Collections Magazine Spring 2018

SPRING 2018

COL L E C T ION S A P U B L I CAT I O N O F T H E B E N T L EY H I STO R I CA L L I B RA RY

“Mrs. Philip A. Hart

doesn’t care beans about being a senator’s wife. ” JANE BRIGGS HART AND HER QUEST TO BE AN ASTRONAUT

DIRECTOR’S NOTES

SPRING 2018

contents

COL L E C T ION S

Terrence J. McDonald Director, Bentley Historical Library

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(Left) University of Michigan’s Detroit Observatory, ca. 1861.

Time for Restoration

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[features]

[departments]

Nearly an Astronaut Poetry to the People Citizen Grain

DIRECTOR’S NOTES

She flew helicopters and airplanes, jumped horses, and sailed dangerous waters. Jane Briggs Hart could have been a demure senator’s wife, but instead she used her fearlessness to fight for women to be counted among the astronauts in the NASA space program.

1 Time for Restoration

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Kellogg is a household name, but few know that brothers John and W.K. Kellogg were bitter rivals. A new book about the brothers from Battle Creek explains how the rift between the famous men began, and how Corn Flakes cereal spoonfed their war.

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2 Select Bentley Bites IN THE STACKS

18 A Private U-M? 20 Finding Tshusick PROFILES

22 Problem Solvers 23 Primary Concerns BENTLEY UNBOUND

24 Polite Society

HS14541

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Dudley Randall was an introvert and a librarian, quiet in person but bold in his poetry.

On the eve of the Civil Rights Movement, he founded Broadside Press in Detroit, which gave African American poets a place to publish their work, and changed literature forever.

FOR MOST OF HUMAN HISTORY, no one had the faintest idea of the exact time.

Because we have the archives of the Detroit Observatory here at the Bentley, we know that the exact time arrived in Ann Arbor on June 29, 1860, when a telegraph line permitted the mean time clock at the Hamilton College Observatory in New York to communicate with the sidereal clock in the Detroit Observatory on U-M’s campus.

This made it possible to calculate the Observatory’s longitude for the first time.

With the longitude in hand, and the ability to observe the movement of stars between the two observatories, the precise time was established. By 1863, the Observatory was telegraphing the correct time to Detroit, where a ball atop the Smith Jewelry Store would drop at exactly noon. A local business in Ann Arbor performed the same service with a whistle.

This was a critical development for businessmen who needed to know the correct time to enforce time-bound business contracts: e.g. “I offer you my corn at this price until 5 p.m. Friday.” The Observatory was even financed by gifts from the Detroit business community to U-M President Henry P. Tappan, which is why it’s called the Detroit Observatory in the first place.

This was the first time, but by no means the last, that the research of the University would serve the needs of the state.

Tappan built the Observatory, which opened in 1854, to be the first research instrument on campus and thereby to transform what he thought was a “college” into a real “university” distinguished not only by its teaching, but by its search for new knowledge.

It worked.

The first two University astronomers who worked there—Franz Brunnow (1854-1863) and his student James Watson (1863-1878)— moved rapidly into the front ranks of astronomers in the world, setting the bar high for the University’s nascent research mission.

A perfect restoration of the original Observatory building and its equipment— partially funded by loyal donors—was conducted 20 years ago. That work saved this second-oldest building on campus and its original site, and made it one of the few extant observatories in America to retain its original telescopes from the 1850s in working condition, in their original mounts. It is now managed by the Bentley.

Focus groups with faculty and community members have revealed that the site has been underutilized because it lacks

proper access to and facilities for those with disability or health issues (e.g. restrooms).

There’s also a range of inadequacies in modern teaching space, power supply for digital teaching and display equipment, and HVAC to permit year-round use.

That’s why, this past semester, the Regents approved a significant addition to the area around the Observatory.

This new project will barely touch the original building. But it will remedy most of the problems leading to under-use by adding 6,000 square feet of new teaching and display space beneath and to the rear of the original building, including an elevator that will ease access to the first floor of the Observatory.

It is a difficult site to build on and an important original building to keep safe.

And so it is an expensive project. But a perfect project for the University’s third century of distinguished research.

Terrence J. McDonald

Arthur F. Thurnau Professor, Professor of History, and Director

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abridged #TEACHINGWITHARCHIVES

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The hashtag for the upcoming Bentleyhosted symposium, Teaching Undergraduates with Archives, which will be held November 7–9, 2018. The free event will explore how evidence from the past impacts today. Interested in joining us? Email teachingwitharchives@umich.edu

Number of online finding aids recently updated to help researchers find what they need in the stacks.

“I hope I may not be thought guilty of a want of decorum or of attempting anything, which is not warranted by the strictest propriety on my part, if I set forth my pretentions and offer to the consideration of the Executive the claim which I humbly believe I possess, both on the score of justice and pure military principles, to succeed to the vacant Major Generalship in question.”

Letter to President John Quincy Adams (the “Executive”), by Alexander Macomb, then a colonel and hero from the War of 1812, asking to be promoted to the position of Major General. Adams agreed, and Macomb held the position from 1828 until his death in 1841. The Bentley recently acquired the Macomb Family Papers, which include family correspondence from 1806 to 1892.

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723.25 Number of linear feet taken up by new accessions.

1412.15 Number of Gigabytes in new digital content.

PALM BEACH, FLORIDA WASHINGTON, D.C. DETROIT, MICHIGAN Locations visited in this issue of Collections magazine.

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COL L E C T ION S

Diver Eight, Take a Break An incredible collection of more than 1,000 photos of early life in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and Wisconsin have been acquired by the Bentley, including this image of a diver in Marquette, Michigan, circa 1870.

44.5123° N, 64.2949° W Coordinates for Oak Island, Nova Scotia, where a fabled horde of treasure is allegedly buried and which has recently been made famous by the History show, The Curse of Oak Island.

One of the treasure’s earliest sleuths was Ross J. Wilhelm, a U-M professor of business economics, who served as a cryptographer during World War II. His papers at the Bentley contain symbols, scribbles, and cyphers, all based on a secret code he claimed he was able to crack to help lead the way to the Oak Island treasure. Sadly, no gold has been discovered in Wilhelm’s collection, at least to date.

year that the Michigan Palladium— 1893 The the yearbook precursor to the Mich-

iganensian—printed this strange, if creative, graphic illustration depicting the third verse of the Michigan song “The Yellow and Blue.”

Flu masks Chipmunk pelts Human hair Cigarettes Snake skin Clothing scraps A few of the “treasures” that Bentley Lead Conservator Dianna Samuelson has found inside student scrapbooks as she’s worked to repair and preserve them in the Bentley’s Conservation Lab.

$10M Number of dollars that will be spent to renovate the Detroit Observatory, the campus’s second-oldest building.

The renovation includes specialized footings and foundations to protect the historic building and to support a new belowground addition.

See the note from Bentley Director Terry McDonald on page one.

@UMICHLIBRARY: An illustration of proposed additions to the Library by architect W.A. Otis. Picture circa 1906. Thanks, @UmichBentley! #TBT

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COL L E C T ION S

Nearly an Astronaut

From an early age, Jane Briggs Hart was fearless and fierce. As a senator’s wife, she bucked convention again and again, eventually using her love of flying to help pave the way for women in the NASA space program.

By Alex Boscolo

ON A WARM AFTERNOON IN 1957, Jane Briggs Hart was flying a helicopter over Michigan with her husband, Michigan Lieutenant Governor Phil Hart, beside her. He rehearsed his stump speech as she guided them over fields and forests, blades whirring, to their next campaign stop. It was a tight Senate race in 1958 and Jane, the first licensed female helicopter pilot in Michigan, wasn’t going to miss the chance to get her husband from place to place quickly in order to reach the most voters. That day, Jane dressed modestly for the warm weather, sporting Bermuda shorts, tall socks, and a long-sleeved shirt. When she landed the helicopter at the airport, a single photographer snapped a picture. That image ran in local papers, and the public was scandalized to see the Lieutenant Governor’s wife not only wearing shorts but piloting her husband around. This wasn’t a woman’s place, argued letters that were mailed to the couple.

Jane shrugged it off and continued doing whatever she pleased, which included campaigning for equal rights, raising eight children, competing in sailing races, hunting regularly, and flying back and forth to D.C. in her plane.

Her collection at the Bentley reveals how her passion for flying was a thread that connected many parts of her life, and eventually landed her in front of a U.S. House committee, where she gave furious testimony about how women belonged in the NASA program. Her hard work for equality on all fronts would be the core of her work, right up to her death in 2015 at age 93.

COL L E C T ION S

(PREVIOUS PAGE) HS17822; (THIS PAGE, LEFT TO RIGHT) HS17871, HS17875; (OPPOSITE PAGE) HS17878/TONY SPINA

The Mercury 13

From War to Politics

Doesn’t Care Beans

Jane was born in Detroit on October 21, 1921. As a young girl she was fearless, competing in elite horseback riding competitions, winning medals for coaxing her horses over the highest jumps. A 1941 newspaper article from the annual Devon Horse Show ran a photograph of Jane falling from her horse after just barely failing to clear a jump of four feet, six inches—a height that would land her in nearly the top level of U.S. competition, even today.

Jane and her younger sister, Elizabeth, also grew up sailing, and they competed regularly in races on the Straits of Mackinac, a dangerous and often icy section of water just off Mackinac Island. She would complete the race 15 times with all-women teams.

When the U.S. entered World War II, Jane did her part by joining the Red Cross Motor Corps, driving trucks from Detroit’s auto plants to military bases and ports. After two years with the service, she earned her pilot's license. She eventually would become well-known for piloting her own single-engine Bonanza, one of the first post-war commercial aircraft to include newly developed military technology.

When she was 22, she married a young military man and lawyer named Philip Hart. Their engagement was announced in all of the local papers; Jane kept a scrapbook dedicated to clippings about their engagement and wedding. Philip had liberal ideas and a drive for politics, which appealed to Jane as well.

In a 1950 newspaper clipping, carefully pressed in one of her many scrapbooks, Jane spoke of becoming “interested in the mechanics of government . . . following World War II,” and that she sought answers to a political climate rife with turmoil. That same year, she became vice chair of the Oakland County Democrats, and would regularly go door-to-door registering voters and encouraging participation. She firmly believed that the average person needed to be more involved in politics.

By the time Phil was elected to the Senate in 1958, Jane was the fulltime caretaker of their eight children, while still regularly competing in aviation contests. Phil remained in Washington when Congress was in session, and Jane would fly her plane back and forth often.

In a later interview, she remarked that she had to go to D.C. at least once a week to do Phil’s grocery shopping.

During this time, Jane enlisted and served as an officer in the Civil Air Patrol, and documented the accomplishments of other female pilots. If Jane lost a race, she carefully saved clippings about the winner.

Instead of relying on Phil’s platform, Jane found her own. She served as a founding member of the National Organization for Women (NOW), sat on the board of the League of Women Voters, and had a lifetime membership to the NAACP. Jane believed passionately in equal rights, and frequently spoke out against injustice.

One newspaper article around this time headlined: “Mrs. Philip A. Hart doesn’t care beans about being a senator’s wife.”

Despite her civic engagement, she acknowledged that she didn’t have the patience for politics. In the 1960s, she limited her political responsibilities so that she could focus on a new passion: outer space.

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It is inconceivable to me that “ the world of outer space should be restricted to men only, like some sort of stag club.”

On April 9, 1959, NASA announced that a group of seven astronauts would fly on the Mercury class of manned spacecraft. These were to be the first Americans in space, and they had to pass an extensive series of physical and mental tests in order to qualify. These original male astronauts were known as the Mercury 7.

NASA’s group only included men because women were not thought to be able to pilot rockets or withstand the rigors of space travel. However, some top executives at NASA were curious to see what effects space might have on the bodies of women. Furthermore, they were able to obtain private funding from a famous female aviator named Jacqueline Cochran, who had an interest in furthering the careers of women pilots. Thirteen women eventually passed the same tests required of male astronauts, and they were informally called the “Mercury 13.”

Jane Briggs Hart was one of the pilots hand-selected by the organizers of the program to participate in the series of grueling tests.

At the age of 41, she was the oldest candidate to pass them all. This included X-rays and routine physicals, but there were also more unusual challenges. For instance, women had to strap themselves to a tilt table to test their circulation, and their recovery time from vertigo was tested when doctors injected ice water into their ears.

By the end of 1961, Jane and the other 12 women were preparing to travel to Florida, where they had finally received government funding to undergo advanced examinations. Just a few days before, though, they received an abrupt telegram that their program had been canceled.

Jane was indignant. She had passed the same tests as the men and believed that she should have the same opportunity to be on the forefront of space exploration. In 1962, she and another woman, Jerrie Cobb, testified before a special House committee. The transcript,

like so many newspaper clippings, is carefully preserved in one of her scrapbooks. When Jane spoke, she remarked that “it is inconceivable to me that the world of outer space should be restricted to men only, like some sort of stag club . . . I submit, Mr. Chairman, that a woman in space today is no more preposterous than a woman in a field hospital 100 years ago . . . I wonder if anyone has ever reflected on the great waste of talent resulting from the belated recognition of women’s ability to heal.”

Unfortunately, Jane’s well-reasoned appeal did not hold sway in Congress, and her program was not reinstated. This did not stop her.

Well into the 1960s, she continued to lecture on the topic of women in space.

Clippings from her scrapbook at the Bentley note lectures she gave at the East Lansing Rotary Club and the Flint Golf Club on the “Space-Age Challenge for Women.” When the first female astronaut reached space in 1963, a Russian woman named Valentina Tereshkova, Jane wrote a scathing article in the New York Journal-American that examined “attitudes toward the role of women in the space age [with the goal of making] whatever changes are necessary for women to fulfill that role.”

She remained an active proponent of civil and women’s rights for the rest of her life, through her husband’s career as a senator. When he passed away suddenly in 1976, The New York Times reported that President Ford called Jane to “ask if there was anything he could do.”

She asked him to grant amnesty to all Vietnam draft evaders and deserters. Ford declined the request.

After Phil’s death, Jane continued to fly and sail regularly, while still supporting organizations such as NOW and the League of Women Voters. At age 73, she crewed a sailboat with her sister from Europe across the Atlantic to the Caribbean. Before her death in 2015, she donated her personal papers to the Bentley, which also holds Phil’s papers. Both collections are open to the public.

