Blog Post
New York Times databases
by lucroe
The library subscribes to two slightly different New York Times databases. The first provides full text articles of the newspaper from 1980 to the present. The second is the New York Times Historical database covering the period 1851-2007. The historical database provides scanned copies of the original newspapers including obituaries and images when available as PDFs. A great resource for genealogists and history buffs alike! The daily New York Times in print is available at all our branches and we retain 6 weeks worth.
Blog Post
Clang, Clang, Clang Went the Trolley
by amy
While browsing through old newspapers and listening to the radio at our archive this afternoon, I caught part of a 2006 interview with Hugh Martin, composer, lyricist and arranger of such classics as "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," "The Boy Next Door" and "The Trolley Song" from the great 1944 musical Meet Me In St. Louis. Martin, who died last Friday explained that he was browsing through an old newspaper at the Beverly Hills Library when he saw a photograph of a trolley with the caption, "Clang! Clang! went the trolley"...and three hours later the song was done. In his honor, and because my love of old musicals, libraries, newspapers and photographs just collided and I can't help myself, here's a photograph of an old Ann Arbor trolley. May it inspire you to write the next great American song.
Thanks to Site 3 of the Downtown Historical Street Exhibits Program there are several photographs of old Ann Arbor trolleys to choose from. And if songwriting isn't really your thing, we have an entire book on the subject.
Blog Post
101 Things You Didn’t Know About Ann Arbor…
by manz
…But Are About to Find Out Why is a new book by Martin Woodhouse. The author presents “fascinating tangents and tidbits in purposely random sequence” about the fair city of Ann Arbor. He ups the “quirk quotient” and treats readers to some interesting stories and facts about A2 and some of its story-worthy inhabitants.
Perhaps you’ve read Wicked Washtenaw County, Strange Tales of The Grisly and Unexplained, and are looking for more facts about the area. This book is right up your alley. Also recommended for some local trivia is another new book, Ghostly Tales of Michigan, which shares ghostly tales of some of Michigan’s more ghostly places.
Blog Post
Brookwater Farm Revisted: New Book, Old Articles
by Debbie G.
A new book arrived in our Local History Collection recently, Brookwater Farm of Webster Township, and in one of those serendipitous moments we're having at the Archives lately, we came across some articles related to the history of the Brookwater Farm.
In 1948, the Ann Arbor News ran a long article, Restoration of Brookwater, complete with a description of the annual livestock auction and historic photos of the farm. The new owner, Lawrence F. Carlton, undertook an extensive restoration of the farm house. However, later articles from 1950 describe the "Corn War", a year-long legal battle with suits and countersuits over 29 acres of corn crop. There's even an article about Mr. Carlton temporarily blinding himself when a tear gas bomb went off as he was showing it to folks.
Blog Post
Why Did Washtenaw County Vote Against Suffrage, Not Once, But Twice?
by Debbie G.
Liberty Awakes in Washtenaw County: When Women Won the Vote, a new exhibit at the Museum on Main Street runs January 8-February 27, 2011. The exhibit features artifacts, stories and images from the local woman suffrage movement. On the 2nd and 4th Thursday of January and February, please bring a lunch and join in a discussion on woman suffrage in Washtenaw County from 12 noon-1:00 PM.
The exhibit is sponsored by the League of Women Voters of the Ann Arbor Area and the Washtenaw County Historical Society. For more information or to arrange group tours or talks email Zoe Behnke at bliz468@yahoo.com
Blog Post
Ypsilanti Gleanings 2010: A Year in Words & Pictures
by amy
We recently posted the winter issue of Ypsilanti Gleanings, the official publication of the Ypsilanti Historical Society. Gleanings offers, on a quarterly basis, a variety of articles, quizzes and miscellany for enthusiasts of Ypsi history. All four 2010 issues are here, with both text and images available for searching and browsing. As a matter of fact, we have the complete text and images of Gleanings dating all the way back to its origins in 1971!
So if you need a good read to keep you enthralled over the holiday break, look no further than the Gleanings corpus where you'll find ghost stories, mysterious abductions, natural disasters, westerns, epic biographies and other fascinating tales of Ypsilanti history.
Blog Post
1928 - Oldest Article Found At the Archives So Far: George J. Burke
by Debbie G.
Not only is it the oldest "name" file so far, It's a historical gold mine. The first article we unfolded in the file was on the appointment of Mr. Burke as a judge for the Nuremberg Trials. The 1928 article concerns a speech Mr. Burke gave to fellow Democrats in Port Huron. Back in the day, when newspapers were the medium of record, the full-text of the speech was included in the day's paper. Mr. Burke had a long and distinguished career of public service to Ann Arbor, Michigan and the nation.
Read more to see the oldest article, the article about George Burke's appointment to the Nurenberg Trials, and George Burke's obituary from the Ann Arbor News.
Blog Post
Grisly Local History: Wicked Washtenaw County
by darla
For those of you who enjoy history with a morbid twist, the AADL now offers Wicked Washtenaw County: Strange Tales of the Grisly and Unexplained. This new collection of short stories from local Ypsilanti historian James Thomas Mann offers up true tales of murder, mystery, grave robbing, scandal, etc. culled from old newspapers of our area. Mann's book is a short, quick read garnished with photos and drawings of the people and places involved. It gives a glimpse into Washtenaw's darker history, like the unsolved 1913 murder of a Chelsea woman who was strangled and found buried under a pile of cornhusks in her barn.
Blog Post
An Intimate look inside one of the oldest estates in Barton Hills
by amy
Jean Spero, granddaughter of former Detroit Edison president, Alex Dow (1862-1942), recently sent us several photographs of her childhood home in Ann Arbor. Known as " Brushwood," this country estate was one of the first homes to be built on the rolling slopes above Barton Dam, which eventually became Barton Hills. Local historian Grace Shackman covers the origins of this area in her article, " The Buried History of Barton Hills."
Spero's childhood memories color her personal tour of Brushwood. For example, here's one about the Brushwood Library, her grandfather's favorite hideaway:
"There were two walls filled with books, a special radio, a fireplace, two desks, one his and one for the secretaries who often came out for a week or so to work with him....they were very sweet and two became especially good friends of mine. As a teen when Grandfather wasn't there I would use that room to 'entertain' my friends by listening to the radio in front of a roaring fire...wonderful atmosphere. As a little one I read all I could get my hands on, including the Encyclopedia Britannica which was thoughtfully put on a lower shelf! The collection was very diverse, lots of folklore, philosophy or religious tomes of every sort of religion, history, plus, of course, current novels, etc. I have two of the books, Willa Cather's My Antonia and a huge coffee table-sized book on Scottish tartans...." (J. Spero)
Blog Post
Halloween in Ann Arbor, 1957
by amy
Here are a few photographs from the Ann Arbor News archive to give you a taste of what Halloween was like in Ann Arbor 50 years ago. The first photo, below, is of a girl trying on a mask in a Main Street dime store. The second photograph is of a boy looking at candy. Both were taken on October 21, 1957. Does anyone recognize the store? Could it have been Kline's? Or maybe Kresge's?
The two photographs at the bottom are from the Burns Park School Halloween Parade in 1957: children marching in the parade ; and, my favorite, the Burns Park band playing in costume.
These are from a dimestore on Main Street, October 21, 1957:
These are from the Burns Park School Halloween parade, 1957: