Among the newest student clubs on offer to the Phillips Academy community as of this term is the Andover Anthropological Society: a group of students of superior intelligence who recognized ahead of their peers that doing research with cultural materials is incredibly fun, and an excellent use of one’s free time.
Now with a membership of ten, club members selected as their inaugural project an accession of Arctic materials surface-collected by Patricia Hume near Utqiagvik (previously Barrow), Alaska during six summers between 1959-1969, and donated to the Peabody Institute in 1998. Meeting weekly at the Peabody, so far the AAS has received collections handling training and begun to build direct experience doing close-looking analysis of cultural materials; perused the Pat Hume accession file and visited storage, doing archival research AND learning some basics of museum practice (I’m very efficient); learned about the Bureau of American Ethnology and delved into 20th century ethnographies from the region (thank you, OWHL reference librarians!); and started to explore various themes and approaches for their group project. These have included connecting collections to Iñupiaq language, exploring notions of gender and household structures, and questioning anthropological terms like “effigy” to build more robust interpretations of people’s material expressions of spirituality and religion – just to name a few.
AAS members closely examining “household” items from the Pat Hume accession and debating whether I was messing with them in my claims for what they were. [Not pictured: all the female members of the club. I promise it was just unlucky they had to leave before I could take any photos…]
Whichever direction(s) the club ends up taking, what they learn will enter into the Peabody’s database, enhancing our own understandings of these collections here and the ways in which we’ll be able to connect others to them in the future.
I happen to have the privilege of serving as faculty advisor for this club, and it has been a joy getting to know these students, and having them teach me about Iñupiat culture. Bookmark this blog and stay tuned to learn more about the AAS from the AAS itself!
This term, the Peabody has a student volunteer workforce assisting us with making mounts for the moccasins that we care for. Currently, the moccasins are wrapped in tissue and housed in boxes. This housing situation is stable, but it can be improved. On the positive side, the boxes protect their contents from dust and debris. They are also stackable, which was a space-saving necessity prior to the renovation. Inside the boxes, the tissue prevents movement, but the moccasins are resting on their sides. In addition, some of the boxes are overfilled and need to be de-densified.
Workflow for Moccasin Mount.
Our goals for this project are two-fold. The first is to design and construct external supports for pairs of moccasins that prevent them from rolling on to their sides or off the mount.
The second goal is to create soft internal supports. Leather items, like moccasins, can be subject to flattening if they do not have additional support. Since the moccasins are laying on their sides in the boxes, the flattening can lead to additional deformation. If left unaddressed, flattening and deformation will cause permanent creasing which requires careful conservation to reverse.
For the first step, the volunteers practiced making external mounts for their own footwear using cardboard. A few elements of the mount were altered after we saw the construction of the initial design. When the design is finalized, the volunteers will be using archival blue board covered in soft Tyvek fabric to house the moccasins.
The next step will be to practice making internal supports. These supports are essentially tubes constructed of stockinet filled with polyester fiber. The ends are stitched together to ensure the poly-fil doesn’t come out of the tube. Once fabricated, these will be inserted into the moccasin, helping keep their shape and resist the flattening effect of gravity.
The volunteers are making great strides with their practice work, which means they will soon start making mounts for the moccasins. We will keep you posted with an update in the future.
If you are interested in seeing what kinds of mounts your institution can make use of, please see this pdf from History Nebraska. It was an excellent source of inspiration.
Two months ago, I wrote about the process of moving the collection in advance of renovations to our building’s basement and moving it back after renovations were complete. In this blog, I thought I could briefly cover how we organized the collections when we moved back in.
Before embarking on any large-scale collections-based project it is a good idea to know what comprises the collection. As noted in the moving blog, the seeds of the renovation started with the 2017-2021 inventory and rehousing project. Understanding the size, weight, and material of the collection was instrumental for us to plan where it would all go. It also helped us select the appropriate type of furniture to best suit the items’ individual storage needs.
Quantify the collection
We worked with a design team from the storage furniture company we contracted to help us make the most of the space we had available. The designers needed to know how much space was required to house the items we steward. Thinking of the future, the figures we gave them included room for growth. We hoped we wouldn’t be at capacity as soon as the renovation was completed.
