Digital Commons Network^™

Chasing The Albino Pygmy Giraffe, Charles H. Haddad

School of Communication and Journalism Faculty Publications

It's never a good sign when someone is knocking on the door of your hotel room at seven in the morning. That's especially true if you have been schlepping eight college students across Western China, as I had been for the past week. I now heard in this soft rapping the death knell of my fledgling professorial career. Wrapping a ratty, threadbare pillow around my head, I tried to shut out the insistent rapping. Of course, that didn't work. Bad news has a way of butting in.

So begins my novel “Chasing the Albino Pygmy Giraffe.” It is a laugh-aloud …

The Rise And Fall Of Caribbean Piracy: A Socio-Technical Analysis Of The War Of Spanish Succession, Maritime Innovation, And Edward Randolf’S Policy, Dominique M. Salinski

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

This paper argues that the mode and historical context in which piracy ascended in the Caribbean after the War of the Spanish Succession, as well as the historical interrelation between maritime technology and pirate tactics, coalesced into a diachronic Damocles Sword that resulted in the downfall of piracy in the Golden Age. Sanctioning piratical enterprises as a subconventional maritime strategy displayed a geopolitical reliance on piracy by great powers. However, the depraved treatment conventional sailors received across all major European navies generated a social stratum that eventually bore the Golden Age of Piracy, while simultaneously contributing significantly to British naval …

Italian Railroad, Construction And Timber Laborers In The Lake Superior Basin And Michigan, 1880s-1920s, Russell Magnaghi

Upper Country: A Journal of the Lake Superior Region

What follows is an overview of the Italian story scattered across the Lake Superior region in the states of Wisconsin and Minnesota and the Canadian province of Ontario and finally the state of Michigan. The role of the unskilled laborer seeking work on rail lines and other construction jobs that started in the 1880s came to an end by the 1920s when railroads no longer needed large numbers of construction crews.

The narrative will begin by focusing on railroad laborers in the Lake Superior basin, but the majority of the story will be centered in the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. …

Cramped, Narrow, And Overfilled: What Drove The Renovation Of Rochester’S Can Of Worms In March 1989, Declan S. Morrow

The Exposition

Constructed in the 1960s and rebuilt in the 1980s, the I-490 Interchange situated east of Rochester, New York was a source of constant controversy by the motorists who used the freeway to journey from the suburbs where they lived to the downtown districts where they worked. This infamous interchange became known to Rochesterarians as “the Can of Worms” because of its winding ramps and narrow roads that would often leave those who traversed it confused and at the mercy of other drivers if they had not already experienced its design. To explain why this freeway was so terrible to drive …

The Tide Taken At The Flood: The Black Suffrage Movement During The Dorr Rebellion In The State Of Rhode Island (1841-1842), Caleb T. Horton

Dorr Scholarship

This essay by Caleb Troy Horton provides a brief history of the Providence, Rhode Island, African American Community and their involvement in the Dorr Rebellion.

The essay recounts the actions of the Rhode Island Anti-Slavery Society, its members, and Rhode Island Black leaders—headquartered in Providence—during the conflict that ultimately, through their agency, granted Black men suffrage in the 1842 Rhode Island State Constitution (a.k.a. the Law and Order Constitution) enacted in May 1843.

Different Perspectives In Early Twentieth-Century Utah: A Love Story Between Lewis Gillilan And Ellen Benson, Greer E. H. Garver

Student Publications

Lewis Gillilan and Ellen Benson were young adults who lived in Utah during the first decade of the twentieth century. Between the years 1909 and 1910 they engaged in a long-distance courtship, which ended in an elopement. In that period, they wrote many letters to each other which were full of details about what shaped their relationship. Such details ranged from romantic expressions to disagreements about religious beliefs. Their letters also frequently included references to their work and education, which tell a story of a state going through both agricultural, industrial, and social development. This paper explores themes present in …

Historical Company And Industry Publications: Finding Aid, Bethany Latham

Finding Aids

This collection (cataloged on Bib #2888882) is comprised of items related to American industries, companies, and association/guilds, primarily from the 1940s to 1960s. These include short publications, pamphlets, reports, and product catalogs. The items originated with the Library’s vertical file, which was culled and the majority of items discarded in 2020. Items related to Alabama and items deemed of significant historical interest were retained and added to the Library’s Special Collections. The vertical file’s original contents date back to JSU’s time as a Normal School; it appears items were added up until at least the 1990s.

