Arsenical Candy and Copper Peas: Food Adulteration in 19th-Century Michigan

Fri, 05/31/2019 - 11:36am

In 1896, Michigan consumers spent an estimated $23,000,000 ($690,000,000 today) on impure food products. Vinegars, spices, jam, cheese, coffee, and condiments were among the items tainted with additives ranging from benign to deadly. Local history writer Laura Bien gives an illustrated talk on the state’s history of food fraud and the efforts to quash it. This event is in partnership with the Culinary Historians of Ann Arbor (CHAA), an organization of scholars, cooks, food writers, nutritionists, collectors, students, and others interested in the study of culinary history and gastronomy. Their mission is to promote the study of culinary history through regular programs open to members and guests, through the quarterly newsletter Repast, and through exchanges of information with other such organizations.

Farms and Open Space: Preserving Rural Washtenaw County

Fri, 05/31/2019 - 10:36am

A panel of experts from Washtenaw County government agencies and nonprofits discuss what we can do to preserve farmland, forests, open space, and natural areas in Washtenaw County. They will highlight what efforts are already under way, and how we can expand efforts to help local farmers and conservationists.

This panel includes members from the Mindful Eating Team of the Ann Arbor Unitarian Universalist Congregation, the Park Planning and Natural Areas Planning Department of Washtenaw County, members of the Legacy Land Conservancy, local farmers, and Argus Farm Stop.

This event is in partnership with the Unitarian Universalist Church of Ann Arbor.

"Locomotive/Brilliant Corn" | Miles Okazaki

Thu, 05/09/2019 - 7:48pm

Miles Okazaki is the first artist to record all of Thelonious Monk's music on a solo instrument. In this concert he will be presenting selections from his 2018 album "WORK," a five-hour performance of the complete compositions of Thelonious Monk for solo guitar, praised by critic Nate Chinen as “an act of immersive scholarship and exhaustive scope. . . a singular achievement,” and selected by the New York Times as one of the best albums of 2018, a “monumental statement of devotion.”

Check out the Pulp interview with Miles Okazaki. 

Okazaki has released four albums of original compositions over the last 12 years; he has taught guitar and rhythmic theory at the University of Michigan for five years.

Author Event | Guardians of Detroit

Mon, 05/06/2019 - 10:25am

Due to a fortunate confluence of water, geography and entrepreneurial vision, Detroit at the end of the 19th century was poised to experience unprecedented growth. Even before the Ford Motor Company was established in 1903, Detroit was a major industrial center and transportation hub. All this commercial activity and prosperity led to a building boom of incredible proportions at a time when the most popular architectural styles were Beaux Arts, Gothic Revival, Classical Revival, and Art Deco. Each of these styles typically required extensive ornamentation and because of this, Detroit became a treasure trove of architectural sculpture. 

Jeff Morrison’s new book Guardians of Detroit: Architectural Sculpture in the Motor City documents these incredible features in a city that began as a small frontier fort and quickly grew to become a major metropolis and industrial titan.  Jeff shares more than 100 spectacular close-up pictures of architectural sculpture from throughout the city of Detroit. You also learn about the symbolism behind the ornamentation and hear some of the untold stories of the artists, artisans, and architects involved in its creation, all drawn from the book. 

Jeff Morrison is a historian and photographer who has been taking pictures since his parents gave him his first camera at age nine. He has a bachelor’s degree in history and art from Eastern Michigan University and over thirty years’ experience as a graphic artist. Jeff lives in Oxford, Michigan, with his lovely wife, Susie, and their wonder dog, Manfred.

Bright Nights Community Forum | What is Neuroscience and How Can it Change Psychiatry?

Mon, 05/06/2019 - 10:19am

As we understand the brain better, we should be able to improve our diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric disease. In fact, ideally, neuroscience should lead us to be able to fully understand and possibly even repair brain circuits important for mental health conditions. But how likely are we to achieve that ideal?  What stands in our way?