The dimensions for items held in standard sized boxes was straightforward. We provided more detailed dimensions of the large items and boxes. Shelving for these items would need to be more strictly planned to accommodate individual item and box dimensions.
Capacity, layout and review
The building renovation contractors provided the storage furniture design team with precise room dimensions that included height restrictions required by lighting, HVAC, electrical, and fire suppression systems.
Based on our needs and the space available, the design team gave us a series of shelving layouts. We double checked the dimensions of shelving- length, depth and shelf heights- to ensure that the collections could fit. The design team and our collections team went through several drafts before we came to a finalized layout.
Organization
Once we knew the basement’s storage capacity, we set about creating an organizing principle for the collection. Collections in each space were organized by region. Unboxed items were organized first by type, followed by region. Space on fixed shelves was reserved for items at risk of rolling off mobile shelving.
Future
We’ve been living with the renovation for several months now and are very happy with the results. We have contemplated making a change to the organizational structure of the standard-sized archival boxes. In the future we may organize collections by site or collection area within their broader region. Understanding the scope of this project will require data manipulation to better understand. It may mean moving items between boxes, in which case we’d have to weigh the benefits against the resources required to see an organizational schema such as this carried out.
The change in season brings a time for storytelling and passing down traditions. The winter months are a prime time for sharing scary stories due to colder weather keeping people inside and gathered together.
In honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day (October 14) and upcoming National Native American Heritage Month (November), we’re highlighting some folklore inspired by the Indigenous dark fiction anthology, Never Whistle at Night. This book is comprised of 26 short stories that explore aspects of Indigenous horror, beliefs, traditions, and folklore. These stories are told by a variety of Indigenous authors (see complete list below), edited by Shane Hawk(Cheyenne & Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma) and Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians), and introduced by Stephen Graham Jones (Blackfeet Nation).
Carson Faust(Edisto Natchez-Kusso Tribe of South Carolina)
Kelli Jo Ford(Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma)
Kate Hart(Chickasaw/Choctaw in Arkansas)
Shane Hawk(Cheyenne & Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma)
Brandon Hobson(Cherokee Nation Tribe of Oklahoma)
Darcie Little Badger(Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas)
Conley Lyons(Comanche)
Nick Medina(Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana)
Tiffany Morris(Mi’kmaw)
Tommy Orange(Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma)
Mona Susan Power (Standing Rock Sioux Tribe)
Marcie R. Rendon (White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe)
Waubgeshig Rice (Wasauksing First Nation)
Rebecca Roanhorse (Navajo Nation)
Andrea L. Rogers (Cherokee Nation)
Morgan Talty (Penobscot Indian Nation)
D.H. Trujillo (Pueblo)
Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians)
Richard Van Camp (Dene Nation)
David Heska Wanbli Weiden (Lakota)
Royce Young Wolf (Hiraacá, Nu’eta, and Sosore, ancestral Apsáalooke and Nʉmʉnʉʉ)
Mathilda Zeller (Inuit)
The title of the anthology refers to a belief common in many Indigenous cultures that whistling at night can attract malevolent entities. The act of night whistling is forbidden by many Native American cultures due to a shape-shifting entity, known as a “Skinwalker” or “Stekini” that responds to the call, causing harm to those who encounter it.
Skinwalker – Image courtesy of DoubleOurEfforts/reddit
Native cultures use storytelling to pass down knowledge and history, including folklore. Scary stories often carry deeper meanings, serving as lessons and warnings. Some of my favorite stories from this book were: Kushtuka, Quantum, Snakes are Born in the Dark, Before I Go, and Dead Owls.
Several stories in the book share a common subject – the owl. Interpretations of owls can be found across different Native American tribes, with some viewing owls more negatively than others. There are several items in the Peabody collection that highlight the owl form, their meanings varying significantly between different Indigenous cultures and locations. Here are just a few for you to explore!
Owls are often associated with death and the spirit world, seen as messengers or harbingers of bad luck reflected in their nocturnal habits. Seeing an owl, particularly during the day can be a sign of death or misfortune. Some tribes consider owls as spirits of the deceased or that they might not be real birds at all, but shapeshifters. The sound of an owl’s hoot is seen as a call to the spirit world or a way to connect with ancestors.
Owl Effigy (2018.2.1266) – Fragment of an owl effigy from the Valley of Mexico. Warren K. Moorehead compared this item to clay effigies from the Etowah village site in his 1932 book Etowah Papers: Exploration of the Etowah Site in Georgia.
Owl Effigy (2018.2.1266), Peabody Collections
Folklore of the Valley of Mexico believe in a witch known as “La Lechuza” who shapeshifts in the form of an owl that preys on people who are disobedient, unbaptized, or who harm others. Check out this episode on La Lechuza from the podcast, History Uncovered.
Owl Effigy Slingshot (97.1.53) – From the Ixil Maya community in Chajul, El Quiché, Guatemala. Used by men and boys to hunt birds, though it is common to hunt with a blowgun.
Other tribal beliefs revere owls as symbols of wisdom and intuition, as well as carriers of ancient knowledge and protection.
Ceramic Owl Figurine (2017.6.1) – Ceramic piece by Maxine Toya from the Pueblo of Jemez, New Mexico. In Pueblo culture, owls are seen as protectors. The ceramic owl design is built by stacking and smoothing hand coils of clay. The piece is both carved and painted, the feathers on the front being carved into the clay. Painted designs are intricate using symbols of rain, clouds, and feathers. These designs are all matte and painted with clay slips with only the eyes being polished.
Maxine Toya is well known for her figurative pottery (the first piece of pottery Maxine created was an owl!) Maxine is one of several pottery artists from the Pueblo of Jemez that visit Phillips Academy campus each spring to work with students in ceramic classes. You can read more about these visits here and here!
Ceramic Owl Effigy Jar (90.4.2) – Globular body in black on white design with vessel opening located at owl beak. Owl facial features at neck, wings at sides and tail at back. The globular shape is the most recognizable characteristic of pottery from Cochiti Pueblo, New Mexico.
Ceramic Owl Effigy Jar (90.4.2), Peabody Collections
Owls are featured in Cochiti Pueblo pottery, often associated with the god of death and spirit of fertility, Skeleton Man.
Exciting News! – Never Whistle at Night, Part II: Back for Blood is currently accepting submissions from emerging Indigenous writers. This is the second book in the Never Whistle at Night series.
The Society of American Indians, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, February 14, 1914. The Quarterly Journal of the Society of American Indians, Volume 2, 1914.
On the weekend before Columbus Day in Columbus, Ohio, 1911, a group of Native American leaders and activists joined together to attend what became the first annual meeting of the Society of American Indians, or SAI. For the next thirteen years, this pioneering Pan-Indian organization was a center for Native American political advocacy, lobbying Congress and the then-Office (now Bureau) of Indian Affairs; offering legal assistance to Native individuals and tribes; publishing a quarterly journal; and corresponding extensively with Native Americans, “Friends of the Indian” reformers, political allies, and critics across the country.
Members of the SAI were a veritable “who’s who” of early twentieth century Native history, representing activists, clergy, entertainers, professionals, speakers, and writers, from communities both on- and off-reservation. To namedrop just a few, these included (but were by no means limited to): attorney Marie Louise Bottineau Baldwin (Métis/Turtle Mountain Chippewa/French); musician and writer Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (Yankton Dakota); educator Henry Roe Cloud (Winnebago); Episcopal priest Sherman Coolidge (Arapaho); civil servant Charles Dagenett (Peoria); painter and illustrator Angel De Cora (Winnebago); Episcopal priest Philip Joseph Deloria (Yankton Dakota); physician Charles Eastman (Dakota); author and linguist Laura Cornelius Kellogg (Oneida); ethnologist Francis La Flesche (Omaha); physician Carlos Montezuma (Yavapai Apache); writer, editor, and journalist John M. Oskison (Cherokee); archaeologist Arthur C. Parker (Seneca); lawyer Thomas Sloan (Osage); and advocate Henry Standing Bear (Lakota).
