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Press Release: Announcing Afro-Americana, 1535-1922 — the online edition of the Library Company’s unparalleled collection

Monday, January 16th, 2012

Today we distributed this news release:

Readex to Launch Digital Edition of the Library Company of Philadelphia’s Unparalleled Collection of Afro-Americana

More than 12,000 searchable books, pamphlets, and broadsides will stimulate new research on centuries of African American history, literature, and life 

Source: Library Company of Philadelphia/Afro-Americana Collection

January 16, 2012 (NAPLES, FL) – A digital edition of Afro-Americana, 1535-1922: From the Library Company of Philadelphia will be introduced in late Spring 2012 by Readex, a division of NewsBank. Created from the Library Company’s acclaimed collection—an accumulation that began with Benjamin Franklin and has steadily increased throughout its entire history—this unique new online resource will provide researchers with more than 12,000 wide-ranging printed works about African American history. Critically important subjects covered include the West’s discovery and exploitation of Africa; the rise of slavery in the New World along with the growth and success of abolitionist movements; the development of racial thought and racism; descriptions of African American life—slave and free—throughout the Americas; and slavery and race in fiction and drama. Also featured are printed works of African American individuals and organizations.

“The Library Company’s Afro-Americana Collection is one of the most comprehensive and valuable archives of printed material by and about people of African descent anywhere in the world,” says Professor Richard Newman of the Rochester Institute of Technology. “From early descriptions of African society and culture to the black struggle for justice in the Americas during the 19th century, it remains a touchstone for scholars and students alike. To have it available online and at your fingertips in a searchable format will be a dream come true.”

Source: Library Company of Philadelphia/Afro-Americana Collection

The works in this collection, many of which are quite rare, span nearly 400 years, from the early 16th to the early 20th century. Examples include David Walker’s 1829 Appeal . . . to the Colored Citizens of the World, but in Particular, and Very Expressly to Those of the United States of America, a militant attack on both southern slavery and efforts to colonize free blacks; Lydia Maria Child’s 1833 essay, An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans; William Still’s The Underground Rail Road: A Record of Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, &c., Narrating the Hardships, Hair-breadth Escapes, and Death Struggles of the Slaves in Their Efforts for Freedom (1872); William J. Simmons’ Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising (1887); and Booker T. Washington’s The Story of the Negro: The Rise of the Race from Slavery, published in 1909.

Source: Library Company of Philadelphia/Afro-Americana Collection

Also included are such important but lesser-known works as Joseph Sidney, An Oration, Commemorative of the Abolition of the Slave Trade (New York, 1809) and Russell Parrott, An Oration on the Abolition of the Slave Trade . . . First of January, 1814 (Philadelphia, 1814), two works by African American authors celebrating January 1 anniversaries of the end of the slave trade; Grand Bobalition of Slavery! (Boston, 1820), a satire of such celebrations, one example of a long-overlooked genre; Robert B. Lewis, Light and Truth (Portland, Maine, 1836), which champions the central role of black Africans in laying the basis for ancient civilization; William Wells Brown, The Black Man: His Antecedents, His Genius, and His Achievements (an 1865 republication in newly-liberated Savannah of an 1863 collective biography of prominent blacks, many still alive, and most, like the author, former slaves); Martin R. Delany, Principia of Ethnology: The Origins of Race and Color, with an Archeological Compendium of Ethiopian and Egyptian Civilization (Philadelphia, 1879), a work by an African American analyzing the origins of color and race and championing black creativity; Charles Carroll, “The Negro a Beast” or “In the Image of God” (St. Louis, 1900), one of many savage works by whites denying the humanity of blacks; and three works by the preeminent African American sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois: The Atlanta Conferences (Atlanta, 1902); Some Efforts of American Negroes for Their Own Social Betterment (Atlanta, 1898); and A Select Bibliography of the Negro American (Atlanta, 1905).

Source: Library Company of Philadelphia/Afro-Americana Collection

The Library Company’s Afro-Americana Collection began to gain international renown for its size, range, and significance in the late 1960s as scholars, influenced by civil rights activism, initiated fresh studies of slavery’s part in the American story. “As researchers rediscovered the importance of the long-neglected writings of African Americans, they told us that our collection was vital to new scholarship in African American studies,” says Librarian James N. Green. The Library Company mounted the path-breaking exhibition “Negro History, 1553-1903” in 1969, and followed that with the publication in 1973 of the magisterial bibliography Afro-Americana 1553-1906: A Catalog of the Holdings of the Library Company of Philadelphia and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Since then, Afro-Americana has been a priority of the Library Company, and the collection has grown with each year. A second edition of the Catalog, including 2,500 works acquired since 1973, was published in 2008, preserving and extending the legacy of this landmark work and now providing the bibliographic control for Readex’s online edition. Afro-Americana, 1535-1922 will be fully integrated into America’s Historical Imprints for seamless searching with Early American Imprints, Series I and II: Evans and Shaw-Shoemaker, 1639-1819 and the recent Supplements from the Library Company of Philadelphia, which have added nearly 2,000 newly discovered items. In addition, Afro-Americana, 1535-1922 will be cross-searchable with all Archive of Americana collections, including African American Newspapers, 1827-1998 and African American Periodicals, 1825-1995.

Source: Library Company of Philadelphia/Afro-Americana Collection

Researchers around the world have praised advance word of the partnership between Readex and the Library Company to digitize this landmark collection. UCLA Emeritus Professor Gary Nash writes, “The benefits to scholarship and teaching that will come when the Library Company’s Afro-Americana Collection is made into a digital database are virtually immeasurable. This will be a major step in infusing American history in general with its vitally important African American component. Teachers at all levels will find this a gold mine.”

And University of Michigan Professor Martha S. Jones says, “Today, early African American studies is a global enterprise that includes researchers throughout the United States as well as Europe, Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Latin America. This collaboration between the Library Company and Readex will bring new resources into reach and enrich this still expanding field of research and study.”

About the Library Company of Philadelphia

The Library Company is an independent research library specializing in American history and culture from the 17th through the 19th centuries. Founded in 1731 by Benjamin Franklin, the Library Company is America’s first successful lending library and oldest cultural institution. Free and open to the public, the Library Company houses an extensive non-circulating collection of rare books, manuscripts, broadsides, ephemera, prints, photographs, and works of art. The mission of the Library Company is to preserve, interpret, make available, and augment the valuable materials within its care. It serves a diverse constituency throughout Philadelphia and the nation, offering comprehensive reader services, an internationally renowned fellowship program, online catalogs, and regular exhibitions and public programs.

With the creation of the Program in African American History in 2007 (currently directed by Erica Armstrong Dunbar, an associate professor of history at the University of Delaware), the Library Company has expanded fellowships, conferences, exhibitions, publications, public programming, teacher training, and acquisitions to help achieve the full potential represented by its holdings in this area. For more information about this Program, see http://www.librarycompany.org/paah/

About Readex, a division of NewsBank

For more than sixty years, the Readex name has been synonymous with research in historical materials and government documents. Recognized by librarians, students, and scholars for its efforts to transform academic scholarship, Readex offers a wealth of Web-based collections in the humanities and social sciences, including the Archive of Americana, a family of historical collections featuring searchable books, pamphlets, newspapers, and government documents printed in America over three centuries, and the World Newspaper Archive, created in partnership with the Center for Research Libraries. Also available are the Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports and the Joint Publications Research Service Reports, two of the U.S. government’s fundamental sources of political, historical and scientific open source intelligence during the second half of the 20th century.

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For more information, contact Readex Marketing Director David Loiterstein by calling 1.800.762.8182 or emailing dloiterstein@readex.com.

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Explore new collections at ALA Midwinter: Visit Readex at Booth 1311 in Dallas

Wednesday, January 11th, 2012

If you will be attending the ALA Midwinter Conference, please visit Readex at NewsBank booth 1311. Our newest collections available for demonstration—either in Dallas or at your desk—include:

Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) Reports, 1957-1994

This authoritative digital edition is an important supplement to FBIS Daily Reports, 1941-1996. With emphasis on communist and developing countries, JPRS Reports is a uniquely valuable resource for researching socioeconomic, political, environmental, military, religious, and scientific issues and trends. (Request Trial)

African American Periodicals, 1825-1995

Drawn from holdings of the Wisconsin Historical Society, African American Periodicals ranges over more than 150 years of American life, from slavery during the Antebellum Period to the struggles and triumphs of the modern era. Like African American Newspapers, 1827-1998, this new collection is based on James Danky’s monumental bibliography. (Request Trial)

Ethnic American Newspapers from the Balch Collection, 1799-1971

In partnership with a leading ethnic research center, this collection presents new opportunities to explore the American immigrant experience of many of the most influential ethnic groups in U.S. history. (Request Trial)

American Newspaper Archives

Digitized editions of dozens of historical American newspapers from more than 40 states can now be acquired individually. Major titles include the Baton Rouge Advocate, Boston Herald, Dallas Morning News, New Orleans Times-Picayune, Omaha World-Herald, Richmond Times-Dispatch, San Diego Union-Tribune, Tampa Tribune and others from every region of the U.S. (Request Trial)

Latin America Newspapers, Series 2, 1822-1922

Created in partnership with the Center for Research Libraries, this second series of digitized Latin American Newspapers dramatically expands the number of searchable titles available from this important region. (Request Trial)

Or stop by NewsBank booth 1311 just to say hello. David Braden, Erin Luckett and Georgia Frederick will be representing Readex on site.

