Beyond the Reading Room

Anecdotes and other notes from the U-M Special Collections Research Center.
Detailed illustration from Audubon's Birds of North America of a nest in a tree with birds sitting around it.

Posts in Beyond the Reading Room

Showing 261 - 270 of 354 items
Title-page of Giovanni Francesco Loredano's Burlas de la fortuna en afectos retoricos (Madrid: Diego Dises, 1688).
  • Pablo Alvarez
In a previous post, I argued that we must judge a book by its cover because the design of an early binding can tell us much about the social status of its former owner. Now, I would like to argue that we can learn a lot about early printing history by examining the preliminary pages of a book.
  • Athena Jackson
Don't miss this exhibit opening in Hatcher Library's Audubon Room until December 17th. Read more to learn about associated events.
Audubon Room Hours: Monday-Friday 8:30 am to 7 pm, Saturday 10 am to 6 pm, Sunday 1 pm to 7 pm
Alice surrounded by the playing cards and creatures of Wonderland
  • Juli McLoone
Join us to celebrate 150 years of artistic exploration of Lewis Carroll's Wonderland on Monday, September 21, 4:00-5:30 p.m in Hatcher Gallery. Learn more about the artistic, textual, and cultural history of Alice illustration from Arnold Hirshon, avid Carroll collector and Associate Provost and University Librarian at Case Western Reserve University.
Copperplate engraving  in Philipp Adolph Böhmer's Epistola anatomica problematica de ductibus mammarum lactiferis (Halle an der Saale, Impensis Orphanotrophei,1742)
  • Pablo Alvarez
A recent addition to our holdings on the history of medicine is a fascinating collection of twenty-five university dissertations, treatises, prize-winning essays, books, and reports, on the subject of milk. Ranging from 1659 to 1822, and published across Europe, these works are extraordinary witnesses of how milk was thoroughly studied from a chemical, medicinal, nutritional, and even a social perspective.

Alice and Dinah the cat watching the white rabbit run across a meadow
  • Juli McLoone
The Special Collections Library opens a new exhibit this week, "Curiouser and Curiouser!": Exploring Wonderland with Alice. Please join the exhibit curators, Juli McLoone and Angie Oehrli for cookies and coffee to celebrate 150 years of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland today (Wednesday, August 26th) from 4:00-5:00pm in the exhibit gallery on the 7th floor of Hatcher Graduate Library.
Goldman's grave
  • Julie Herrada
The famous suitcase belonging to the anarchist Emma Goldman has found its final resting place in the Labadie Collection, 75 years after its last journey.
Three hats watermark in p.100 Isl. Ms. 337
  • Evyn Kropf
This Wednesday's watermark feature: three hats motifs in watermarked papers from the Islamic Manuscripts Collection. Hats off to a year of monthly Watermark Wednesdays!
Dustjacket illustrated by a boat on a lake surrounded by trees.
  • Juli McLoone
"The Light Princess" by Victorian writer George MacDonald plays on the many meanings of lightness and weightiness. A parody of Sleeping Beauty that delights in puns and word play, this 19th century literary fairy tale also has a more serious side as a reflection on the role of sorrow and grief in emotional maturity.
Lion passant guardant watermark in Isl. Ms. 337 p.12
  • Evyn Kropf
This Wednesday's watermark feature: lion motifs in watermarked papers from the Islamic Manuscripts Collection.
Brewing tanks at the Bergner & Engel Brewing Co., Philadelphia, 1880's
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
The University of Michigan presents a new online exhibit: The Reflection of Technology in Brewing. This exhibit focuses on the swift changes that the brewing industry underwent from the late eighteenth century to the mid-twentieth century.