Without sharing a singular vision of Native American identity, tribal self-determination, or what the place of Native Americans should be within US society, these individuals committed themselves to a shared purpose, striving firstly “To promote the good citizenship of the Indians of this country, to help in all progressive movements to this end, and to emulate the sturdy characteristics of the North American Indian, especially his honesty and patriotism.” Seeking to benefit the freedom and development of all Native Americans, the two primary platforms on which the SAI stood were U.S. birthright citizenship for Native Americans and tribal access to the U.S. Court of Claims, addressing the two major issues at the forefront of public debates on the “Indian problem” at the time – the ambiguity of Native American legal status and the Office of Indian Affair’s mismanagement of Native lands and resources.
The investment of people’s time and unpaid labor in the work of the Society and its journal was extraordinary but ultimately unsustainable, and the SAI dissolved in 1923. Disappointingly, it had achieved neither of its major goals. Congress passed the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, granting birthright citizenship to Native Americans but maintaining their wardship status. The Indian Claims Commission took over twenty more years to come, in 1946, allowing tribes to bring claims against the US government through judicial arbitration, not a court, and successful claims could result only in monetary compensation, not regained lands. The SAI also could not succeed in delivering a unified expression of Native American opinion to the government and public – probably the most unrealistic aim of all.
Despite its “failures,” the Society of American Indians was the first organization of its kind, created by Native Americans to amplify a Native American voice across the country during a time when people’s lives were under siege and they battled to have their voices heard on multiple issues. It may not have lasted long, but the SAI left a legacy of political, legal, and intellectual activism, setting the course for the many Native professional organizations to follow, and standing as part of an ever-present, ongoing continuum of Native Americans advocating for their best interests; joining in the debate as to what that might look like or how to get there; and striving to build better, stronger, and healthier relationships with the rest of the nation.
Maybe consensus is less important than joining in the conversation. Whether you are celebrating Columbus Day, commemorating Indigenous Peoples’ Day, or just slogging through another Monday – that door is always open.
The Society of American Indians, 5th Annual Conference, on the steps of Engineering Hall, Kansas University, October 1, 1915. The Quarterly Journal of the Society of American Indians, Volume 3, 1915.
In January 2024 renovations to our collection housing were completed, finalizing a process that started in March 2023. To accommodate the demolition of existing shelving and installation of new condensing metal shelving, the collection was moved out of the basement in early 2023. With the project completed and several months of living with the move behind us, this seems like a good time for a brief recap. Perhaps some of our planning can help other institutions that have a collection move on the horizon.
During initial planning for the renovation, we faced two scenarios for moving the collection. The first was to move the collection offsite. The second, involved keeping the collection onsite within portions of the building that were not renovated. We needed to make viable plans for both options while decisions about construction phases and timelines were being made.
We identified several challenges to moving the collection offsite. Some of the largest hurdles included the high cost of offsite storage, the massive time commitment required for packing the collection for an offsite move and conducting a post-move inventory and condition reporting of the collection. A second round of inventory and condition reporting would need to be done after the collection was moved back into the building.
Keeping the collection onsite raised other concerns. Temporary housing would need to be big enough to house the collection. We would only be allowed in the building during designated windows when it was safe for us to enter, therefore the temporary housing area would need to be locked and monitored by cameras. The space would need to be environmentally controlled to the best of our ability. We also contemplated whether construction could lead to a catastrophic accident that would damage the building and collection.
The benefits and challenges of each scenario were taken into consideration within the larger framework of the construction plan. Ultimately, it was decided to keep the collection onsite in temporary housing. Although it came with some complications, it resulted in huge savings and a greater degree of control over the moving process when compared to moving the collection off-site.
Inventory and rehouse
The move started with an inventory and rehousing project that was carried out between 2017 and 2021. The project has been covered in previous blog posts. To summarize, Peabody staff conducted a 100% inventory of collections housed in aging wooden drawers in our basement. The inventory collected basic information; a description, count and provenience. Once inventoried, the items were rehoused in archival boxes with lids. While the wooden storage bays didn’t allow for stacking, future storage could take advantage of the ability to stack boxes.
The archival boxes were about half the size of the wooden drawers. Boxes were therefore much lighter and in most cases two boxes existed where previously there was one drawer.
Barcode and Weigh
During the planning onsite and offsite moves, we identified the first floor as the likeliest location for temporary housing if we were moving the collection inside the building. We knew the collection was heavy, but in the basement the collective weight of the collection was never a concern. Now, the ability of the building to hold the weight of the collection boxes was an important question that needed to be answered.