Opposite left: Hart and her horse Marina clear a jump at the Chevy Chase Horse Show.

Opposite right: Hart and an unidentified companion (possibly her sister, Elizabeth) aboard a sailboat.

This page: A gathering to honor the late Phil Hart in March 1977 included, from left to right, First Lady Rosalynn Carter, Jane Briggs Hart, Rachel Keith, the Hon. Damon Keith, Joyce Garrett, and Detroit Mayor Coleman Young.

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COL L E C T ION S

When he founded Broadside Press in Detroit, Dudley Randall elevated African American voices and changed the face of literature forever.

By Lara Zielin

ON AN UNSEASONABLY WARM SEPTEMBER

evening in 1975, poets, writers, politicians, educators, cultural advocates, and more gathered at Detroit’s Manoogian Mansion to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of Broadside Press. Mayor Coleman A. Young was there, charming staff and guests alike, but the real star of the night was poet Dudley Randall, who had founded Broadside Press and who ran every aspect of it when he wasn’t working his day job as a reference librarian at the University of Detroit (now the University of Detroit Mercy).

Under the leadership of Randall, Broadside Press had published more than 81 titles in the previous decade, totaling more than 500,000 books—nearly all of them celebrating African American poets and their works. By contrast, before Broadside, only 35 poetry books by African Americans were published in the United States from 1945 to 1965.

That evening, lights twinkled and a fresh breeze blew in from the nearby Detroit River. It was a grand night, worth celebrating, since Broadside had changed the face not just of poetry, but of literature writ large. Broadside had “rescued the new Black poetry of the sixties from predictable, white rejection and, furthermore developed an original, highly effective means of getting these poems to the national Black community,” wrote June Jordan in a 1974 review of the Broadside book After the Killing.

What’s more, for the first time, black writers were being sought after in major publishing houses, for poetry and more. “Then, Blacks were in the public eye,” Randall said, and the entire landscape of what publishers wanted to acquire—and the mainstream public wanted to read—had shifted.

Who, then, could have predicted that just a few short months later, the press’s deep debt would necessitate its sale? Dudley

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Dudley Randall was born on January 14, 1914, in Washington, D.C., and his parents moved to Detroit when he was six years old. Randall was a quiet, thoughtful child, which he attributed in part to being the son of a preacher. He said he “heard too much talking” at his home in the poor and mostly African American neighborhood of Black Bottom in Detroit. He turned to inward reflection and began writing, publishing his first poem in the Detroit Free Press at age 13.

After graduating from Eastern High School, Randall got a job in 1932 at the Ford Foundry, working for 50 cents per hour in the blast furnace unit at the River Rouge Plant. In 1935, he married his first wife, Ruby Hands, and the pair eloped, certain that Ruby’s parents would disapprove of the union (she was 16; he was 21).

The pair settled down in Black Bottom, and Randall began writing poetry when

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Mildred moved to Lincoln, Missouri, where Randall worked at Lincoln University as a librarian.

It was while he was in Missouri that his hometown neighborhood of Black Bottom— which housed more than 300,000 African American residents—was razed by Mayor Albert Cobo and the all-white Detroit city government. The fallout from the mass gentrification project would provide fuel for the Detroit Uprising in 1967, which would further inform Randall’s poetry and Broadside Press. Around this same time, Randall published one of his most famous poems, “Booker T. and W.E.B.,” which imagines a conversation between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois.

The poem, says Boyd, was “written on the eve of the Civil Rights Movement. In [it], the voice of Du Bois supports the struggle for desegregation and equal rights, while Washington’s retorts represent conformity and acquiescence to conventional racial roles. . . . In the poem, Du Bois gets the last word, which indicates [Randall’s] agreement.”

By 1956, Randall was back in Detroit. He and Mildred had divorced, but he soon met his third wife, Vivian Spencer, on the tennis court at Northwestern High School. They married in 1957 after Randall got a job at the Wayne County Federated Library System as the head of reference in the interlibrary loan department.

He began to write more and more poetry, and was published in magazines such as Free Lance, and the Negro History Bulletin, but his outlets were limited. In his Bentley collection, the earliest rejection letters from publishers date from this time, including a 1957 letter from McFadden Publications in New York for their magazine, True Love.

Though there’s no record of the work he submitted, the rejection is boilerplate language that sounds like many of the other “thanks but no thanks” letters he would receive in time from The Atlantic, The New Yorker, the Motown Record Corporation, and many, many more.

Previous pages: Randall at work in his Broadside office, 1981.

Opposite page: Various handbills, book covers, and promotional material from Broadside Press.

(CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT) HS17859, HS17860, HS17863, HS17861

f Finding His Voice

he wasn’t working.

His poem “Hastings Street Girls” about young women searching for excitement on the streets of Black Bottom was soon accepted for publication in Opportunity Magazine, but the magazine folded in 1937 before Randall’s work could be showcased.

“There was a dire lack of publishing opportunities for black poetry,” writes Boyd in her Randall biography, Wrestling With the Muse, “and this delayed Randall’s publishing debut.”

But 1937 would still be a milestone year, because that’s when Randall met Robert Hayden—a poet who also grew up in Black Bottom, and who would go on to study under W.H. Auden at the University of Michigan and become the first African American to be appointed as Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress (now known as U.S. Poet Laureate). But back in 1937, he and Randall were just young men meeting in a YMCA to discuss and critique each other’s work, and to socialize occasionally at local clubs Randall’s relationship with Hayden would continue throughout his life, and, much later, Hayden gave many of his poems to Broadside Press for publication. But numerous milestones came first, including divorce for Randall and marriage to a new wife, Mildred Pinckney, in 1942. World War II also intervened, sending Randall to the South Pacific through the Army Air Corps.

He worked as a supply sergeant, and in this role, Boyd writes, his “talent for classifying and cataloguing foreshadowed his future career as a librarian.”

When he returned to Michigan, Randall went to college at Wayne State University on the G.I. Bill, while also working fulltime in the Post Office. Randall’s poetry flourished while he was in school, and his subject matter reflected his own musings on the Great Depression and war, as well as increasing racial tensions in Detroit with the surge of African Americans into the city after the war, and continued racial discrimination in the automotive plants, as well as by the police.

In 1949, he earned his bachelor’s degree from Wayne, followed by a master’s degree from the University of Michigan in library science in 1951. After graduation, he and

(PREVIOUS PAGES) COURTESY OF MELBA BOYD

Randall would fall into a dark depression, burning many of his papers, photos, and documents about Broadside and his own poetry. His legacy would be in jeopardy.

Help would come to Randall from a few key sources, including poet and professor Melba Boyd, who worked briefly at the Press beginning in 1972, and who would eventually become his biographer.

Boyd would painstakingly conduct hours of interviews with Randall, recording all the audio, while seeking duplicates of Randall’s correspondence with publishers, poets, and others. She would research historic events and intersect Randall’s life with these important moments. She compiled and organized interviews from Randall’s friends and colleagues. She encouraged him to continue writing, which he did when his depression lifted, publishing A Litany of Friends: New and Selected Poems in 1981.

