice, its history, and art.  One of the best known is Calli e Canali in Venezia, (Streets and Canals in Venice), published in the 1890s.  The images capture Venetian life at that time, from the people, to the gondolas, canals, and architecture.


 

 

 

The Mentor: Learn One Thing Every Day

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mentor019

 

The object of The Mentor Association is to enable people to acquire useful knowledge without effort, so that they may come easily and agreeably to know the worlds great men and women, the great achievements, and the permanently interesting things in art, literature, science, history, nature and travel.

The Mentor magazine was published from 1913 to about 1931 by The Mentor Association.  The Association was founded by William David Moffat in 1912 and included experts in various fields.  Each issue was devoted to a single subject augmented by fine photogravures (photogravures are prints produced in such a way as to mimic the richness and subtle range of tone found in photographs).  Several examples are included here:


The purpose of The Mentor Association is to give people, in an interesting and attractive way, the information in various fields of knowledge that they all want and ought to have. The information is imparted by interesting reading matter, prepared under the direction of leading authors, and by beautiful pictures, produced by the most highly perfected modern processes.


We give you in The Mentor the good things out of many books, and in a form that is easy to read and that taxes you little for time. A library is a valuable thing to have if you know how to use it. But there are not many people who know how to use a library. If you are one of those who don’t know, it would certainly be worth your while to have a friend who could take from a large library just what you want to know and give it to you in a pleasant way. The Mentor can be such a friend to you.

 

The D’Youville College Archives holds 43 issues of The Mentor, from September 29, 1913 to April 1, 1915.