Equally important was how we would maintain physical control (i.e. knowing where everything in the collection is) over the collection boxes and their contents. This portion of the collection comprises nearly 3,000 boxes containing roughly 500,000 items. It was necessary to come up with an efficient way of tracking each item’s movement. Updating records at the item level within our existing database would take an incredible amount of time. Our database at the time supported barcodes at the item level, a process that would be no different than updating each item individually. We decided to assign barcodes to each box and track the box locations using a separate barcode tracking program (Orca Scan).
Over the summer of 2020, with the help of two great interns the collection was weighed and barcoded. The barcode data included the original location within the wooden storage (home location), weight, how many spaces the box would occupy in temporary housing, and any additional notes.
Results
Armed with the weight data, we were able to organize the collection so that the weight was equally distributed over the entirety of the first floor. This information also helped us organize the collection in the newly renovated basement. Now, heavy boxes are located on shelves at waist height, making for safer lifting. Lighter boxes are housed on higher and lower shelves.
Tracking box locations with barcodes worked well for the most part and was a net positive over tracking individual item locations. A 5% inventory of barcodes after the move resulted in no errors. However, errors have been found in the system since we moved the collection back into the basement. These have resulted from location errors entered into the database, as well as errors and inconsistencies entered into Orca Scan. I would recommend checking for inconsistencies in the original location data before making the move.
Using the barcode program in addition to the database to find items on the fly was time consuming, but not unreasonable. Tracking movement has been more challenging. Some movements were simple, like moving a box from one location to another. Other moves involved unpacking dense boxes and giving the removed items their own barcodes or emptying an entire box, deleting the barcode, and giving each unpacked item a new barcode. Processing so much data has required the use of formulas in Excel, and it is hard to find and analyze errors when looking at 115,000 item records.
That wraps up this brief summary of our experience moving the collection. It was the culmination of years of planning and months of preparing and implementing. I’m happy to report that 600,000 items moved one or more times up and down one or two flights of stairs resulted in nothing being damaged. Hopefully some of the issues we encountered can help inform other institutions researching a move.
A four-year-old Mi’kmaq girl goes missing from the blueberry fields of Maine, sparking a tragic mystery that haunts the survivors, unravels a community, and remains unsolved for nearly fifty years.
The Berry Pickers is a heartbreaking, riveting tale of Indigenous family separation. We follow an Indigenous Mi’kmaq family in Nova Scotia who travels every summer to Maine to pick blueberries as migrant workers. In the summer of 1962, 4-year-old Ruthie, the youngest of the family’s five children, disappears from the fields. The last to see her is the second youngest, 6-year-old Joe, who takes the loss especially hard and carries his guilt in the years to come.
The book is told through two alternating character perspectives – one being Ruthie’s brother Joe and the second being a young girl named Norma. Growing up in Maine as the only child of affluent and overprotective parents, Norma, struggles to find the truth behind her recurring dreams and visions (that seem more like memories than imagination). As time and secrets unfold, these two storylines ultimately converge.
This is a treasure of a book – filled with loss and sadness yet manages to be hopeful as well. Amanda Peters (Mi’kmaq, Glooscap First Nation) has a lot of empathy for her characters and gently invites readers to examine the affects of intergenerational trauma, racist residential institutions, and the specific ways Indigenous families were treated – in a deeply personal way.
This story is both powerful and moving. Although told quietly, it did not take away from its impact.
Next on my list to read is Amanda Peter’s newest book, Waiting for the Long Night Moon: Stories. This is her debut collection of short fiction that describes Indigenous experiences across time and space – from contact with European settlers, to the forced removal of Indigenous children, to the present-day fight for the right to clean water.
The book will be available August 2024 in Canada and January 2024 in the U.S.
The first steps in the deinstallation process: items are removed and inventoried.
This month we began deinstalling our institution’s last remaining exhibit case. The case resides on the second floor in what was, until recently, our only environmentally controlled storage housing. The case was installed in 1967 and held materials recovered during excavations led by Scotty MacNeish in Mexico’s Tehuacán Valley. The display has sat largely hidden from view behind shelving since 2012, when this room was converted into a housing area.