We hope to see you in Dallas!

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Pearl Harbor: As Reported the Day After

Wednesday, December 7th, 2011

Today is the 70th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor.  Here’s how four American newspapers reported it the next day on their front pages.  

 

For more information about American Newspaper Archives, or to request a free trial, please contact readexmarketing@readex.com.

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A uniquely valuable archive of translated foreign materials

Wednesday, November 30th, 2011

 

Discover Joint Publications Research Service Reports

China has emerged as a global power. We can all recite the formidable facts: most populous state on earth. Second largest global economy. World’s largest military. But what do we really know about a culture half a world away, the machinations of the country’s ruling party, or the day-to-day lives of its citizens? Where can one find authentic accounts that provide unfiltered insight into a nation’s socioeconomic, political, environmental, military, religious, and scientific issues and events-including those that reveal the naked truth about China’s inexorable rise?

Enter Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) Reports, 1957-1994, the ideal resource for developing a holistic understanding of cultures across the globe. This digital collection features English-language translations of foreign-language monographs, reports, serials, journals and newspapers from regions throughout the world—four million pages from 130,000+ reports, all told. Much of the information is quite rare; in fact, few libraries or institutions outside of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Library of Congress hold a complete collection. With an emphasis on communist and developing countries, this fully searchable resource is an essential tool for students and scholars at academic institutions worldwide.

The comprehensive Readex digital edition of JPRS Reports, 1957-1994, is now available by request for live preview. It features an intuitive interface that includes digital full-text searching, metadata search assistance and an individual bibliographic record for each JPRS Report. In addition, JPRS Reports, 1957-1994, will be cross-searchable with the Readex digital edition of Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports, 1941-1996.

For more information or to arrange a product trial, contact Readex at 800.762.8182, sales@readex.com or use this form.

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Key Titles in African American Periodicals, 1825-1995: Part One of Three

Tuesday, October 25th, 2011

African American Periodicals, 1825-1995, reflects more than a century and half of the African American experience. The first collection in Readex’s new America’s Historical Periodicals series, this wide-ranging resource features more than 170 titles from 26 states. Below is a brief description of seven of these publications. For descriptions of fourteen others, please visit the Key Periodicals page on the Readex website.

The Voice of the Negro (Atlanta, Georgia)

A literary journal aimed at a national audience of African Americans, The Voice of the Negro was published from 1904 to 1907. It published writings by Booker T. Washington, as well as a younger generation of black activists and intellectuals, including W.E.B. Du Bois, John Hope, Kelly Miller, Mary Church Terrell and William Pickens. It also featured poetry by Paul Lawrence Dunbar, James D. Corrothers and Douglas Johnson.

• Includes issues published between 1904 and 1907

The Colored American Magazine (Boston, Massachusetts)

One of the most prominent vehicles for black intellectual, artistic, and political expression during the first decade of the 20th century, The Colored American was edited by Pauline Hopkins, African American novelist, playwright and journalist. The magazine’s masthead read: “An Illustrated Monthly Devoted to Literature, Science, Music, Architecture, Facts, Fiction, and Traditions of the Negro Race.”

• Includes issues published between 1902 and 1908

The Horizon: A Journal of the Color Line (Washington, D.C.)

Edited by W.E.B. Du Bois, The Horizon was the precursor to The Crisis—Du Bois’ groundbreaking publication for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. However, The Horizon was a very different publication in that it functioned as an aggregator of news from other sources, as well as an outlet for its editors’ views. It had three main sections: “The In-Look” was a digest of the “Negro-American press,” “The Out-Look” was a digest of the periodical press, and “The Over-Look” was a digest of opinions and general catch-all for books, political discussions, and the views of Du Bois and his editors. It ceased publication in 1910 when Du Bois started The Crisis.

• Includes issues published between 1907 and 1910

The Crisis: A Record of the Darker Races (New York, New York)

The official magazine of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), The Crisis was founded by W.E.B. Du Bois in 1910 and is widely considered one of the most important African American publications of the twentieth century. Primarily a current-affairs journal promoting the NAACP’s liberal program of social reform and racial equality, The Crisis also included poems, reviews and essays on culture and history. “The object of this publication,” Du Bois wrote, “is to set forth those facts and arguments which show the danger of race prejudice, particularly as manifested today toward colored people. It takes its name from the fact that the editors believe that this is a critical time in the history of the advancement of men.”