And when Randall died on August 5, 2000, it was Boyd who ensured his collection came to the Bentley. Thanks to her work, Randall’s legacy is preserved, and the collection now showcases his incredible life and his critical role in poetry and in publishing, raising up African American voices at a time when many wanted them silenced.

p

Poetry and Civil Rights

On September 15, 1963, a bomb thrown by Ku Klux Klan members tore through the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, killing four girls and injuring at least 14 others. The tragic and racially charged event moved Randall to write “The Ballad of Birmingham,” about a young girl who wants to attend a Freedom March, but is persuaded by her mother to instead go to the “safer” venue of church, where she ultimately loses her life. Soon after, Randall would write “Dressed All in Pink” about the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

In 1965, both poems were set to music by folk singer Jerry Moore, and Randall wanted a way to copyright his work.

Taking 12 dollars out of his library paycheck, he printed them as “broadsides,” and the press was born.

“My strongest motivations have been to get good Black poets published, to produce beautiful books, help create and define the soul of Black folk, and to know the joy of discovering new poets,” Randall said about Broadside in his memoir, Broadside Memories.

While keeping his day job as a librarian, Randall wore every hat possible at Broadside—acquiring manuscripts, editing them, working with printers, licking stamps, filing, cleaning windows, mentoring young poets, and more. Initially, he had a small collection of volunteers who helped him, though at Broadside’s height, he would employ eight part-time staffers. They worked out of a series of run-down office spaces, including an old burger joint and a former exterminator’s building.

In 1966, Broadside published its first book, Poem, Counterpoem, featuring Randall’s poetry alongside that of poet Margaret Danner. The second book, For Malcolm: Poems on the Life and Death of Malcolm X, was published in 1967, just ahead of the Detroit Rebellion.

The Rebellion launched Broadside into the public sphere. “The intensity of nationalist activism and political radicalism attracted an audience for Black literature,”

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wrote Boyd in Muse. “Collectively, the new black poets brought an excitement that attracted a broader audience.”

Broadside books flew off the shelves at Vaughn’s Bookstore in Detroit. Black Studies courses at colleges and universities across the United States ordered titles.

Broadside published internationally in Europe, Africa, South America, and more.

Randall tried to limit himself to four books per year, but found he couldn’t, given all the demand.

The long list of poets on Broadside Press’s pages nearly defies belief and includes Robert Hayden, Gwendolyn Brooks, Sterling Brown, Naomi Long Madgett, Don L. Lee (now Haki Madhubuti ), Langston Hughes, Audre Lorde, and countless more. By 1972, Broadside had published more than 192 authors, either in individual books, anthologies, or in broadsides. Haki Madhubuti alone sold more than 100,000 copies of his work.

Poet Laureate of Detroit

It was in 1972 that a young Boyd met Randall and began working for Broadside Press as an assistant editor, having just completed her master’s degree in English from Western Michigan University. She would help plan the 10-year anniversary celebration at the Manoogian Mansion in Detroit, and would also have insight into the pitfalls that kept Randall and Broadside Press from being profitable. This included his self-admitted Depression-era mentality, for example, that viewed business success as a negative, as well as his penchant for publishing anything he felt was “good,” versus what might actually sell.

By the end of 1975, Broadside Press was $30,000 in debt to its printer, and had uncollected debts from bookstores and poets who owed the press money but were unable to pay. In January 1976, Randall took early retirement from his librarian position at the University of Detroit Mercy to try and fix the red-lining financials, but eventually he was forced to sell the business to the Alexander Crumwell Center.

“His self-image was severely distorted by a sense of catastrophic failure,” Boyd writes, noting that Randall withdrew from friends, and also stopped writing. In January of 1980, deep into his depression, he sat on his bed and placed the barrel of a shotgun next

COL L E C T ION S

to his head. It was only his wife Vivian’s discovery of him in this position that kept him from pulling the trigger.

Slowly, bit by bit, Randall began to emerge from his depression. He started writing again, struggling at first, and then in a flurry: From April 1980 to May 1981, he composed more than 29 poems. He also asked Boyd to be his official biographer.

Broadside Press also welcomed him back as a consulting editor, and he ultimately regained control of the press in 1981. His first publication was Boyd’s book of poetry, Song for Maya.

This was the beginning of an upswing that saw Randall recognized for his many accomplishments in literature. On November 5, 1981, Detroit Mayor Coleman Young named Randall the Poet Laureate of Detroit.

In 1986, he was the recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts’ Lifetime Achievement Award. That same year, Wayne State awarded him with an honorary doctorate of letters, and in 1987, the University of Michigan gave him a distinguished alumni award.

Although Randall ultimately had to sell Broadside Press a second time (on this occasion to Don and Hilda Vest), he didn’t sink too far into darkness, and was able to publish A Litany of Friends about his depression and emergence from it.

Boyd, meanwhile, worked on a documentary about Randall titled The Black Unicorn: Dudley Randall and the Broadside Press.

It debuted at the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1996. Randall was there on its opening night, which also marked his 82nd birthday.

Randall died on August 5, 2000. Boyd published Wrestling With the Muse in 2003, honoring Randall’s request that his biography only come out after he was gone.

Boyd says she worked to make Randall’s voice “primary” in the biography, and her role was to provide context. “I’m not of the school that I knew more than they did,” she says.

Boyd donated Randall’s papers to the Bentley in 2016. His collection is open to the public.

Citizen Grain

The Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company, now the Kellogg Company, evolved from a wholescale effort to return health and vitality to illness-plagued citizens across the country.

But a bitter rivalry between brothers John Kellogg and W.K. Kellogg forever altered the business and the nature of their relationship. The Kellogg feud is documented in a new book by U-M Professor Dr. Howard Markel, who relied on the Bentley’s collections in his research.

By Robert Havey

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COL L E C T ION S

John Harvey Kellogg was born into a world of sickness.

Six of his 16 siblings and half-siblings died of infectious diseases in a nine-year span. John contracted tuberculosis when he was very young, rendering his left lung useless his entire life. He also suffered from several painful bowel disorders, made worse by the then standard Michigan diet of overcooked grain, fried potatoes, and fatty meat.

John was a bright child, but his father was reluctant to educate him. First, there was the real possibility that the sickly boy would die from one of the myriad frontier diseases. Second, the Kellogg family was deeply tied to the Seventh-day Adventist Church, which believed the Second Coming of Jesus was going to happen any day, probably soon. Why send the boy to school when the world was about to end?

The life that the Kelloggs lived in mid-1800s Michigan would be unrecognizable today. The entire state was covered in dense pine forests. Railroads were just starting to connect distant towns. By the time John came of age, his family sold its homestead farm and moved to Battle Creek to join the congregation of Adventists. Even with his

HS17838

An artist’s rendering depicts the main buildings of the Battle Creek Sanitarium.

Health, Hygiene, and Dr. Kellogg

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(TOP TO BOTTOM) HS17833, HS17842, HS17843

WHEN WILLIAM KEITH “W.K.” KELLOGG founded his cereal company in 1906, it should have been a moment of triumph and joy. W.K. had overcome a hard life on the Michigan frontier to start what was soon to be a booming business and an iconic American brand. Instead, the founding of the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company (later the Kellogg Company) marked the darkest time in W.K.’s longstanding feud with his older brother, John Harvey Kellogg. Their bitter fight over the Kellogg name and legacy raged for a decade, culminating in a Michigan Supreme Court case and permanent estrangement.

The John Harvey Kellogg and the W.K. Kellogg Institute collections at the Bentley were the foundation of Dr. Howard Markel’s new book, The Kelloggs: The Battling Brothers of Battle Creek. Markel, the University of Michigan’s George E. Wantz Distinguished Professor of the History of Medicine, writes that John Kellogg, the world-renowned doctor, and W.K. Kellogg, the titan of industry, both changed the way we think about health, diet, food manufacturing, and philanthropy. Their success made Kellogg a household name, but it also drove them apart.

family owning a successful broom factory, John still had to milk cows, make soap, and fetch wood for the stove.

The precocious John eventually did go to grammar school, where he excelled at reading. His intelligence was noticed by Ellen and James White, elders in the Battle Creek Seventh-day Adventist Church. They hired him at 12 years old to help in the church’s print shop, setting type and refilling ink wells.

The time with the Whites and the church was profoundly influential on John. Ellen White in particular preached a theology that was, as Markel writes, “remarkable for its emphasis on a sound body and a slate of hygienic habits, to maintain one’s physical, mental, and spiritual health.” Seventh-day Adventists believe the mind, body, and soul are an inseparable entity, so purity of body means purity of spirit.

With this new perspective and encouragement from the Whites, Top: John Kellogg John decided to become a doctor. speaks to an audiHe enrolled at U-M Medical School ence at the Battle in 1873, then Bellevue Hospital in Creek Sanitarium, New York City a year later. answering questions John’s curriculum at medical from his “weekly school was severely deficient by question box.” modern standards. Says Markel Middle: A metabin an interview with the Bentley, olism laboratory “[The material taught] was closer where the “breath of to what was taught by Hippocrates life” was analyzed. or Galen, or medieval scholars than Bottom: John Kelwhat is taught now. Doctors were logg, in white, in still bleeding patients, administerfront of the Sanitariing arsenic and purgatives. It was um’s Pavlov Physionot medicine we’d recognize.”

It was during this time that John logical Institute. started to develop ideas about health that would make him world famous. He synthesized concepts from his Seventh-day Adventist upbringing with the latest in modern physiology to come up with what he termed “biologic living.”

According to Markel, John still got a lot wrong, but some of his theories were remarkably ahead of their time. John believed “exercise, fresh air, clean water, spirituality, personal hygiene, and good sleep habits,” were the keys to good health. One hundred twenty-five years before juice cleanses and Pilates, John Harvey Kellogg championed what we would now call “wellness.”

John had the perfect venue to practice his medical philosophy when he was made the director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium in 1876. The San, as it was often called, was a combination of hospital, spa, and health resort.

The multi-building complex was deeply imbued with the teachings of Seventh-day Adventistism. The phrase Mens Sana in Corpore Sano greeted each guest coming through the gates: “A healthy mind in a healthy body.”

People flocked from around the world to the San, from

BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU 15

COL L E C T ION S

Amelia Earhart to Henry Ford. Battle Creek went from a remote, dusty town to the busiest train stop in Michigan after Detroit. John wrote bestselling books. He gave lectures to medical schools around the country. Kellogg became a household name.

John was able to accomplish all of this because he had his little brother W.K. running every part of his empire.

For years following, W.K. did his own cereal experiments, refining the process. He hit upon the idea of using corn instead of wheat. Corn was a little sweeter, and W.K., unlike his brother who cared only about digestion and health, wanted his cereal to taste good. Corn Flakes was born.

To know what a revelation Corn Flakes and other cereals were, it’s important to understand the state of American breakfast in the 1800s. If you wanted to eat any sort of grain in the morning, someone would have to get up hours before the meal to put the cracked wheat, oats, or barley on the boil. Much later, the family woke up with runny porridge in their bowls: terrible tasting, but at least digestible.

Compare that to pouring Corn Flakes into a bowl. “Plain” cereals like Corn Flakes might seem boring to us now, but in 1906 they represented freedom from hours of work.

W.K. Kellogg, the Workhorse

Like every great collaborative achievement, there are endless variations on the origin of Corn Flakes. John almost certainly had the idea for a ready-to-eat grain first. With the help of W.K. (and probably John’s wife, Ella), John spent hours in the San’s experimental kitchen making batch after batch of unpalatable wheat crumbs until finally arriving on what he called Granose. The toasted wheat flakes were an instant hit with the guests, and John instructed W.K. to start a mail-order service so San alumni could continue to buy this strange new snack.

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GETTY IMAGES/TRANSCENDENTAL GRAPHICS

The Origin of Corn Flakes

Toward the end of his life, John attempted to reconcile with W.K. He penned a letter in 1941, writing, “I am sure you were right in regards to the good business. . . . I earnestly desire to make amends for any wrong or injustice of any sort I have done to you.”

The letter was never sent. John’s secretary, believing the apology was beneath the doctor’s dignity, filed it away. John died two years later, assuming W.K. had read the letter and refused to respond.

The letter was found later and delivered to W.K. in 1948. It had to be read to him by a nurse, as W.K. had gone blind from glaucoma.

“It’s hard to know,” Markel says, if there would have been a real reconciliation. “There was so much hurt, so many hard feelings. I like to think that there would be, though. They both deserved that peace.”

Kellogg v. Kellogg

(TOP TO BOTTOM) HS17845, HS17850, HS17846

William Keith Kellogg was born in 1860, eight years after his brother John. There was little love for W.K. in the Kellogg house. His father thought teaching him to read was a waste of time. His mother was cold and distant.

John bullied him mercilessly. Years later, W.K. dedicated his fortune to children’s charities, lamenting: “I never learned to play.”

The massive changes to sociTop: Men and wom- ety from the Industrial Revolution were making their way slowly to en exercise outdoors at the SaniBattle Creek, but that didn’t exempt tarium with piano children like W.K. from toil. When accompaniment. he was six years old, his father put him to work six days a week in the Middle: Some Sanitarium baths incor- broom factory. His only day off was porated a low-amp Saturday for the Sabbath.

What W.K. lacked in formal eduelectrical current to cation, he more than made up for help patients lose with an incredible work ethic. He weight and get in shape. started working for his brother at Bottom: The Sanitar- the San in 1880. Soon, W.K. was running the publishing house for ium menu substiJohn’s books, managing the family tuted meat with vegetables, lentils, health food company, and acting as administrator of the massive Saniand soy. tarium. W.K. reported working 120 hours a week for hardly any pay.

Not that John showed any gratitude for W.K.’s efforts, according to Markel. A common sight on the San campus was Dr. John on his bicycle pedaling from building to building dictating his thoughts, as W.K. frantically recorded them while keeping up . . . on foot.

Apologies and Tragedies

W.K. was desperate to launch himself into the cereal business. He saw the pathetic imitations of Corn Flakes, like C.W. Post’s Post Toasties, flying off the shelf. W.K. knew he could do better. Only one thing stood in his way: his big brother John.

John went along with the new Kellogg cereal venture at first, but his criticisms and demands of his brother only grew worse as the business succeeded. W.K. bought out John’s share of the company, but that didn’t prevent both brothers from filing lawsuits in 1910, each claiming the exclusive A 1917 ad for Corn right to the Kellogg name.

