Collecting area: Arts & literature

An award-winning photojournalist, Kathy Borchers began a thirty year career with the Providence Journal in the mid-1980s. A native of Dayton, Ohio, she and her twin sister Karen (also a photojournalist) took up photography in high school and refined their technique as undergraduates at Bowling Green State University. After receiving her master’s degree at the Indiana University School of Journalism in 1981, Borchers worked for three years with the Topeka Capital-Journal before landing in Providence. In addition to covering general news and sports, she took on a number of special assignments and longer-form photoessays over the years in southern New England. She retired in 2015.

A rich sampling from a long career in photojournalism, the collection includes photographic negatives and prints along with associated published materials. Centered primarily on her time with the Providence Journal, the collection reflects the breadth of Borchers’ assignments, including general news, sports coverage, and longer-form photoessays, in both black and white and color. The collection also includes five self-made books: three on long-term photographic projects for the Journal and two career retrospectives.

Born on February 12, 1936, to John and Jenny Bos of Tonawanda, New York, John Henry Bos graduated from Carnegie Tech with a B.A. in drama. His career in the arts began with a job in technical support in summer theaters and included work at major theaters, such as the Theatre of the Living Arts in Philadelphia, and Deputy Director of the performing arts division for the New York State Council on the Arts. Bos served as Director of Performance Programs for National Public Radio during the 1980s where he earned a Peabody Award. Following his time at NPR, he hosted Arts America, a weekly cultural television program produced by the United States Information Agency. In the 1990s, Bos relocated to Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts, where he provided arts consulting and was involved in the revival of Memorial Hall, one of the many locations in which he hosted musical performances as a part of Rural Renaissance. It was during this time that Bos began writing, first as a member of the writing group, Spirit of the Written Word, at the CancerConnection during his first bout with cancer, and later as a bi-weekly columnist for the Greenfield Recorder. In his column, “Connecting the Dots,” Bos advocated for climate change and political life. He died of December 11, 2024, at the age of 88.

The John Bos Collection consists of an array of materials related to his career in the arts including theater programs, photographs, documents from the Theatre of the Living Arts in Philadelphia, as well as copies of his articles printed in the Greenfield Recorder and other publications.

A constructed language developed by a Polish physician, L.L. Zamenhof, and first published in 1887, Esperanto is the most widely spoken auxiliary language in the world. Fundamentally utopian in origin, Esperanto is a simplified and highly rationalized language derived from a pastiche of languages, primarily European. By creating a universal second language, Zamenhof hoped that Esperanto would help transcend national and cultural boundaries and thus promote peace and understanding in a fractious world. Allan Boschen, an engineer with General Electric in Pittsfield, was a student and teacher of Esperanto and longtime officer with the Esperanto Society of New England.

The Esperanto book collection includes instructional materials in the language from around the world along with a diversity of imprints ranging from novels and poetry to travel books, histories and biographies, political writings, materials on China and Vietnam, children’s literature, and even a cookbook. We expect to add to the collection in future.