• Includes issues published between 1910 and 1922

The Negro: A Review (St. Louis, Missouri)

Billed as “America’s Best Negro Monthly,” The Negro: A Review contained articles, illustrations, advertisements and short stories. Edited by Frederick Bond in St. Louis, it was one of the only general interest African American magazines published in the Midwest during World War II.

• Includes issues published between 1943 and 1948

The African World (Greensboro, North Carolina)

Published first by the Student Organization for Black Unity, The African World described itself as the “Voice of the Revolutionary Pan-African Youth Movement in the Americas.” It contained articles and photographs covering civil rights, the youth movement, prison abuse, and the exploitation of African American workers. Its founders later helped form, and publicize, the February First Movement, the civil rights group named for the date in 1960 when four African American students asserted their right to sit at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina.

• Includes issues published between 1971 and 1975

Black Careers (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)

A bi-monthly journal that did much to educate African American job seekers about the importance of Equal Opportunity Employment legislation, Black Careers contained articles on employment trends, educational opportunities and discrimination in employment. It was also popular with teachers in inner city schools due to its profiles of role models from the African American business community.

• Includes issues published between 1977 and 1982

For more information about African American Periodicals, 1825-1995, please write to readexmarketing@readex.com. To request trial access for your institution, please use this form.

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“Appeal to Loyal Women!” — The Creation of the United States Sanitary Commission and the Impact of Civilian Volunteers during the American Civil War

Wednesday, October 19th, 2011

Henry Whitney Bellows (1814-1882), planner and president of the United States Sanitary Commission, the leading soldiers' aid society, during the American Civil War.

On April 12, 1861, Confederate artillery opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. The first shots had been fired in a war that would last four long and bloody years. This April marked the beginning of a four-year commemoration of the 150th anniversary, or Sesquicentennial, of the American Civil War. Over the next four years, Civil War re-enactors, historians and history enthusiasts from across the United States will gather to help commemorate the battles and other important events linked to the war.

With the start of the Civil War in 1861, hundreds of aid societies sprang up across the country almost as quickly as young men rushed to enlist. Women of course were barred from enlisting in the military, although a few successfully disguised themselves as men and joined the fight. In New York, a group of women wishing to show their loyalty and patriotic spirit formed the Women’s Central Association of Relief, inspired by the work of Florence Nightingale and the British Sanitary Commission during the Crimean War. However, efforts to gain government support for their organization proved unsuccessful until Dr. Henry Whitney Bellows stepped in to help. Dr. Bellows and a group of male doctors traveled to Washington, D.C., to meet with President Abraham Lincoln on behalf of the women’s organization. At first, the president and other government officials were reluctant to have civilians become involved with the needs of the military. In spite of this, the United States Sanitary Commission (USSC) was established on June 9, 1861, with Dr. Bellows as its president.

"United States Sanitary Commission. Our Heroes." Source: Harper's Weekly. Courtesy: Brooklyn Museum Libraries

The headquarters of the USSC was in Washington, D.C., but regional commission branches were established throughout the Northern states, most notably in Boston, New York City, and Philadelphia. These branches acted as collection and distribution centers. Individuals and local aid societies shipped boxes of supplies to the commission branches where they were repackaged for delivery to soldiers in the field. Money was also collected and used to purchase additional food, clothing, and medical supplies.  

From the Jamestown Journal (NY), Oct. 18, 1861. Source: America's Historical Newspapers

By 1863, there were nearly 7,000 local aid societies affiliated with the USSC. Knitted socks, linens for bandages, quilts, baked goods, writing paper, stamps, and medicines were just a few of the many items that poured in. Even the little town of Chester, Vermont sent items, as reported in The Vermont Phoenix on May 7, 1863:

The Chester Soldiers’ Aid Society was organized in October of 1862. We very soon decided that the Sanitary Commission was the best channel through which to send our supplies and accordingly sent our first box to the care of “The Womans Central Relief Association, New York. Nine boxes have been sent there—three to the Vt. 4th Regiment and one to Brattleboro Hospital….The following is a list of articles sent: 107 quilts, 509 towels, 233 prs. Socks, 27 flannel shirts and under shirts, 9 woolen blankets, 147 shirts, 22 pillows, 102 sheets, 232 prs. drawers, 86 pillow cases, 212 handkerchiefs, 24 cushions, 239 napkins, 14 cans currant and apple jelly, 41 prs. Slippers, 43 bed sacks, 10 dressing gowns, 6 bottles raspberry shrub, 78 lbs. dried apple, 12 lbs. currants, 3 bottles lemon syrup. 