Flakes notes that While the battle raged in the the “right” packagcourt system, the brothers also took ing will feature the their fight to the free market. In signature of W.K. 1908, John’s health food company Kellogg. sold a “sterilized bran” cereal very similar to Corn Flakes. The box and advertisement campaign warned against “copycat” products. W.K. responded by releasing several other “Kellogg’s” branded cereals, including “Kellogg’s Bran Crumbles,” a direct competitor to his brother’s product.

In 1920, when the lawsuits went to the Michigan Supreme Court, John had a strong case that he was the more popular Kellogg. According to Markel, “[John] was perhaps the most famous doctor in America, or at least one of them. His books were translated into [several] languages. The Battle Creek Sanitarium was a destination for people around the world. If you had heard of Kellogg’s cereal, you probably would have assumed it was connected to Dr. Kellogg.”

But it was W.K. who eventually emerged victorious. He was able to calmly and meticulously explain that the original flaked cereal envisioned by John was wheat-based, and intended as merely a health food. W.K. also showed that he had spent millions of dollars to advertise his cereal, claiming his right to the name Kellogg.

BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU 17

Regents would “have the general supervision of the University, and the direction and control of all expenditures.” The education article also stated that the Regents would be elected.

When the Constitution of 1850 was ratified the following fall, the Regents of the University of Michigan were created as a constitutional entity. Their status was equivalent to the other branches of government—e.g. governor and legislature.

Because they were elected, the Regents had the same democratic mandate as other officials, but by intention of the constitutional framers, their power was specialized: They functioned solely to provide “the general supervision of the University, and the direction and control of all expenditures.”

The Regents were, in other words, given the electoral mandate and political autonomy to run a public university—not a private one.

AT THE TIME OF THE 1850 CONVENTION, A MAJORITY OF Therefore, through legislation passed in DELEGATES WERE CONVINCED the 1860s, candidates for the Board of Regents would be nominated by their OF TWO THINGS: FIRST, THAT respective political parties, and votes would be cast during general elections, at EXECUTIVE POWER WAS the same time as other important offices.

DANGEROUS, AND MEASURES A LEGAL UMBRELLA EFFECT TO INCREASE THE POWER OF The constitutional status and electoral AN EXECUTIVE, FOR INSTANCE mandate of Regents was reaffirmed in succeeding constitutional conventions, THE GOVERNOR, WERE including the most recent in 1963. Moreover, in that year, that same status and WRONG; AND SECOND, THAT expectation of election were extended to STATE LEGISLATORS, BECAUSE the trustees of Michigan State University and Wayne State University.

OF THEIR SHORT TERMS AND And a kind of legal “umbrella effect” has also been extended to state camLACK OF FOCUS, COULD RUIN puses whose boards are appointed by the governor—e. g. Eastern Michigan HIGHER EDUCATION.

FREE FROM POLITICIANS’ WHIMS

THE RESOURCES THAT MOST state governments provide to their University President Emeritus James J. public universities have declined in recent years, raising the Duderstadt has declared that “During our question of whether public universities would be better off as private entities.

50 years at the University of Michigan, The answer to the question for the University of Michigan is a we’ve seen it evolve from a state-support- resolute On its own, the University of Michigan could not “go ed to a state-assisted to a state-related to private.” no.

In fact, such a decision on the part of the Regents would a state-located university. Today it remains seem unconstitutional on its face.

The reason for this goes back to the 19th century. only a state-molested institution, at least as far as Lansing is concerned . . . ” THE EDUCATION ARTICLE Wednesday, August 2, 1850, was the 50th day of the Michigan state Under the circumstances, should the constitutional convention. In the blistering summer heat, 40 members University attempt to become a private of the convention voted yes on an educational article; 26 voted no. school?

The article declared that “the Regents of

By Terrence J. McDonald

18 BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU

the University and their successors in office shall constitute the body corporate, known by the name and title of ‘the Regents of the University of Michigan’”. . . and that these

Richard Rummell colored print depicting the U-M campus, ca. 1907.

At the time of the 1850 convention, a majority of delegates were convinced of two things: first, that executive power was dangerous, and measures to increase the power of an executive, for instance the governor, were wrong; and second, that state legislators, because of their short terms and lack of focus, could ruin higher education.

A driving force of the convention was to remove as many functions as possible from the office of the governor and place them instead in the hands of the voters. By the convention’s end, nearly every office previously appointed by the governor was put on the ballot and given over to voters in the new constitution.

The 1850 delegates made points similar to those of an 1840 subcommittee of the state legislature that decried the fate of universities that were at the whim of politicians: “Thus has state after state, in this American union, endowed universities, and then, by repeated contradictory and over legislation, torn them to pieces with the same facility as they do the statute book, and for the same reason, because they have the right.”

The constitutional framers wished for a public version of what the state legislators saw in 1840 as the benefits of the private college and university model of leadership: “Oneness of purpose and singleness of aim…which inspires confidence and ensures success.”

Americans in the 19th century were committed both to democratic decision-making and to the system of political parties.

University, Western Michigan University, Central Michigan University, etc.

Although the governor makes these appointments, it is assumed that interference in their policies by the governor or legislature will be minimal.

The Michigan Supreme Court has also upheld and reaffirmed the constitutional autonomy of the Regents. In 1911, the Michigan Supreme Court declared that “by the provisions of the Constitution of 1850 . . . the Board of Regents is made the highest form of juristic person known to the law, a constitutional Corporation of independent authority, which, within the scope of its functions, is coordinate with and equal to that of the legislature.”

The phrase “within the scope of its functions,” is important, because the decision goes on to clarify that the functions of the Regents are “the general supervision of the University, and the direction and control of all expenditures from the University funds.”

As the founders of 1850 intended, there is no privatization in the future of the University of Michigan. Without a constitutional amendment to that effect, neither the University of Michigan nor any of the other state universities will ever become private.

The term “public Ivy” has been invented to refer to those public universities in America whose competitors are major private universities.

The University of Michigan is thought to be a very model of a “public Ivy,” and that is what the constitutional founders intended. n

BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU 19

I N T H E S TA C K S

Can the University of Michigan Ever “Go Private”?

HS1072

I N T H E S TA C K S

COL L E C T ION S

I N T H E S TA C K S

I N T H E S TA C K S

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Finding Tshusick One researcher dives into Bentley collections to find out what really happened when a Native American woman walked from Michigan to Washington, D.C.

GETTY IMAGES/MPI/STRINGER

By Lara Zielin

20 BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU

THE STORY GOES SOMETHING LIKE THIS: In the winter of 1826, an American Indian woman named Tshusick (pronounced CHOOsick) made the snowy and treacherous journey from Michigan to Washington, D.C., on foot. She arrived on the doorstep of Thomas McKenney, the Superintendent of Indian Affairs, claiming to be a widow who wanted to be “properly instructed and baptized” in the “true” religion of the white man.

McKenney took her in, and a short time later, Tshusick found herself in the White House. Tshusick charmed First Lady Louisa Adams with tales of Louisa’s sister, Harriet Boyd, whom she claimed to know from Michigan, and she quickly became a darling of the D.C. social scene. She had her portrait painted by artist Charles Bird King. In February, when she was ready to leave, she was lavished with presents and given money, a horse, and a military officer to help make her way first to Baltimore, then back to Detroit.

