Category Archives: Uncategorized

The End of an Era

After over 12 years of sharing archive and rare book content on this blog, we are officially retiring it. It’s not going anywhere anytime soon, however — we’re leaving the content here for the time being so you can continue … Continue reading

“There was joy and there was sorrow”: Armistice Day, 1918

World War I was fought between multiple countries in two main alliance groups, making the process of ending the war complicated. In some ways, it began with Allied power Russia’s separate peace with the Central Powers, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, … Continue reading

University Libraries Special Collections Announces LGBTQ Digital Exhibit and Digital Collection

University Libraries Special Collections announces the launch of a new digital exhibit, Empowering Voices, and a digital collection, the Alabama Forum, a major LGBTQ newspaper. University Libraries is pleased to hold the largest collection of Forums in Alabama, with issues dating from … Continue reading

WWI Poster Art

Hoole Library is home to over 100 World War I posters — large and occasionally fragile, but still in beautiful color. You can take a look at full-size facsimiles of some of them at Gorgas Library, as part of our … Continue reading

The Power of Facsimiles, part 1

Facsimiles — exact copies — of historical documents provide a way to access details of the original without having to actually possess it. Some are of printed items for which certain versions are now rare, or for which the original publishing context — … Continue reading

Men of Color in the 19th Century

African Americans occupied a wider variety of spaces in the social order of 19th century America than you may realize. Because of the horrors of slavery, there are an uncountable number who, at least individually, are all but erased from the historical … Continue reading

Shakespeare at 400

Four hundred years ago tomorrow, William Shakespeare’s life was over and the story of his cultural legacy began. At what a legacy it has been! There are countless adaptations of his work, in every artistic medium we’ve come up with over the … Continue reading

What the Heck Is a Vertical File?

What the heck is a Vertical File? This is a question I had when I began working in archives. We have three such large archival collections here at Hoole — University of Alabama Pamphlet Files, Alabama Vertical Files, and Rare Vertical Files — and I … Continue reading

Chronicling UA’s First Steps Toward Desegregation

Sixty years ago, the first major step was made toward desegregating the University of Alabama. Autherine Lucy, a black woman from Shiloh, Alabama, was enrolled – and a few days later suspended, eventually expelled, though she had done nothing wrong. … Continue reading