Summer curatorial assistant, Cyrus, removing items from the case.
Beginning this spring, the room slowly changed from collection housing into offices and workspace for collections staff. As part of the transformation, collections were moved into the basement, boards covering the windows were removed, and collections supplies and worktables were assembled. The final piece to resolve was this exhibit case. With the help of our summer curatorial assistants, Kyra Smith and Cyrus Marion, we were finally able to tackle its deinstallation.
Those are actual mesquite seeds attached to the wall.
The case is a fantastic example of exhibit design from the ‘60s and includes charming hand-painted illustrations that have a lot of character. However, the materials within have been “on display” for decades and they need a rest. Moreover, with the window coverings removed, the room and case were exposed to unfiltered ultraviolet light, an agent of deterioration.
The key to the exhibit case.
Perhaps as an auspicious sign, a key to the exhibit case happened to be in one of the repurposed desks that we moved in for the new office space. With the case opened, we investigated how the items had been installed. Most were secured to the walls with bee’s wax. The wax held up remarkably well for the past six decades. In fact, it was somewhat difficult to remove the items from the wall. Once off the wall, the wax was more accessible and could be removed with heat. We did not remove the wax from botanical items due to their sensitivity to rapid changes in temperature.
Bees Wax held these items on the wall for 57 years!Instructions for the vitrine’s removal.
The items were rehoused and moved into our basement storage for a much-needed rest. The deinstallation of this case marks the end of our institution’s intentional move away from exhibitions, which began in 2017.
As summer approaches and we begin to wind down from the end of another school year, we could all use a good book (or podcast) to help us relax and escape our busy lives. We’ve rounded up our staff’s “Peabody Picks” for summer and hope one of these recommendations may accompany you to the beach, on your next trip, or at home on the couch. We hope you all enjoy your summer!
Happy reading (and listening)!
Ryan Wheeler, Director – Sins of the Shovel: Looting, Murder, and the Evolution of American Archaeology by Rachel Morgan
American archaeology was forever scarred by an 1893 business proposition between cowboy-turned-excavator Richard Wetherill and socialites-turned-antiquarians Fred and Talbot Hyde. Wetherill had stumbled upon Mesa Verde’s spectacular cliff dwellings and started selling artifacts, but with the Hydes’ money behind him, well—there’s no telling what they might discover. Thus begins the Hyde Exploring Expedition, a nine-year venture into Utah’s Grand Gulch and New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon that—coupled with other less-restrained looters—so devastates Indigenous cultural sites across the American Southwest that Congress passes first-of-their-kind regulations to stop the carnage. As the money dries up, tensions rise, and a once-profitable enterprise disintegrates, setting the stage for a tragic murder.
Sins of the Shovel is a story of adventure and business gone wrong and how archaeologists today grapple with this complex heritage. Through the story of the Hyde Exploring Expedition, practicing archaeologist Rachel Morgan uncovers the uncomfortable links between commodity culture, contemporary ethics, and the broader political forces that perpetuate destructive behavior today. The result is an unsparing and even-handed assessment of American archaeology’s sins, past and present, and how the field is working toward atonement.
“An incisive history of early American archaeology—from reckless looting to professional science—and the field’s unfinished efforts to make amends today, told “with passion, indignation, and a dash of suspense.” –New York Times
Richard Davis, Peabody Volunteer – A Kind of Flying: Selected Stories by Ron Carlson
Ron Carlson’s stories, sometimes wicked or bittersweet, often zany, are rich with a hard-earned hopefulness frequently absent in contemporary fiction. In this generous gathering from collections no longer available, longtime fans and new readers alike can savor the development of a master of idiosyncrasy.
Properly celebrated for his range, Carlson offers us a rural sheriff who’s wary of UFOs (“Phenomena”), a lawyer on a mission in remote Alaska (“Blazo”), a baseball player turned killer-by-accident (“Zanduce at Second”), and a man accusing Bigfoot of stealing his wife, followed by Bigfoot’s incomparable response.