Through science and technology, we have discovered a great deal about the brain. However, emotional systems and psychiatric disease are incredibly complex. Modern neuroscience has focused its efforts and advances on the brains of experimental animals, but we are still far from moving these highly precise interventions onto humans. The question remains: how do we translate this advanced work into solutions for individuals with mental illness?

Dr. Brendon Watson, Assistant Professor for the Department of Psychiatry at Michigan Medicine, gives a brief overview presentation of our current standing in neuroscience in relation to psychiatric practices, and shares where he believes we are going. Dr. Watson speaks about the tension between theory and practice within research and the importance of moving towards non-invasive procedures.

Archivist Bill McNitt on President Gerald R. Ford

Mon, 04/22/2019 - 10:14am

Join us as archivist and President Gerald R. Ford specialist Bill McNitt discusses Ford and his legacy.

In 1965, U. S. Representative Gerald R. Ford began donating his papers to the Bentley Historical Library.  After President Richard Nixon appointed Congressman Ford as Vice President in 1973, the Library created a new staff position to arrange, rehouse, and describe the Ford Congressional Papers and selected Bill to fill it.  When President Ford left the White House in 1977, Bill (and the Congressional Papers) moved to the Ford Presidential Papers Project, a precursor of the Ford Presidential Library. He spent much of his career there processing the extensive records of the Ford presidency, while also assisting researchers in using the collections, managing a major database indexing the holdings, and helping to launch a digitization project to make key documents available online.

Bill McNitt is a retired archivist whose career at the University of Michigan’s Bentley Historical Library and then the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library of the National Archives and Records Administration spanned more than 40 years.  He grew up in western Michigan and was quite familiar with the career of Gerald R. Ford from a very young age as the family lived in Ford’s congressional district and Bill’s father James had attended junior high school and high school with Ford.  Bill majored in history as an undergraduate at the University of Michigan and began working as a student employee of the Michigan Historical Collections (now housed in the Bentley Historical Library) in 1969. He then earned master’s degrees from the University in both history and library science.

AADL Board of Trustees Meeting - May 20th, 2019

Tue, 04/16/2019 - 1:41pm

19-074 I. CALL TO ORDER 

19-075 II. ATTENDANCE  

19-076 III. RECESS TO CLOSED SESSION FOR DIRECTOR’S EVALUATION 

Nerd Nite #58 - The Search for Drugs Within: A Multi-Scale Journey from Organs to Organelles

Mon, 04/01/2019 - 1:01pm

Did you know that many FDA-approved drugs accumulate inside organs and tissues of our bodies, sometimes so much so that they actually form crystals inside cells? Have you ever wondered where drugs go when we consume them? This talk explores routes of administration, the fate of drugs inside our bodies (the ways they distribute throughout different organs and cell organelles), and the use of laser-scanning microscopy for the measurement of drug accumulation inside immune cells.

About Vernon: Vernon is a PhD candidate in Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy. He is part of an interdisciplinary research team of scientists, engineers, and medical professionals studying the effects of long-term drug exposure and adverse drug reactions. Vernon was born and raised in Northern Michigan and has lived throughout this glorious state his entire life. When he’s not peering through a microscope, he spends his time pursuing balance in life through socialization, exercise, spirituality, literature, musical/visual art, and other creative avenues.

AADL Board of Trustees Meeting - April 15th, 2019

Mon, 04/01/2019 - 11:38am

This is where you watch the April 15th, 2019 Meeting of the AADL Board of Trustees.

For more information, see the Board Packet for this Meeting. 

19-054 I. CALL TO ORDER

"Back Page": A Super Colossal Production (1936)

Thu, 03/28/2019 - 7:38am

This film was made by the Display Advertising Department of the Ann Arbor News in 1936. It's a humorous look at a day in the life of the advertising staff as they work to secure an advertisement from a local merchant and get it to press in time for the daily run. 1936 marks the year the Ann Arbor News building was completed at 340 E. Huron and the year the News acquired its new printing press, both of which are featured in the film. There's also a tantalizing glimpse of the Bell Tower under construction on the University of Michigan campus. The Library received this 16 mm film along with the clipping files and photo negatives from the Ann Arbor News.

Original: 16mm film, silent, 00:21:41, 1936