Collections: I

Advances in color printing technologies combined with decreasing costs of publication led to a flowering of illustrated sheet music between 1890 and the 1920s.

This small collection is comprised of illustrated sheet music dating primarily from the first quarter of the twentieth century. Representing a cross-section of popular music at the time from minstrel tunes to patriotic marches, most of the songs were selected either for their representation of African Americans (usually in stereotypical and racist caricature) or as examples of pro-war propaganda during the First World War.

Preparing to translate the Bible from Hebrew into Latin, St. Jerome relocated to Palestine, where in 388, he began, as he wrote, to “set forth a book of Hebrew Names, classing them under their initial letters, and placing the etymology of each at the side.” His Interpretationes nominum Hebraeorum (Interpretations of Hebrew Names) enjoyed wide popularity throughout the Middle Ages and was a regular part of early medieval Gospel books as an exegetical aid.

This incomplete copy of the Interpretation of Hebrew Names begins with “A[h]az apprehendens” and continues through “Tirus angustia v[e]l tribulatio s[i]v[e] plasmatio aut fortitudo.” Internal evidence suggests that it was once part of a larger manuscript, presumably a Bible.

Local 2 of the Independent Condenser Workers Union represented employees of the Sprague Electric Company in North Adams, Massachusetts. Beginning in the 1930s, Sprague was one of the largest employers in the Berkshires. Employing 4,000 workers, Sprague provided one-third of the area’s jobs, many of them held by women. By the 1960s, however, Sprague began increasing layoffs, and in 1985 the company moved its world headquarters out of North Adams, closing all but two small facilities.

Records of Local 2 include by-laws, constitutions, correspondence, company publications, and minutes of meetings between management and union representatives.

Following the Japanese invasion of China in 1937, the New Zealand expatriate Rewi Alley threw his considerable talents behind the war effort. Building upon knowledge acquired over a decade of living in China, Alley helped organize the Chinese Industrial Cooperative Movement (CIC). The CIC coordinated the creation of industrial cooperatives throughout unoccupied China to keep industrial production flowing, and it sponsored a series of industrial schools named after Alley’s friend Joseph Bailie to provide training and support.

The Indusco Bailie School Collection includes documents and photographs relating to the establishment and operation of the Bailie Schools in China during and immediately after the Second World War. Probably associated with the Indusco offices in New York City, these documents include a model constitution for industrial cooperatives, typewritten reports on Bailie Schools, and published articles describing the schools’ efforts. The reports extend through 1949, and include three mimeographed newsletters from the Shantan Bailie School for the months immediately following the school’s liberation by Communist forces. Also included are printed works by Alley and eighteen photographs taken between 1942 and 1944 of students and scenes at Bailie Schools.

David R. Inglis enjoyed a distinguished career in nuclear physics that ranged from theoretical work on the structure of the nucleus in the 1930s to the development of the atomic bomb in the 1940s and work on renewable energy in the 1960s and 1970s. A Professor of Physics at UMass from 1969-1975, Inglis was a founding member of the Federation of American Scientists and from the mid-1940s on, he dedicated himself to informing public policy on the dangers of nuclear technologies.

The Inglis Papers offer a perspective on the life and career of a theoretical physicist who grew from an early involvement in the Manhattan Project to becoming a committed critic of nuclear weaponry and nuclear power. Although the collection is relatively sparse in unpublished scientific work, it includes valuable correspondence relating to Inglis’s efforts with the Federation of American Scientists and other organizations to influence public policy on issues relating to disarmament and nuclear power.

Organized at the New England Peace Pagoda in Leverett, Mass., the Interfaith Pilgrimage of the Middle Passage was a twelve-month walk through the eastern United States, the Caribbean, Brazil, West Africa, and South Africa in 1998-1999, reversing the direction of the Middle Passage symbolically and geographically. A “living prayer of the heart, mind, and body for the sons and daughters of the African Diaspora,” the Pilgrimage was intended by the participants to contribute to a process of healing the wounds inflicted by hundreds of years of slavery and racial oppression. Along the way, participants visited sites associated with the history of slavery, from slaves’ quarters in Virginia to stations on the Underground Railroad and villages that had been raided in Africa, offering prayers for those who had suffered under slavery and commemorating the dignity of those held in bondage and those who resisted.

Chronicling the course of the Interfaith Pilgrimage of the Middle Passage from conception to conclusion, this collection contains a rich textual and visual record of a spiritual approach to addressing the legacy of slavery in the Americas. The collection includes the range of materials collected by participants during the Pilgrimage, including lists of reading materials, information on the sites visited, a handful of mementoes and souvenirs, some correspondence, and notes and photographs taken along the way.

The records of Northampton Local 36 of the IBEW provide insight into the adjustments of union members to the introduction of new technology, the changing labor environment, and the local debates over the merits of the use of nuclear power in the region. Collection includes by-laws, reports, correspondence, contracts, membership lists, and materials relating to nuclear energy.

First organized as Eagle Lodge in Holyoke, Massachusetts, the United Brotherhood of Paper Makers was granted a charter by the AFL in May 1883. Almost as soon as the union was established, however, it faced a serious struggle for power from within. Hoping to maintain their higher economic and social status, the machine tenders ultimately organized their own union, and the two remained separate for a number of years until they finally merged in 1902 as the International Brotherhood of Paper Makers.

The surviving records of the Eagle Lodge, Local 1 of the International Brotherhood of Paper Makers, include by-laws, minutes, correspondence, some contracts, a ledger, and three histories of the local and the early days of the union.

The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, organized in 1903 when two leading team driver associations merged, is one of the largest unions in the U.S. Local 170, representing central Massachusetts, and Local 404, representing western Massachusetts, were both granted their charters with the Teamsters in 1933, and continue to thrive today. The records of these locals consist entirely of agreements between the union and local businesses.

Founded in 1917, the International Center for the Disabled was the nation’s first outpatient rehabilitation center. With the support of benefactor Jeremiah Millbank, the ICD was dedicated to helping disabled veterans reintegrate into all aspects of American life. Over the years, it has assumed a leading role in development of the profession of physical medicine, training physicians and nurses for the Veterans Administration, creating rehabilitation programs for the Army and VA, manufacturing prosthetics, and providing vocational rehabilitation for disabled veterans and others. The ICD remains a leading international advocate for the needs of people with disabilities and was instrumental in passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, remaining true to their mission of training people with barriers to employment as they enter the workforce.

The ICD collection includes a rich array of official minutes, correspondence, and publications documenting the development of rehabilitation services for persons with disabilities, and a remarkable record of the success of a philanthropic enterprise. Of particular note are are the large holdings of photographs documenting ICD’s work from its early days through the dawn of the 21st century.