I was pleased to learn that my hometown of Springfield, Vermont also contributed to the war effort—as seen in this Nov. 9, 1861 item in the Springfield Weekly Republican:

“Springfield has done most excellently well in the war thus far. The town contains but 3000 inhabitants, yet has sent 80 men to fight for the country, five being from one family. The ladies also, during the three weeks just past, have manufactured articles for the sanitary commission, and have sent off five large boxes, containing the following articles: 46 bed quilts, 32 woolen blankets, 120 pairs of woolen socks, 111 pillow cases, 7 linen sheets, 43 cotton sheets, 67 napkins, 27 old linen handkerchiefs, 84 books and magazines, 5 old shirts, 2 cravats, 1 muffler, 1 dressing gown, 1 bag mutton tallow, 25 pounds dried apples, 3 boxes guava jelly, one can solidified milk, a quantity of cotton batting, and a quantity of old linen and cotton for bandages and compresses. Other articles have been handed in since the articles named were forwarded, and another box is to be sent soon.”

“Amateur theatricals in aid of The National Sanitary Commission, at Brinley Hall ... Nov. 28, 1862. Programme.” Source: American Broadsides and Ephemera

To help raise money for the USSC, fundraisers held sanitary fairs, bazaars, concerts, raffles, and plays.  Play bills and concert programs for these charitable events are among the many USSC-related items found in America’s Historical Imprints. During its existence the USSC raised roughly $5 million in money and $15 million in donated supplies for the Union Army. The Western Sanitary Commission and the United States Christian Commission also supported the Union Army but worked separately from the USSC. The Confederate States had small aid societies, but none as large as the USSC.

The USSC relied heavily on volunteers. Only a handful of individuals, mostly men, held paid positions. Sanitary agents were employed to inspect the living conditions of military camps and hospitals as well as the health of the soldiers, much to the disgust and annoyance of some military officers and surgeons. These agents would make note of any needed supplies, especially for sick or wounded men, and advise the officers on how to request such supplies from the USSC. Mary A. Livermore was one of the few paid female agents. Livermore and women like Clara Barton and Dorothea Dix, the Union’s Superintendent of Female Nurses, were instrumental in organizing aid societies, collecting goods and money, and recruiting qualified nurses to work in the hospitals. In response to the flood of letters inquiring about wounded or missing soldiers, the USSC created a hospital directory. By April of 1863, the directory included the names of wounded or sick soldiers in every general hospital.

Time and again the USSC proved its worth by providing aid when it was needed most. In many cases the organization was the first to provide medical care and supplies after major battles. Aid delivered after the battles of Fredericksburg, Antietam, and Gettysburg, for example, stands as a testament to the hard work and devotion of thousands of civilian volunteers. The USSC was also able to provide some relief to Union soldiers held at the infamous Andersonville Prison.

"The Sanitary Commission ministering to the wounded and dying after the battle." Courtesy: New York Public Library Digital Gallery

Although the Civil War ended in April, 1865, relief work continued for several months. The USSC aided soldiers and their families by providing food, lodging, and occasionally, travel expenses for returning veterans. Volunteers helped fill out pension claims, locate missing soldiers, and identify the graves of thousands of unknown soldiers. In 1866, the organization was officially disbanded. Work with the USSC opened many doors for women in the field of medicine and helped to convince people that women were capable of achieving great things. In 1881, Clara Barton helped found the American Red Cross using the United States Sanitary Commission as a model.  

From the Oregonian, May 22, 1917. Click to open full article in PDF. Source: America's Historical Newspapers

For more information about Readex collections, or to request a trial for your institution, please contact readexmarketing@readex.com.

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Newly Discovered Materials Enrich Early American Imprints

Monday, October 10th, 2011

Nearly 2,000 rare printed items from the Library Company of Philadelphia—previously unavailable in the Evans and Shaw-Shoemaker series—have been digitized by Readex.

Available in two parts, Supplements from the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1670-1819 may now be seamlessly searched and browsed within Readex’s fully integrated America’s Historical Imprints collection—the definitive resource for researching every aspect of 17th- and 18th-century America.

Representing the largest collection of early American imprints to have been identified and cataloged during the last 40 years, these new series of remarkable printed materials include items relevant to a host of humanities topics and are representative of numerous genres of colonial print. These newly discovered materials are particularly valuable for studying popular culture; many emanate from the middle and lower orders of society.