.“These stories are full of surprises, jolts, and lightning strikes of recognition. Do yourself a favor and read Ron Carlson.” –Stephen King
John Bergman-McCool, Collections Coordinator – Podcasts: Handsome and Throughline from NPR
Handsome is a podcast from comedians Tig Notaro, Fortune Feimster, and Mae Martin. Every week, the handsome hosts field a question from a friend and attempt to answer it together, covering every subject you could think of. Along the way, Tig, Fortune, and Mae tell plenty of stories and just generally have a ridiculous time.
Throughlineis a time machine. Each episode, we travel beyond the headlines to answer the question, “How did we get here?” We use sound and stories to bring history to life and put you into the middle of it. From ancient civilizations to forgotten figures, we take you directly to the moments that shaped our world. Throughline is hosted by Peabody Award-winning journalists Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei.
Marla Taylor, Curator of Collections – Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
Marla – Sometimes I like to revisit favorite books that I have read in the past. Lamb by Christopher Moore is one of those books for me. The full title is Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal.
Moore tells the story of a very human Joshua (Jesus) and his best friend/protector, Biff, as they explore their world and learn about themselves. Joshua can’t sin, so Biff has to do it all for him with some delightful and unexpected encounters. This book is irreverent and hilarious – it makes me laugh every time.
But Lamb is also so much more than that. It is a deeply sentimental story about friendship, an exploration of faith, and something that has stuck with me over the years. I really enjoy reading it periodically and hope you find the time to read it as well.
“An instant classic…terrific, funny, and poignant.” –Rocky Mountain News
Emma Lavoie, Administrative Assistant – The Only One Left by Riley Sager
At seventeen, Lenora Hope, Hung her sister with a rope – Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.
Stabbed her father with a knife, Took her mother’s happy life – It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer—I want to tell you everything. “It wasn’t me,” Lenora said, But she’s the only one not dead.
“Propulsive … a dizzying Gothic whodunit.” –New York Times Book Review
Michael Agostino, Peabody Volunteer – Discovery and Adventure in Africa by James Wilson Jameson and Hugh Murray
Mike – I like old books. Really old books. Old books which have sat on shelves for many years, sometimes read cover to cover, sometimes ignored and gathering dust. Passed down, sold, and exchanged, they end up in a bookstore that I manage to find while on vacation. I have been lucky enough to come across science books published in the late 1800’s and own four Darwins from that time period. No, these are not first edition collector’s items valued at thousands of dollars. I believe the most I ever spent was $30! They must be in good shape for me to buy them, but often show their age. I don’t mind these flaws as it adds to the character I am seeking.
One year I purchased a very old book, “Discovery and Adventure in Africa,” printed in 1832. According to the writing inside the jacket, I spent $5. It is very fragile, yellow with age, and I must be careful when I open it and turn the pages. But what a find! It is number 16 of a 71 book series called “Harper’s Family Library.” It is written by two men who appear to be professors of history and they are recounting the travels and discovery of other Europeans in Africa. It contains a number of illustrations (“engravings”) which try to capture what the explorers are seeing. The real gem of the book is a 9” x 8” fold-out map of Africa. This map reflects the European knowledge of that era as numerous features appear on the edges of the continent but much of the interior is blank.
This 4” by 6” book is a tough read as the text is tiny. But the style is very colorful, common in old writing. Explorers and their teams died frequently in their travels. In this case, almost every explorer came down with high fevers and were ill for weeks. But many recovered to continue months of travel marked with deteriorating resources and energy. They were met by kindness, distrust, help, violence, and puzzlement. The people they met varied in apparent wealth. Many led simple lives while others were the local kings and queens. Some villages contained dozens of inhabitants, while cities had populations in the thousands. Since the descriptions are second and even third-hand, it is hard to decide how accurate the accounts are. But even with that in mind, the window back in time is still interesting and I am enjoying reading about the various cultures the explorers encountered.
Given its age, I was lucky to find this book on a store shelf. But you can find it for sale on the web as you can for almost anything. For me, the hunt continues and if I’m lucky I will find another volume of this great series of books.
