Monday, September 12, 2011

Weekly Review


Nation of Nations/UK Core Celebration Highlights Week:

art gallery
In honor of UK’s new general education requirements, Young Library is hosting a major 10-panel art work by Lexington artist Marjorie Guyon.

Guyon's "Nation of Nations" is a series of 10 paintings with each panel depicting a 6-foot-8-inch figure. On each one, the phrase, “Have Mercy on Us,” is written in a different language: Cherokee, Chinese, Spanish, Swahili, Cyrillic, Haitian, English, Arabic, Hindi and Hebrew. In addition the titles of the 10 paintings echo the anthems, "My Country, 'Tis of Thee" and "America the Beautiful."

Also, check out Professor Buck Ryan’s (School of Journalism) interpretation of the celebration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbLucsvMBzY   


New Book by Henry Clay Simpson:




Henry Clay Simpson, a member of UK Libraries National Advisory Board, is the author of Colonel William H. Russell, Sir. He will give a presentation and book signing at Ashland, the home of Henry Clay, at 4:30 p.m. on September 25.

Simpson is a native of Lexington and direct descendent of Henry Clay. He studied at University of North Carolina (AB) and Columbia Graduate School of Business (MBA). After an international career at Bank of America, he moved to London to help design the first industry clearing-house for foreign exchange (CLS Bank) and served as its first Executive Vice President. He is a trustee and supporter of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation and has loaned the museum an extensive collection of Clay family artifacts. In 2005, he donated the Henry Clay family papers to UK Libraries. He lives in Hanover, NH where he writes historical books and articles and is currently teaching a course on the financial crisis for Dartmouth's extension program.

He is also the author of Josephine Clay: Pioneer Horsewoman of the Bluegrass published in 2005.


UK Libraries Acquire Early Henry Clay Letter:


Special Collections has recently acquired one of the earliest known letters of Henry Clay. Unpublished, it was written in Virginia, over a year before his move to Lexington in November of 1797. Dated July 16, 1796, it is addressed to Peter Tinsley, clerk of the High Court of Chancery of Virginia and was written when Clay would have been only nineteen years old. The letter, in which Clay discusses his poor health, is a revealing one. Young Clay states that he has “unwrapt his soul” and wishes to make amends for a misunderstanding in his terms of employment with Tinsley.

From his appointment with Tinsley, Clay moves on to work with Chancellor George Wythe, the teacher of Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe, and is granted a license to practice law in Virginia in 1797. He was soon afterwards admitted to practice in the Fayette County circuit court, taking the oath on March 20, 1798.

The UK Libraries housed the Papers of Henry Clay editorial project, which produced eleven volumes of Clay documents over a forty year period. The earliest item in the first volume dates to August 22, 1797 and is a legal paper. The first piece of correspondence in the edition dates to December 27, 1798. This new acquisition prefigures all of the printed material in the published Clay papers and sheds significant light on Clay’s precocity and his early association with an important figure in Virginia’s public life. U.K. Libraries holds one of the largest collections of Henry Clay letters, rivaled only by the Library of Congress.


UK Libraries Host SAA Workshop:

The Society of American Archivists’ Managing Electronic Records in Special Collections and Archives workshop was hosted by UK Libraries on September 8 and 9. The workshop reviewed and discussed electronic record issues facing colleges and universities. The workshop also provided opportunities for small group discussions of case studies and report findings. Day two of the workshop demonstrated tools supporting electronic records workflows including Archivematica, HTTrack, and forensic tools. Participants also learned about and use open source tools for ingest and management of electronic records.


MCL Director Appointed to Regional Advisory Council:

Janet Stith, Associate Dean and Director of the Medical Center Library, has been appointed to the Regional Advisory Council of the Greater Midwest Region, National Network of Libraries of Medicine for a five year term. The Regional Advisory Council (RAC) provides guidance in developing and evaluating programs and services that meet the needs of the region. The RAC is composed of representatives from key constituency groups within the region and includes the ten State Representatives.


Jewish Archives Lecture:

The UK Judaic Studies program’s first lecture of the year will be Monday, September 26. Lisa Leff, a history professor from American University, will be speaking on the treatment of Jewish archives after the Holocaust. Her presentation, “Rescue or Theft? The Salvaging of French Jewish Archives after World War II,” will be in the President’s Room of the Singletary Center at 8:00 p.m. The lecture, sponsored by the UK Judaic Studies Program and the UK History Department is free and open to the public. For more information, contact Jeremy Popkin, director, UK Jewish Studies program, popkin@uky.edu


Director of Archives:

Ruth Bryant joined UK Libraries as Director of Archives this month. Welcome Ruth!


ASERL Selects Paula Sullenger as Visiting Program Officer for Cooperative Journal Retention:

ASERL Executive Director, John Burger, announced this week that the Association of Southeastern Research Libraries (ASERL) has selected Paula Sullenger, Head of Electronic Resources and Serials for Auburn University Libraries, to serve as the organization’s next Visiting Program Officer (VPO). Ms. Sullenger will lead the expansion of ASERL’s cooperative print journal retention program. Her work with ASERL will be a six month assignment, starting October 15, 2011.


Thanks to John Burger, Erin Holaday Ziegler, Whitney Hale, Buck Ryan, and Deirdre Scaggs for their contributions to the Weekly Review.



Terry Birdwhistell
Dean of Libraries

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