Early American Imprints, Series I:

Supplement from the Library Company

of Philadelphia, 1670-1800

Sample Documents – Title List – Request Trial


Early American Imprints, Series II:

Supplement from the Library Company

of Philadelphia, 1801-1819

Sample Documents – Title List – Request Trial

 “These collections are rich in imprints that have never before been available in the digital Early American Imprints because they came to light after the completion of the bibliographies on which it was based,” says James N. Green, the Library Company’s Librarian. “By adding them to their Archive of Americana, Readex has made it even more truly the national digital library of early American print.”

 

For more information or to arrange a product trial, please contact Readex at 800.762.8182, sales@readex.com or use this form.

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The Digital Detective: Tracking Criminals When the Trail Runs Cold (by Stephen Mihm)

Thursday, October 6th, 2011

[The article below by University of Georgia professor Stephen Mihm first appeared in The Readex Report (Sept. 2008). Last month, an op-ed by Mihm headlined "The Biographer's New Best Friend" was published in The New York Times Sunday Review section. In his Times piece, Mihm quotes historians and biographers James McGrath Morris, Joshua Kendall and Graham Hodges to help explain why "Readex's America's Historical Newspapers...has the potential to revolutionize biographical research."]

The Digital Detective: Tracking Criminals When the Trail Runs Cold

By Stephen Mihm, Associate Professor of History, University of Georgia

When I began work on a history of American counterfeiting between the Revolution and the Civil War, I was faced with some peculiar research problems. With a few rare exceptions, counterfeiting during this period was a crime that was not prosecuted by federal authorities. The problem was instead left to state and local law enforcement officials who were often outnumbered and incompetent. This was partly a consequence of the fact that the paper money in circulation originated not with the federal government, but with hundreds of state-chartered banks. But it was also a reflection of the relative weakness of the federal government’s policing.

And therein lay a serious problem, not only for the police of the day, but for the historian who would attempt to reconstruct this kind of criminal activity. Counterfeiting involved vast numbers of players spread out across state and even national lines. This meant that local law enforcement officials often operated in the dark as to the scope and scale of the network of manufacturers, distributors, retailers and passers of bogus bills. Local law enforcement records—what few have survived—often provide but a fleeting snapshot of an individual counterfeiter who typically posted bail and fled, never to be seen again. What, then, is a historian to do, particularly a historian who wants to reconstruct the entire criminal careers of some of these colorful individuals?

When I began research for A Nation of Counterfeiters, I started keeping tabs on the names of criminals who surfaced at multiple times and places in the historical record. But this is like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack: you could spend many lifetimes reading through newspapers and other sources, trying to track your quarry. The advent of a new generation of digital resources—particularly America’s Historical Newspapers—made life much easier, and netted results that not only surprised me, but would have stunned the detectives and bounty hunters who spent so much time unsuccessfully tracking counterfeiters in the early republic.

Take a man like Seneca Paige. The epitaph of his gravestone notes that he was a “poor man’s friend,” a not-so-subtle reference to the fact that he was the head of a counterfeiting syndicate that straddled the border between Vermont and Canada. Paige was a notoriously slippery individual, someone who constantly escaped from the clutches of the law. That initially made tracking him almost absurdly difficult. I made a few serendipitous finds in records on both sides of the border, but when I ran searches for “Seneca Paige” or “Seneca Page” in millions of pages of America’s Historical Newspapers, some interesting things turned up.

Paige was everywhere. He showed up first in September 1809, where he was busted in Jersey City after trying to pass a counterfeit note.

He wriggled free in that instance, but was again in the news in April 1812, when a thousand dollar reward for his capture had the desired effect, and Paige was escorted to Baltimore to face charges.

The same key word searches revealed that after being indicted and committed to jail in Baltimore, he made his escape—only to be captured again a year later in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.

Judging from the news reports, the local authorities weren’t aware that Paige had already escaped from other jails: how could they be? Local law enforcement officials didn’t correspond with one another on a regular basis, and they didn’t have access to every newspaper in the Union. If they had, they might not have been surprised at what happened next: Paige escaped from prison once more, “without breaking any locks or bolts,” as the Commercial Advertiser reported in August 1816.

Paige chose not to push his luck at this point: he apparently relocated to Canada, where he quickly assumed leadership of the so-called “Canada Counterfeiting Company.” And yet news of Paige’s movements continued to drift south of the border, sometimes in court papers, but just as often in the pages of newspapers.

In this particular case, finding Paige required expanding the search, dropping his first name and simply running searches for articles containing both “Paige” or “Page” and “counterfeiter.” When I did this, I found a curious mention of him in a Baltimore newspaper from 1826.