“This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.” –Wentworth Press
Nick Andrusin, Temporary Educator and Collections Assistant – The Age of the Vikings by Anders Winroth
The Vikings maintain their grip on our imagination, but their image is too often distorted by myth. It is true that they pillaged, looted, and enslaved. But they also settled peacefully and traveled far from their homelands in swift and sturdy ships to explore. The Age of the Vikings tells the full story of this exciting period in history. Drawing on a wealth of written, visual, and archaeological evidence, Anders Winroth captures the innovation and pure daring of the Vikings without glossing over their destructive heritage. He not only explains the Viking attacks, but also looks at Viking endeavors in commerce, politics, discovery, and colonization, and reveals how Viking arts, literature, and religious thought evolved in ways unequaled in the rest of Europe. The Age of the Vikings sheds new light on the complex society, culture, and legacy of these legendary seafarers.
“[Winroth] has an impressive knowledge of the sources, the archaeology, and the modern historical literature. . . . Winroth really knows what he is writing about, and has done the research. . . . I recommend the work to anyone with little knowledge of the subject and a wish to learn more.”–New York Review of Books
Cyrus Marion, Curatorial Assistant – The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow
A dramatically new understanding of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution―from the development of agriculture and cities to the origins of the state, democracy, and inequality―and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation.
Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, Graeber and Wengrow reveal how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual blinders and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing during all that time? If agriculture and cities did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organizations did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more open to playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.
Cyrus – Pay special attention to those footnotes! You do not want to pass those up in your reading.
“[The book takes] as its immodest goal nothing less than upending everything we think we know about the origins and evolution of human societies.” –The New York Times
Kyra Smith, Curatorial Assistant – Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer
As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces the notion that plants and animals are our oldest teachers. Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, and as a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings―asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass―offer us gifts and lessons, even if we’ve forgotten how to hear their voices. In reflections that range from the creation of Turtle Island to the forces that threaten its flourishing today, she circles toward a central argument: that the awakening of ecological consciousness requires the acknowledgment and celebration of our reciprocal relationship with the rest of the living world. For only when we can hear the languages of other beings will we be capable of understanding the generosity of the earth, and learn to give our own gifts in return.
“Robin Wall Kimmerer has written an extraordinary book, showing how the factual, objective approach of science can be enriched by the ancient knowledge of the indigenous people. It is the way she captures beauty that I love the most—the images of giant cedars and wild strawberries, a forest in the rain and a meadow of fragrant sweetgrass will stay with you long after you read the last page” –Jane Goodall
Additional reading recommendations from our Peabody Staff
The Peabody has taught many lessons over the years, so we have a lot of teaching instruments and old plans laying around. When we get contacted by an instructor here at Phillips Academy, we dive into those piles to see what can be used and how! This is what happened very recently with our Trade Connections lesson.
The opportunity arrived when history fellow Anna Green asked us to do a few lessons for her history 100B class. She was looking for a lesson to fit into her student’s final project, a presentation on various Native American cultures from South to North America. We sat down with her one day and sketched out what this lesson could look like and what we could incorporate.
We have a previously existing lesson known as Trade Connections that we last taught in December 2022. This lesson features objects from 4 different regions of the Americas (Mesoamerica, Andes, American Southwest and American Southeast) and discuss how these societies traded and interacted with each other over the millennia. So, for this new version we focused on 8 objects that represent the areas for the assignment. In addition, we made sure that both ancient and modern examples from these cultures were included, showing that there are forms of continuation with these Indigenous groups.
But we didn’t stop at just substitutions of objects. We wanted students to practice basic object interaction so they could approach looking at artifacts in a way that they may not have done before. To do that we broke out the tried-and-true Tarps exercise, which basically give them a crash course in item handling and simple archaeology. Here we set up a mock dig site complete with objects used for different purposes (pottery making, cooking, etc.) and have the students use there critical thinking skills to evaluate what the objects are and areas are used for based on how they found them (kitchen, stone tool workshop, etc.).
(shoulda’ been a conductor…)
After completing the Tarps exercise, students apply their newly acquired knowledge and skills to study of the objects from Mesoamerica, the Andes, American Southwest and American Southeast. We asked them to write down their observations of the object, what are its potential uses, what does it tell you about the culture, was it made by ancient or modern individuals, etc. The students then use this knowledge to pick and research an object on their own for their final project.
It was great revamping an older lesson and making it available for today’s classes at Phillips Academy!
The Peabody 