Using Vr And Ar To Create Immersive Experiences That Document Local History And Culture, Susan Swiatosz, Beryl White-Bing, Kevin Pfeil

Library Faculty Presentations & Publications

In 2023 the Virtual Learning Librarian at the University of North Florida’s (UNF) Thomas G. Carpenter Library approached the Head of Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) with the idea to create a virtual reality (VR) experience using one of SCUA’s most accessed special collections: the Eartha M. M. White Collection. She was inspired by several existing VR experiences such as The Book of Distance and The People’s House: Inside the White House with Barack and Michelle Obama. She was also stimulated by the challenge set by the Head of SCUA to figure out a collaborative project with Special Collections. …

Los Tecolotes: Chicana And Chicano Studies: Reflections On The Past For The Future, Jaime S. Cruz, Juan Gómez-Quiñones, Teresa Mckenna, Ernesto B. Vigil, Irene Vásquez, Alvaro Huerta, José Ángel Gutiérrez, Blanca Gordo, Minnie Ferguson, Marcos Aguilar, Devra Weber, Elias Serna, Steven Castro

Regeneración: A Xicanacimiento Studies Journal

This texts documents a panel organized on August 20, 2019, that included Chicana/o educators, activist, and supporters of Chicana/o Studies attended the “Los Tecolotes – Chicana and Chicano Studies: Reflection on the Past who participated in the Future” symposium at Virginia Avenue Park in Santa Monica. The event sought to bring attention to the social, political, and educational challenges the Chicana/o community has and is presently encountering. The symposium was also organized to commemorate the 50^th Anniversary of the Chicana/o Moratorium and to share recent findings related to the assassination of Los Angeles Times journalist and KMEX correspondent …

2024-2025 Ursinus College Course Catalogue, Office Of The Registrar

Ursinus College Catalogues, 1869-Present

A digital copy of the 2024-2025 Ursinus College Catalog. It contains details of the curriculum, departmental requirements and courses of instruction as well as the Open Questions core requirements, experiential learning and the Common Intellectual Experience (CIE). Academic policies, special opportunities and scholarships, off-campus programs and graduation requirements are also outlined.

Wagon Tracks Volume 38, Issue 4 (August 2024)

Wagon Tracks

Contents

2 On the Cover: Horse Drinking from the Cimarron River: Timothy K. Lewis

4 Trail Writings: Chris Day

5-6 Joanne’s Jottings

7 Arrow Rock Ferry Site Expands

8-9 News along the Trail: In Memoriam: Bill Drewes Kathleen S. Pickard

10-11 Road of Conquest: Another View of the Santa Fe Trail Rendezvous 2024

12-18 Sibley Expedition in Northeastern New Mexico By L. Stephen Schmidt

18 National Historic Trails: What are They? By L. Stephen Schmidt

20-23 Cold Springs and the Santa Fe Trail By Dan and Carol Sharp

24-27 A Long and Useful for the Santa Fe Trail By T. …

Gladys Mitchell House Collection, Dan Bonenberger, Jaclyn Panter, Katherine St. Amand, Ian Tomashik, Kate Zorn

Digital Heritage Preservation Collection

This collection explores the life of Gladys Mitchell and the home she shared with her family on Detroit's Eastside. Gladys and her husband, Ossian Sweet, lived with her parents Benjamin and Rosella in a residence on 9322-24 Cairney Street from 1922 to 1925 before moving to the now-historic bungalow at 2905 Garland Street, located about a mile southeast. In 1925, when the Sweets moved into an all-white neighborhood, their experience led to a landmark Supreme Court case that affirmed African Americans' rights to homeownership, including the right to defend their private property.

Benjamin Mitchell and his wife, Rosella, rented the …

Enhancing History Education With Google Notebooklm: Case Study Of Mary Easton Sibley’S Diary For Multimedia Content And Podcast Creation, Paul Huffman, James Hutson

Faculty Scholarship

This article explores new features of Google’s NotebookLM, an AI-powered tool designed for advanced document analysis and educational content generation. Tested on the 92-page transcribed diary of Mary Easton Sibley, the founder of Lindenwood University, NotebookLM effectively generated FAQs, a study guide, a table of contents, a briefing document, and an audio overview in podcast format. By transforming static historical documents into dynamic learning materials, the document-based AI model provides a user-friendly interface for educators and students, especially those without experience in audio editing or podcasting. While successful in creating study guides and audio formats, the tool faced challenges in …

Ephemera As A Versatile Primary Resource: A Case Study Of The Nancy Tucker Postcard Collection, Dylan J. Mcdonald, Jennifer Olguin, Monika Glowacka-Musial

Journal of Western Archives

Ephemera are rich primary sources too often overlooked within archival materials and at collecting institutions. This case study argues that archivists and librarians should recognize ephemera, specifically postcards, as powerful historical documents worthy of scholarly investigation. By analyzing a sample set of digitized postcards held at the New Mexico State University Library, we show how scholars can use postcards to develop evidence-based arguments. Through the images, printed texts, and hand-written inscriptions found on these early 20th century postcards, we demonstrate how researchers can examine the pro-development messages found in southern New Mexico postcards.