The Boston Bluegrass Union (BBU) is run by an all-volunteer Board of Directors, with a mission to educate people in the Northeast about bluegrass music.  Formed in 1976, the BBU hosted its first concert on October 3, 1976, with Joe Val and the New England Bluegrass Boys. The BBU is the premier source for bluegrass music activities in the Northeast, presenting concerts, festivals, education programs, and informal music get-togethers. Over its nearly 50 years, the BBU has become the central resource for everything bluegrass in Boston and has, in part, been responsible for creating the vibrant market for bluegrass that exists today in the Boston area. Since its founding, BBU has presented over a thousand shows featuring top national and regional artists, making it one of the longest running such series in the country.  The list of bluegrass bands that have been featured over the years includes such acts as Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys, Ralph Stanley , Jim and Jesse, Tony Rice, the Country Gazette, The Johnson Mountain Boys, The Seldom Scene,  J.D. Crowe and the New South, Hazel Dickens, Laurie Lewis, the Lynn Morris Band, the Good Old Persons, the Lonesome River Band, IIIrd Tyme Out, Special Consensus, Dry Branch Fire Squad, and the Claire Lynch Band. While BBU was first focused on concerts, their signature event is now the annual Joe Val Bluegrass Festival, presented Presidents Weekend at the Sheraton Framingham Hotel.  The Joe Val Festival had its origins in 1985 as a fundraiser to assist the ailing Joe Val with his medical expenses. His untimely passing and his remarkable talents continue to be honored with the three-day festival which bears his name. The event features a star-studded Main Stage, a Showcase Stage which shows off the talents of up-and-coming regional bands, the Joe Val Kids Academy, over 50 workshops, vendors, and round the clock jamming. The festival was awarded the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Event of the Year in 2006. 2026 marks the 40th edition of the Joe Val Bluegrass Festival, the 100^th anniversary of Joe Val’s birth, as well as the 50^th anniversary of the BBU’s founding.  

The Boston Bluegrass Records currently consists of 32 issues of the group’s newsletter, Bluegrass Breakdown, event flyers, and concert recordings. Additions to the collection are expected.

Founded in 1973, the Boston Jazz Society grew from a small group of enthusiasts listening to music in living rooms to a thriving organization that “kept Jazz alive” in New England. As Jazz’s popularity began to fade in the late 1960s, local Jazz societies formed to provide support to artists and give them the means and venues to continue to perform on the road. The Boston Jazz Society was originally inspired by one of the earliest, the Left Bank Jazz Society of Baltimore. Like the Left Bank, BJS produced concerts in clubs, theaters, and hotels but expanded their efforts to include exhibits, television and radio shows, and a Jazz education program for grade school students. The longest running BJS activities, however, were the annual Jazz Barbecues and starting in 1975, the BJS Scholarships. The scholarship program raised funds for young Jazz musicians to attend the New England Conservatory of Music’s Jazz Department and the Berklee School Of Music and began the musical careers of many important musicians, composers, and teachers. BJS was also deeply connected to the local music scene, celebrating Roxbury, Mass. natives Alan Dawson and Roy Haynes, whose brother Vincent was a long-time board member, among many others. After 42 years of promoting Jazz music in Boston, the Boston Jazz Society, Inc. dissolved in 2015.

The Boston Jazz Society Records extensively document BJS’s meetings, events, business dealings, and scholarship administration through meeting minutes, posters, correspondence, photographs, recordings, videos, and BJS’s own propaganda and publications. The majority of the BJS records came from the collection of founding member and longtime president Aureldon Edward Henderson and also represents his involvement in promoting Jazz in the Boston area.

Liane Brandon is an award-winning filmmaker, photographer and University of Massachusetts Amherst Professor Emerita. She is a co-founder of New Day Films and was one of the first independent women filmmakers working in New England. She was also a founding member of FilmWomen of Boston and Boston Film/Video Foundation. Brandon’s groundbreaking films Sometimes I Wonder Who I Am (1970) Anything You Want To Be (1971) and Betty Tells Her Story (1972) were among the most frequently used consciousness raising tools of the Women’s Movement. Her films, which also include Once Upon A Choice and How To Prevent A Nuclear War have won numerous national and international awards, and have been featured on HBO, Cinemax and the Criterion Channel. They have twice received Blue Ribbons at the American Film Festival and have been presented at the Museum of Modern Art, the Barbican Centre in London, the Tribeca Film Festival and many other venues. In addition to her role as Professor at the University of Massachusetts and Chair of the Educational Technology Program in the College of Education, she was the Director of UMass Educational Television. Designed to provide the public with innovative, original educational programming, UMass Educational Television produced award winning, original educational programming for cable/home audiences throughout New England. The twelve original series (50 half-hour episodes) were carried by local and regional cable and were seen in over 40 cities and towns in Massachusetts and Connecticut. The College of Education became the first educational college in the country to produce original educational programming for cable/home audiences. Currently working as a photographer, her credits include stills for American Masters, Nova, and Unsolved Mysteries. Her photographs have been published in The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe and many other publications.

The Liane Brandon Collection consists chiefly of printed materials related to the antinuclear movement, peace movement, labor unions and workers’ movement, feminism and the women’s movement, women filmmakers, student movements and organizing, as well as photographs and videotapes of shows produced by UMass Educational Television (1995-1999). For materials related to Brandon’s contributions to UMET, see the UMass Educational Television Collection.

Brandon’s historic films and papers are held at the Archive of Documentary Arts at Duke University.

In 1918, Clinton Melville Tilman Brann, a dentist by training, served with in the 17th Field Artillery of the American Expeditionary Forces in France, a unit cited for gallantry in five critical engagements of the First World War. During his time overseas, Brann maintained an intense correspondence with Rhea Oppenheimer, despite fears that their different religious (he Presbyterian, she Jewish) and family backgrounds would prove an obstacle. After demobilization, Brann returned home and on Sept. 17, 1919, married Rhea. He went on to build a successful practice in dentistry in Iowa, raising a son and daughter. Clinton Brann passed away on Sept 8, 1961, in Orlando, Fla., with Rhea following on December 29, 1987 in Winter Park, Fla.

In two regards, the Brann collection presents an unusual glimpse into families affected by the First World War. First, Brann’s letters home offer a sense of his unusual role in the service, as a junior officer and dentist, and second, his letters are marked by his unusual relationship with Rhea Oppenheimer and their concerns over the future prospects for a mixed marriage. The collection also includes a wealth of photographs of the Branns’ life together, a family scrapbook, and a handful of mementoes and miscellaneous documents.

Vincent Clinton Brann was a Professor of Dramaturgy and Directing at UMass Amherst. Born Feb. 19, 1927 in Knoxville, Iowa, Brann served in the United States Army during WWII. After completing his B.A. at the University of Iowa in 1950 he was again called to serve in the Army during the Korean Conflict (1950-1951). Brann held faculty positions at Carnegie Institute of Technology, University of Maryland Overseas Program Europe, and Smith College before joining the faculty at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in the Speech Department in 1964. Brann remained in the Speech Department until 1972 when it became the Department of Theater; he continued to teach in the Department of Theater until his retirement in 1988. Brann was well-known for his oral interpretation and performance classes as well as his productions and original scripts. At the time of his death in 2007 he was Professor Emeritus of Dramaturgy and Directing.

The Brann Papers are a collection of genealogical materials dating to the early 20th century, correspondence, family and travel photographs (particularly of Spain and France), play scripts with director’s notes, musical theater scores, and Brann’s college yearbooks.

Temporarily stored offsite; contact SCUA to request materials from this collection.

A long time teacher in the schools in Amherst, Mass., Marybeth Bridegam operated tour agency, Cross-Culture Inc., from the late 1980s through early 2000s. Cross-Culture ran small-group tours of locations around the world led by local tour leaders and specialized guides that were distinguished by itineraries that included sites outside the usual tourist routes.

The Bridegam collection consists of thousands of images taken by Bridegam during her travels, many in preparation for Cross Culture tour groups. Locations include China, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Scandinavia, and Russia.

Mark Taylor Brinsfield studied languages and law in Europe before receiving his MA in European Studies at the University of Exeter. His research has included work in the history of multiracial people in post-World War II Southeast Asia. Brinsfield currently lives in Northampton, Mass.

The posters in the Brinsfield Collection represent a cross-section of West German political campaigning during the decade leading up to reunification. Focused primarily on national, rather than regional elections, the collection includes representative work from the major left- and right-leaning political parties (CDU and RCDS, SDU, the Greens) as well as a few posters addressed at major political issues, including the antinuclear and antiwar movements.