It seems that a man was caught in New Haven with a shipment of counterfeit money concealed in a mahogany dressing case. When examined, he confessed that he had received the bills and the case from “a Mr. Page, in Dunham, Canada.” Dunham was the town where most counterfeit money was manufactured in the 1820s. Again, a serendipitous find, but one that would have been impossible before the advent of digital resources.

America’s Historical Newspapers and other digital resources are extraordinarily powerful tools, enabling historians to reconstruct the movements of fugitives with startling precision. Indeed, with a few keystrokes, a historian working in the 21st century can often reconstruct the movements and careers of obscure criminals two centuries ago with comparable—if not greater—accuracy than the constables and cops who fruitlessly chased them in their own time.

More about the author

Stephen Mihm is the author, with Nouriel Roubini, of Crisis Economics: A Crash Course in the Future of Finance (Penguin Press, 2010) and A Nation of Counterfeiters: Capitalists, Con Men, and the Making of the United States (Harvard University Press, 2007). He is also the co-editor, with Katherine Ott and David Serlin, of Artificial Parts, Practical Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics (NYU, 2002).

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Hello, Comrade Philby

Wednesday, September 28th, 2011

Kim Philby on USSR commemorative stamp

In “Just Browsing: Cool Items from the Past,” I shared several unexpected items I recently stumbled upon in America’s Historical Newspapers.

I don’t however expect to find such wonderful things in Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports. What’s cool there comes more from the benefits of hindsight than sheer surprise. And that backward look lets the propagandistic nature of some of the documents shine through.

One I recently read is the somewhat hagiographic interview with Kim Philby, the former high-ranking member of British intelligence agent who spied for and later defected to the Soviet Union. The interview, first published in the Russian daily newspaper Izvestiya on Dec. 19, 1967, was translated into English for publication in FBIS supplement “MATERIALS ON 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF SOVIET STATE SECURITY ORGANS, FBIS-FRB-68-007-S on 1968-01-10. Supplement number 2”

Titled “Hello, Comrade Philby,” the article starts with a street scene in chilly Moscow:

Click to open page 1 in PDF.

“It was on a frosty morning, and the haze of the night had not yet departed from the snow-covered streets. The trees on Gogol Avenue were covered with hoarfrost. Muskovites rubbing their cheeks and stamping their feet stood in a queue at a trolleybus stop. A new day began with all its worries and fuss. Cars were also in a hurry, one outrunning the other.

“A man of medium height, no longer young, but still strong, leisurely strolls over the sidewalk inhaling the frozen air. He wears a warm, fur-lined overcoat and a fur cap. The man sincerely enjoys this morning, the frost, and the rapid stream of pedestrians. Sometimes people bump into him. ‘Pardon me,’ they say in a hurry. ‘Never mind,’ he replies, speaking with a light accent. He looks with interest at the little boys with rucksacks on their backs who are throwing snowballs at each other on the avenue. He always smiles, this man with a kind and frank face.

“Who is he? Why does he smile? What unusual thing has he discovered on the avenue, in the frost-covered trees, on that ordinary Moscow morning? The little children on the avenue, the passers-by on the sidewalk, the fashionable girls — to which of them would it occur that the person smiling at them this morning has had a most amazing life history? He used to be called a puzzle of a man, and his life was called a rebus. There were many years, whole dozens of years, 30 years of endless puzzles, a life as intricate as a labyrinth.”

It then segues into a description of a 1951 meeting in Washington, D.C., at which Allen Dulles, Frank Wisner and other American intelligence leaders awaited an important British guest. Arriving exactly on schedule, Philby took his place at their table. He listened carefully to the outline of a major operation in which dissidents would infiltrate an Eastern European country, and he offered suggestions to help polish the plan. The article explains that this top-secret operation failed because Dulles:

“…even in his most nightmarish dreams […] would not have imagined that on that August morning a cadre worker of the Soviet intelligence service was sitting at the table opposite him in the office. The Soviet intelligence agent had accomplished another task of the Center.

“And now it was our turn to sit at a table with Kim Philby,” the article continues, providing a further description of the Soviet spy:

“He is very calm and slow[,] his large grey head with hair parted in the middle rests on strong shoulders, his masculine, weatherbeaten face is softened by bright, slightly twinkled eyes. When he smiles, wrinkles run from the corners of his eyes to the temples, giving his face an even warmer expression.”

The interview, with copious direct quotes from Kim Philby, follows. Where he was born, his education, his career before recruitment in the Soviet and then the British intelligence services are covered.