When McKenney wrote to Michigan Governor Lewis Cass to tell him all about the beautiful and well-connected Tshusick, Cass replied that they’d all been had. Tshusick wasn’t a widow wanting conversion, he said, but a swindler. She was, in reality, the wife of a kitchen Artist Charles Bird servant in the house of Harriet Boyd and King painted this her husband, George Boyd, who was, at portrait of Tshuthe time, the U.S. Indian agent on Mackisick in Washingnac Island. She had a reputation for taking ton, D.C., in 1827. advantage of people. Details of the ruse The Smithsonian made their way into History of the Indian Institution acTribes of North America, a book McKenquired the portrait ney co-authored with popular fiction writer in 1858, but it was lost in a fire in 1865. James Hall and published in 1837.

What we know of Tshusick is told through Lithographs of the the eyes of white, male observers from the original are all that time—and nearly her entire existence is remain. boiled down to one famous story. But what really happened, and who was she?

That’s what researcher Justin Carroll is trying to uncover with help from the Bentley. The associate professor of American history at Indiana University East was awarded a Bentley research fellowship to travel to Michigan and use Bentley materials to uncover missing pieces from the puzzle of Tshusick’s life.

“I’m fascinated by her because the history of indigenous women doesn’t usually get recorded,” Carroll says. “They’re either seen as princesses or drudges. Tshusick’s story is a way of exploring richer narratives of indigenous survival and identity.”

Carroll is poring over the papers of Governor Lewis Cass, who initially debunked Tshusick’s story, as well as fur-trading journals from the American Fur Trade Company, a diary from 1847 about Mackinac Island, and various family papers.

“I’m trying to go back through all these papers to figure out if there are any other mentions of her,” says Carroll. “The published stories about her are told from a specific viewpoint that we don’t know if we can trust. For most indigenous women, if they enter the historical record, we often don’t know what happens before or after. For example, I want to know more about what Mackinac was like culturally, socially, and economically to get a sense of what life was like for her, before she left for D.C.” Carroll is also looking for a letter written

by Cass to McKenney that talks about Tshusick’s past exploits. “[James] Hall makes reference to it, but I can’t find it,” says Carroll.

The letter would be a coup, but his goal is any documentation showing that this story is more than a painting and a few paragraphs from 1837.

Ultimately, Carroll hopes to put all of this research into his own book about Tshusick. He hopes to “write about Tshusick in a way where we know the limitations of the historical record, but we can still provide details about her life.”

This includes trips beyond the Bentley, including to the National Archives in Washington, D.C. “How could she have navigated a city she had never been to? How would she have found McKenney?”

These are among the questions he hopes to answer.

The idea of more painstaking research only enhances Carroll’s enthusiasm. “The joy of being a historian and going to a place like the Bentley is that you’re like a fish out of water. You rely on the archivists, and they often find you stuff you never would have found on your own. It’s such a helpful part of the process. It’s a true privilege to be able to do this.” n

WHAT WE KNOW OF TSHUSICK IS TOLD THROUGH THE EYES OF WHITE, MALE OBSERVERS FROM THE TIME—AND NEARLY HER ENTIRE EXISTENCE IS BOILED DOWN TO ONE FAMOUS STORY. BUT WHAT REALLY HAPPENED, AND WHO WAS SHE?

BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU 21

PROFILES

Primary Concerns

How a history major fell in love with primary source material and, years later, decided to support its digitization.

By Lara Zielin

LON HORWEDEL

IN 1975, THE UNITED STATES was in the midst of a recession, and New

Bentley Problem Solvers

By Robert Havey

What do you do in the Conservation Lab? What’s your mission?

SAMUELSON: We take damaged items from

the Bentley’s collections and repair them.

We don’t try to make things look new, we stabilize and protect them to make sure they are accessible to researchers now and in the future.

ROBERTSON: We repair newspapers, books,

photos—you never know exactly what’s

22 BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU

coming in the door. Sometimes it’s something we haven’t done before and we have to think outside the box, but that’s the fun of the job.

SAMUELSON: We’re problem solvers. Every

repair is slightly different and might require different tools and techniques.

What kinds of tools do you use in the Conservation Lab? ROBERTSON: A good number of our tools were originally owned by U-M’s book bindery. We have a board shear, which is like a massive paper cutter; a backing press; and a rounding table. We have two hot stamping machines that we use to stamp 23-karat gold onto the covers of books.

SAMUELSON: If a book’s sewing is broken, we

have some old English sewing frames that we use to sew books the same way they were originally sewn. All of this equipment was used by the University when it printed and bound its own textbooks.

ROBERTSON: There are also smaller tools like spatulas, backing hammers, and knives. We recently purchased a heated spatula that’s really handy for removing tape.

SAMUELSON: My favorite is the English

leather paring knife. One of our specialties is that we can bind or repair leather bindings.

What’s the coolest thing you’ve worked on?

SAMUELSON: We worked on a complete set of Michiganensians [yearbooks] for the U-M President’s house. We had to make sure the bindings were repaired in a way that would be aesthetically pleasing on the shelf, but the inside pages had to be strong enough for guests of the president to flip through. We were told people will always pull down the Michiganensian from their graduation year.

ROBERTSON: The astrological globes! We were given these teaching globes from the Detroit Observatory. They aren’t globes of Earth but the of the night sky. They had little stickers on them from when teachers had marked specific points for students to observe. One had gold paintings of astrological signs. They were cool, but in bad shape.

There were puncture holes, rusty nails sticking out, the wood was delaminating; it was a hot mess. We had to do a lot to make them usable again.

SAMUELSON: It’s a

pleasure to work on things that are 100–150 years old and know that we’re making things sound and usable for another 150 years. It feels like an honor. n

Top left: Dianna Samuelson (left) and Corinne Robertson (right) in the Conservation Lab. Top right: Book covers, paper scraps, ribbons, and tape all pay tribute to the work in the Lab.

HARLAN ERSKINE

Whether it’s 150-year-old scrapbooks with decaying binding or collections that might have spent decades in someone’s damp basement, items in the Bentley stacks often need some TLC. Lead conservators Dianna Samuelson and Corinne Robertson explain how the Bentley’s Conservation Lab repairs and preserves items for future generations.

York City was hard hit. With its credit cut off and a cash-flow shortage looming, the city needed money fast in order to cover its bills.

Without help, bankruptcy was near on the horizon.

Desperate for federal aid, New York City’s mayor and governor went to Washington, D.C., to meet with President Ford at the White House. The meeting was less than successful. Ford told them to solve the financial crisis themselves, and they left without a dime.

Shortly thereafter, the New York Daily News ran the famous headline: “Ford to City: Drop Dead.”

Some argue Ford’s hardline attitude on New York cost him the next presidential election. For his part, Ford called the drop-dead phrase inaccurate and unfair. So what was the truth of that meeting and the Ford administration’s position?

That’s the question history major Larry Portnoy wanted to answer for his honors thesis ahead of his graduation in 1985. So he dug into the archive at the Ford Presidential Library, which would be his first in-depth encounter with primary source material. Portnoy calls it a “fascinating experience,” and says that, in the end, “the public face of the Ford Administration was a true reflection of what they wanted to do. The administration was going to push New York City to fix the problem before federal help arrived.”