Scla 521 Ai In Society, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides access to information resources on societal impacts of artificial intelligence from multiple libraries databases covering multiple disciplines including government information resources.

Maps And Oversized Photographs Collection, 1901-1993, University Library

Morehead State University Manuscripts Collections

No abstract provided.

A Dream Deferred: Communism, Secession, And The Decline Of Hardrock Unionism, Dominic Alexander Treadwell

History ETDs

This thesis examines how the changing conditions after World War II impacted organized labor, focusing on secession movements within the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers. Secessions in Connecticut and Alabama and the differing responses by the CIO Executive Board highlight how external pressures from postwar dynamics and increasing anticommunism undermined the left-liberal alliance in the Congress of Industrial Organizations. World War II increased labor’s reliance on government mediation, reducing the effectiveness of militant strategies. Following the war, assertive capital, restrictive labor legislation, the Cold War, and the rise in anti-Communism exacerbated tensions in the CIO, leading to …

Lieutenant General Robert C. Richardson Jr.: Central Pacific Theater Army Commander For Admiral Chester W. Nimitz 1943–45, James D. Scudieri

Books, Monographs & Collaborative Studies

This monograph analyzes Lieutenant General Robert C. Richardson Jr.’s service as de facto theater Army commander to Admiral Chester W. Nimitz from August 1943 to June 1945. It focuses on the theater-strategic level when Richardson led US Army Forces in Central Pacific Area and US Army Forces, Pacific Ocean Areas. This study highlights the context of Richardson’s operating environment beginning with prewar plans, the realities of early wartime defeats, and the state of joint operating procedures. It assesses Richardson’s accomplishments in exercising Landpower in the Pacific, across the entire range of today’s Army war-fighting and Joint functions and discusses the …

The Potomac Ploy: George Washington’S Secret Scheme That Shaped The Nation’S Capital, Benjamin A. Savel

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

For over 200 years, historians have glossed over blemishes on George Washington’s reputation, transforming the president into an almost mythological figure of the United States’ national identity. This paper brings into focus one of the more overlooked narratives about the president, revealing that his choice of Washington DC and the Potomac River as the location for the national capital was driven by financial self-interest and not by a prescient vision of future national unity.

Overwhelming evidence demonstrates that Washington knew the Potomac River could not serve as a national waterway; he was well aware of impassible rapids, sudden drops that …

Using The Colonizers’ Own Weapons: The Politics Of Equality, Freedom, & Integration In Advocacy Against American Indian Termination, Eliza Kravitz

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Beginning in the early 1950s, the United States Congress enacted a program of “termination” of American Indian tribes. By eliminating the special relationship between tribes and the federal government, termination aimed at the full assimilation of American Indians into U.S. society. Government proponents advocated for termination using the language of equal rights, freedom, and integration. Previous scholarship has shown that anti-termination advocates, by contrast, appealed to the internationalist Cold War language of development, self-governance, and global decolonization to resist termination. These same leaders also invoked the civil rights language of termination’s proponents, however. Their arguments illustrated how the federal government …

Land, Labor, And The Railroad In Industrial Appalachia: How The Baltimore And Ohio Railroad Engineered Space, 1843-1872, Lillian R. K. M. Austin

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

During the nineteenth century, the Baltimore and Ohio railroad reshaped the social, political, and physical environment of the mid-Atlantic around the needs of the industrial economy. The creation of industrial space, and the proliferation of communities to populate it, is seen retrospectively as an inevitable consequence of technological innovation, but engaging with contemporary corporate records reveals that this space, like the railroad, was engineered. In order to design a supply chain that would make industrialization economical, the railroad and coal industries engaged in political and social engineering to design the new locales of industrialism, exemplified in the Allegheny Mountains by …

Charles H. Schaffer: “Alger County Charcoal King”, Thomas J. Straka

Upper Country: A Journal of the Lake Superior Region

One of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula’s earliest industries was iron production. Iron furnaces (smelters) were part of that industry; these were primarily fueled by charcoal, produced in hundreds of charcoal kilns scattered across the Upper Peninsula. Charcoal burning was a major industry in its own right, and one person, Charles H. Schaffer, came to dominate it, earning the name “Alger County Charcoal King.” His empire began when the Detroit, Mackinac and Marquette Railroad expanded east from Marquette and was centered on charcoal kilns at the Onota station in Alger County. When wood supplies near Lake Superior declined, he expanded his charcoal …

Praising The Industrial Achievements Of Switzerland In The Early Twentieth Century: A Mural Painting Cycle For The Federal Polytechnic In Zurich, Alex Winiger

Swiss American Historical Society Review

The dome of the Swiss parliament’s building, the central part of the so-called “Bundeshaus” in Bern, is framed by four stained glass windows. They represent four pillars of the Swiss economy of around 1900: commerce to the north, textile industries to the east, agriculture to the south, and metal industries to the west. Other important sources of the growing wealth of the country are absent: finance (the banks), science (especially chemistry and its respective productions), and tourism. The latter found abundant representation in the railway stations of the time, relics of them still to be seen in the entrance hall …