“It was in my work in the Soviet intelligence service that I found the form of this struggle. I thought at that time, and still think, that in this work I served my own British people, too.”

He tells the following from his days as a reporter during the Spanish Civil War, at which point his coverage was favorable to Franco.

“At that time I lived in Bilbao. Once, an officer from Franco’s staff came to me, seated me in his car, and drove me to the fascist headquarters in Burgos. They showed me into a hall in which there was a group of ridiculously bombastic generals. In the center was the ‘Generalissimo’ himself. I noticed at that time that all of them, including Franco himself, were rather short men. I was introduced. After a couple of minutes, the ‘caudillo’ extraordinarily solemnly presented this very same, cross to me. It later came in very handy for my work: of all Western journalists, I was one of the few awarded with this exotic order. When joining the British ‘intelligence service,’ the cross, too, played its role.”

Philby also discusses his pre-World War II activities in Germany and his wartime rise in the British service. After the war he was sent to Turkey, where his life was hectic. It’s busy when you’re working both sides of the street.

“It was much easier for James Bond in the novels of my old friend Ian Fleming; he still managed to find time for merry holidays and love affairs,” joked Philby.

I love the next question the interviewer poses: “You mean you knew Fleming also?”

“Of course, since he also worked in the secret service as deputy director of naval intelligence. Also employed in intelligence was Graham Greene, who was also a colleague of mine at that time. Today he is a truly great and respected writer.”

A quick discussion of Philby’s taste in literature follows, and then it’s back to his career. When asked about American intelligence elite, he gives dismissive estimates of two CIA directors—Allen Dulles (“considerate in dealing with people, but essentially showed a haughty attitude toward them”) and Richard Helms (“more politician than a specialist in his business”). Philby continues:

“But one person who really made an indelible impression on me,” he continued, “was [FBI Director J. Edgar] Hoover’s deputy, Mr. Ladd. This astoundingly dull person was quite seriously trying to convince me that Franklin Roosevelt, the former president, had been a Komintern agent!”

The interview concludes with this ringing statement:

“We congratulate him with all our hearts on the occasion of the coming jubilee, the 50th anniversary of the VCHK-KGB organs, the holiday of the Soviet Cheka members. This is his holiday too, after all.”

The rest of the FBIS Supplement is cool, too. The articles come from Pravda, Red Star, Soviet Union, Trud as well as Izvestiya—all packaged together to let U.S. government readers see a wide degree of coverage of the anniversary. It opens with a speech to KGB personnel by KGB director Yuri Andropov, who would become leader of the U.S.S.R. fifteen years later:

“Remarkable Chekist cadres, inspired by the ideals of October, grew up and were tempered in the struggle against the enemies of Soviet power. The image of the Chekist as a passionate revolutionary, a man of crystal-clear honesty and vast personal courage, relentless in the struggle against the enemies, stern in his duty, but human and ready to sacrifice himself for the people’s cause to which he has devoted his life—an image which prevails among the people—is associated precisely with the activity of these men.”

Andropov’s style makes the Philby article read as if it came out of movie fan magazine.

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Announcing a Readex Online Seminar: Newspaper Archives for Academic Research and Teaching

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Readex now offers complimentary 45-minute Webinars led by experts in the history and academic use of newspaper archives. We invite you and your colleagues to register for a lively fall session in which you’ll learn about the fascinating and unique histories of a series of major American newspapers.

We’ll also explore such topics as:

• Why are newspapers often described as not only history’s first draft but also the heart of a community?

• How can general reference and local history researchers best utilize searchable newspaper archives?

• How are teachers at academic institutions of all types and sizes now using newspaper archives in their classrooms?

• How has access to newspaper archives facilitated important published research on American life and history?

• How have the editorial perspectives of individual newspapers changed over time, and how have their political slants shaped and influenced coverage?

• How has news reporting itself developed over time, and how do such transformations mirror evolving social values?

• How can all users more effectively search and enjoy browsing historical newspaper archives?

American newspapers—with their eyewitness reporting, editorials, advertisements, obituaries and human interest stories—have preserved essential records and detailed accounts of nearly every facet of regional and national life. Now searchable online, these regionally diverse archives span centuries of social, cultural, political, military, business, sports and literary history, providing students and scholars with invaluable original reporting and fresh, local-level insights.

Michelle Harper

Our host and key speaker has nearly 15 years of high-level experience with the digitization of archival collections, particularly historical newspapers. She has worked for several leading companies in roles such as Vice President, History Publishing; Director, Special Collections; Director, Product Management; and Publisher, Historical Newspapers.

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