This appreciation for research and primary source material would, years later, spur Portnoy’s investment in early digitization efforts at the University of Michigan Library. He funded the addition of 99 volumes of material to a digital repository called the Making of America, which features primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction. “The idea that real primary materials reflecting real history can be made accessible to as wide an audience as possible—I think that’s fantastic,” Portnoy says.

Portnoy’s has also given generous and ongoing support to the Bentley. Each year, he provides a dollar-for-dollar match on Giving Tuesday (or, as it’s called at Michigan, “Giving Blueday”), which is a day dedicated to philanthropy on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving.

Portnoy’s support has helped fuel ongoing digitization work at the Bentley. Last year alone, the Bentley digitized more than 725 linear feet in materials.

“Once something is digitized, anyone who is interested in or doing work in this area can have access. It’s incredible in terms of impact.”

Today, Portnoy is a partner in the litigation department at the New York City offices of the Davis Polk law firm, and he says he still uses primary source materials and research in his day-to-day work.

“I might work with a testimony that was created a day ago, but it’s still primary. If you’re looking for the truth, going back to primary sources is sometimes the only way.”

BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU 23

PROFILES

COL L E C T ION S

B E N T L EY U N B O U N D

COLLECTIONS, the magazine of the Bentley Historical Library at the University of Michigan, is published twice each year.

Terrence J. McDonald Arthur F. Thurnau Professor Professor of History and Director Nancy Bartlett Associate Director Lara Zielin Editorial Director Robert Havey Communications Specialist Patricia Claydon, Ballistic Design Art Direction/Design Copyright ©2018 Regents of the University of Michigan ARTICLES MAY BE REPRINTED BY OBTAINING PERMISSION FROM: Editor, Bentley Historical Library 1150 Beal Avenue Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2113 PLEASE DIRECT EMAIL CORRESPONDENCE TO: laram@umich.edu 734-936-1342

Polite Society

By Katie Vloet

THE REAL ESTATE BROKER INQUIRED about the availability of the home in Palm Beach, Florida. The reply: “I do not know if she [the owner] would even consider an offer for it.”

But if the buyer wished to make an offer, he should know that the property “stands her in close to $4 million.” This was 1937— nearly $18 million today. The broker was not turned off by the sum, though he countered that his client may wish to be a tenant rather than a purchaser. The client, he wrote, “is no less a personage than the Duke of Windsor.”

That is: the Duke of Windsor, also known as the former King Edward VIII, who had abdicated the throne in order to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson. And,

24 BENTLEY.UMICH.EDU

naturally, if royalty were interested in living in south Florida, this home—Mar-a-Lago— would be the perfect place.

The sprawling 128-room palace was built for and partially designed by Marjorie Merriweather Post, who had taken on the ownership of the family’s cereal company at age 27 and amassed a fortune. She welcomed celebrities and royalty, dancers and artists.

The letter about the duke’s possible interest in the home is part of a collection of Mrs. Post’s papers at the Bentley Historical Library. Mar-a-Lago (“sea-to-lake” in Spanish), which was completed in 1927, famously was sold to now-President Donald Trump in 1985, but its history until that time was decidedly more genteel.

The grandness and elegance of Mara-Lago made it the perfect setting for a nearly endless string of dinner parties.

Mrs. Joseph P. Kennedy attended a ball; Lady Bird Johnson came to a dinner when she was first lady. A countess had cocktails with cosmetics magnate Estée Lauder. And just imagine the conversations that took place on the night Chief Justice

Top: Mar-a-Lago circa 1964.

Right: Marjorie Merriweather Post at Mar-a-Lago’s Red Cross Ball in 1971 with Col. C. Michael Paul (left) and Frederick Herman Korth (right).

Warren Burger, a sculptor, a senator, and the ambassador of Portugal attended the same dinner.

A longtime philanthropist, Mrs. Post decided in her later years to donate Mar-aLago to the federal government as a “Winter White House.” Alas, Mar-a-Lago was not to become the getaway for presidents, at least not at that time. After Mrs. Post’s death in 1973, upkeep and tax costs soared and the government returned the estate to the Post Foundation in 1981. In 1985, Trump purchased the home, and as president has made it his retreat—indeed, much like the “Winter White House” that Mrs. Post once envisioned. n Sources: “Marjorie Merriweather Post & the History of Mar-a-Lago,” Biography.com, March 15, 2017. “The Mar-a-Lago Club Was a ‘Winter White House’ Even Before President Trump Got There,” Time, Feb. 16, 2017. “A Palm Beach Guest House for Presidents and Kings,” The New York Times, Oct. 22, 1972.

“Building Mar-a-Lago: Marjorie Merriweather Post’s Palm Beach showplace,” Palm Beach Daily News, Feb. 5, 2017.

(TOP TO BOTTOM) HS18021/MAX ECKERT, HS18022/RAY HOWARD

Long before it was home to Donald Trump, Mar-a-Lago was the splendid palace of Marjorie Merriweather Post.

She hosted royalty, squaredanced with celebrities, and later in life tried to donate the home to the federal government as a “Winter White House” for the president. Her papers at the Bentley provide a glimpse into the shimmery past.

Regents of the University of Michigan Michael J. Behm, Grand Blanc Mark J. Bernstein, Ann Arbor Shauna Ryder Diggs, Grosse Pointe Denise Ilitch, Bingham Farms Andrea Fischer Newman, Ann Arbor Andrew C. Richner, Grosse Pointe Park Ron Weiser, Ann Arbor Katherine E. White, Ann Arbor Mark S. Schlissel, ex officio The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions. Inquiries or complaints may be addressed to the Senior Director for Institutional Equity, and Title IX/Section 504/ ADA Coordinator, Office for Institutional Equity, 2072 Administrative Services Building, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1432, 734763-0235, TTY 734-647- 1388, institutional. equity@umich.edu. For other University of Michigan information call 734-764-1817.

Seeing Stars WE NEED YOU TO INSPIRE THE NEXT GENERATION OF STAR-GAZERS.

The University of Michigan’s secondoldest building is ready to undergo a transformative renovation that will give visitors even more hands-on access to history. But to properly preserve this oneof-a-kind building, we need you.

Will you help save this 160-year-old building for future students and researchers?

PLEASE USE THE ENCLOSED ENVELOPE AND GIVE TODAY TO SUPPORT THE RENOVATION OF A CAMPUS TREASURE.

bentley.umich.edu/giving 734-764-3482

A B O U T T H E B E N T L EY

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN 1150 BEAL AVENUE ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN 48109-2113

Where Michigan’s History Lives Every day, people use the Bentley Historical Library to explore history.

With more than 70,000 linear feet of letters, photographs, books, and more, the Library is a treasure trove of primary source material from the State of Michigan and the University of Michigan. We welcome you to uncover Michigan’s history here.

Our team is eager to help you find what you need. We offer assistance in person, by phone, and by email: 734-764-3482 Bentley.ref@umich.edu VISIT THE BENTLEY Monday–Friday 9:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

EXPLORE COLLECTIONS AND FINDING AIDS ONLINE bentley.umich.edu FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL facebook.com/bentleyhistoricallibrary @umichbentley MAKE A GIFT bentley.umich.edu/giving 734-764-3482