Book Review: 50 Amazing Swiss Women: True Stories You Should Know About, Mary Brunisholz, Yvonne Sandoz

Swiss American Historical Society Review

From Mary Brunisholz:

50 Amazing Swiss Women is the collaborative result of five industrious women writers and one first-rate illustrator brought together by lead author Laurie Theurer, to present this modern view of admirable and inspirational Swiss women in historical and contemporary views. The target audience is primarily adolescent readers, but booklovers of any age will enjoy the read. Included with the book are companion materials for schools in English, German and French that are available for a free download at Bergli Books at 50 Amazing Swiss Women—Bergli.

From Yvonne Sandoz:

To mark the 50th anniversary of Swiss women …

Wild Joy: An Exploration In Queer Spatial Dynamics, Kipper Thomas Reinsmith

Masters Theses

What does it mean to feel represented in a space?

What does a trans space look like?

How can we queer our interior spaces?

Our world is crafted by the many designers that have come before us. These systems, products, and spaces are built upon assumptions of the bodies that will use and occupy them—namely cisgender, able-bodied, straight folks.

Designing and creating objects as a trans person is an act of radical nature. To take up space, to design for trans luxury, for the sake of beauty, for joy itself, feels counterintuitive to the narratives we’ve been served: that of …

The Friendship Train: Peas, Politics, And Propaganda, Miller Scott

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

On a brisk fall night in November 1947, more than 100,000 people packed the streets of Hollywood to celebrate the launch of the Friendship Train. High-ranking government officials, business leaders, and a galaxy of film stars all attended the send-off ceremony. Over the next eleven days, the train traveled across the country, gathering essential foodstuffs to send to hungry Europeans. In small towns and big cities, the train received enthusiastic receptions. Its journey ended in New York City with a ticker-tape parade down the iconic Canyon of Heroes. Along the way, it collected more than 200 boxcars of food, worth …

The World After: Central Virginia In The Wake Of The Civil War, Harry Caldwell

Masters Theses, 2020-current

This thesis examines the situation in Central Virginia following the surrender of Appomattox. Its primary focus is on the Federal Provost Guard who were sent back into the region in the month following the Surrender. It begins in March 1865, introducing the world that the Provost will be thrown into that summer, and it will go month to month until January 1866, when the Provost have fully departed from the region and power was fully turned over to civilian authorities. This research is primarily built of the General Orders that were printed in the Lynchburg newspaper, The Daily Virginian, …

Iron In The New World’S Veins: Government, Ironworks, And Community In The Massachusetts Bay Colony, Abigail Adam

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The Massachusetts Bay Company conceived of a colonial iron industry as early as 1628; two years before its leaders migrated to the New World. The colony’s founders continued their efforts to establish a functioning iron industry in subsequent decades. With the General Court’s support, John Winthrop Jr. engaged in business with the London-based Company of Undertakers to make the iron industry a reality. Nevertheless, previous scholarship has neglected the iron industry’s place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony’s establishment. Yet surviving court records and correspondence indicates that these two bodies are inseparable. Indeed, the General Court used the ironworks to materially …

The Biltmore Forest School And The Establishment Of Forestry Education In America, Dan Barry Croom

Journal of Research in Technical Careers

The Biltmore Forest School, despite its unusual existence within the affluent Biltmore Estate, played a crucial role in the early 20th-century American forestry movement. Founded by Carl A. Schenck and supported by George Vanderbilt II, the school aimed to educate foresters and promote sustainable forest management. However, many aspects of the Biltmore experiment failed due to the new and untested nature of forestry science in America. This experiment exposed a fundamental divide in forestry education, with Gifford Pinchot advocating for conservation-centered teaching while Schenck believed in the economic viability of lumber production. Ultimately, the Biltmore Forest School offered valuable vocational …

Reconstructing The Narrative Of Slavery In The United States: Acknowledging The Complex Exploitation Of Forced, Free, And Semi-Free Labor Beyond Race And Ethnicity And The Several Communities Who Endured Systemic Labor Exploitation And Injustice In The United States, Amma Terrece Sims

Theses (2016-Present)

This thesis explores the deconstruction and modernization of the narrative surrounding slavery in the United States by recognizing the multifaceted exploitation of labor beyond racial limitations. Through an assessment of representations and historical instances of forced, free, and semi-free labor in the United States, this study explores various forms of systemic subjugation and discrimination endured by diverse communities of immigrants. Specific consideration is given to examples such as indentured servitude of the colonial era and the experiences of “new immigrants” of the industrial period in challenging the established racial paradigm correlated with slavery. The experiences of specific European ethnic sub- …