Chelsea Hotel

Description

From the Bowery Boys website:

"Arguably New York's least conventional hotel, the Chelsea Hotel (or rather, the Hotel Chelsea) is the one of New York's counter-culture centers, a glamorous, art-filled Tower of Babel for both creativity and debauchery. From Mark Twain to Andy Warhol, it's been both inspiration and location for artistic wonder. We wind back the clock to the beginnings of Chelsea and to the hotel's early years as one of the city's cooperative apartment buildings. What made the Chelsea so different? And why are people still fighting over this storied structure today?"

The Blues, Black Vaudeville, and the Silver Screen, 1912-1930s

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Circular for the Plaza Theatre advertising. . . , c. 1929, The Blues. . . site
Annotation

In the early 20th century, Macon, Georgia's Douglass Theater was one of Georgia's primary entertainment venues for blacks outside of Atlanta. Over the course of its more than 60-year history, the theater featured famous vaudeville acts, singers such as Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith, boxing matches, as well as both silent and talking films. This website features 100 documents from the files of the theater's owner, Charles Henry Douglass, a prominent black businessman in Macon. Letters, financial statements, contracts, theater newsletters, and advertisements shed light not only on events and business transactions at the Douglass Theater, but on the wider business community supporting African American theaters in the South. A good place to begin is the "Introduction to the Douglass Theater in Macon," a detailed background essay with links to a variety of documents from the collection, including account book pages detailing one week's profits in 1923, and a series of letters exchanged between the theater's temporary manager in the late 1920s and his brother documenting the challenges of the theater business. The materials are transcribed and annotated, and browseable by author, date, type, subject, and title.

Slavery and the Making of America

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Image, Graphic from Religion, Slavery and the Making of America
Annotation

This extensive companion to the PBS documentary of the same name provides interpretive and primary material on the history of African-Americans during slavery and Reconstruction, including essays, personal narratives, original documents, historical readings, and lesson plans. The "Time and Place" chronology of slavery and Reconstruction places the main events of U.S. history relating to African Americans between 1619 and 1881 in their historical context. "Slave Memories" allows visitors to hear the voices of African Americans recorded by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) on their experiences in slavery and Reconstruction. "Resources" includes 17 print resources, 23 books for children, and 30 websites related to slavery. "Slave Experience" allows users to explore slave life through the themes of legal rights and government; family; men, women, and gender; living conditions; education, arts, and culture; religion; responses to enslavement; and freedom and emancipation. Each features essays, historical overviews, original documents, and personal narratives.

A K-12 learning section features historical readings of narratives, slave stories and letters, student plays, links to 19 sites with primary sources, and six lesson plans for middle and high school. This website is a valuable resource for teachers as well as an excellent introduction and overview for those with an interest in the history of slavery and slave life in America.

Dox Thrash: An African American Master Printmaker Rediscovered

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Graphite and brown pencil, "Self-portrait," Dox Thrash, Early 1930s
Annotation

The art of Dox Thrash (1893-1965) is exhibited in more than 60 images—mostly reproductions of his prints, but also including drawings and photographs of the artist at work. Born in Griffin, GA, Thrash spent most of his life in Philadelphia, which he expressively documented in his artworks. The exhibit proceeds along a timeline from birth to death that allows visitors to read a biographical narrative placing his life in appropriate historical context and to view images relevant to each period. Texts and images also can be downloaded in PDF format. Thrash's prints illuminated aspects of African American community life in Philadelphia with scenes of street life, workers, domestic scenes, and leisure activities. Thrash also portrayed scenes drawn from his experience as a soldier in World War I, life on the road, and the lynching of blacks.

In addition to his artistic creations, Thrash invented a new and influential printmaking technique—the carborundum process—in the 1930s as he worked in the WPA Graphic Arts Workshop. The exhibit provides descriptions and images of nine techniques Thrash used, and also includes four audio files of the curator discussing the process of putting the exhibit together. Valuable for students of the history of art and for those interested in expressive depictions of African American life and culture in Philadelphia.

Szarkowski: How To See

Description

According to the History of Photography Podcasts website:

"During his 29-year tenure as director of the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, curator and photographer John Szarkowski (1925-2007) changed the way the world saw photography."

This recording of Jeff Curto's class session introduces Szarkowski's work.

The Octagon Museum: The Museum of the American Architectural Foundation [DC]

Description

The Octagon Museum, the oldest U.S. museum of art and design, permits the American Architectural Foundation to share an understanding of and interest in architecture with the general public. The Federal period museum structure was built between 1799 and 1801. However, today, the interior and exterior reflect the period between 1817 and 1828. Collections include more than 100,000 original architectural drawings, 760 decorative arts artifacts, and over 12,000 archaeological items and architectural fragments found during restoration.

The museum offers exhibits and tours. Tours are unavailable during architectural restoration.

Nevada Historical Society

Description

The Nevada Historical Society museum collections house over 15,000 artifacts, including mining and ranching equipment, artwork, clothing, and items related to the state's gambling industry. The permanent exhibition on Nevada history illustrates the lives of the earliest inhabitants of the Great Basin, the desert stretches of the Immigrant Trail, the Comstock era, the effects of Nevada's liberal marriage and divorce laws, and the rise of the gambling industry. The Nevada Historical Society's library, photograph, and manuscript collections constitute the largest and most complete repository of materials related to the history of Nevada and the Great Basin. Materials available to the public include books, newspapers and periodicals, print files, maps, government documents, subject files, ephemera, manuscript collections, and over 500,000 photographs.

The museum offers exhibits, guided and self–guided tours, hands-on activities, in–classroom presentations on a variety of subjects, a documentary presentation and discussion series, screenings of movies which are set in Nevada, and a research library. The website offers virtual exhibits, children's activities, and a comprehensive PDF outlining available teacher resources.

Montclair Historical Society, Crane House, and Evergreens [NJ]

Description

According to the Montclair Historical Society site, "As a means to fulfill its mission, the Society preserves, restores, and furnishes the 1796 Crane House Museum, as well as other buildings at its Orange Road complex. The Crane House serves as the house museum, exhibition center, and meeting space. Next door, the Clark House houses the Terhune Library as well as historic skills classrooms and administrative offices. Two smaller buildings to the rear of the property, the Crafts Building and Historic Country Store and Museum Shop, offer space for exhibition and educational purposes." The Society also operates the 1896 home Evergreens as a house museum, on a limited basis.

The museums offer exhibits and tours; the society offers classes, research library access, and educational and recreational programs

Photographing History: Fred J. Maroon and the Nixon Years

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Photo, President Nixon in the White House
Annotation

This is a companion site to a 1999 National Museum of American History exhibit of Fred J. Maroon's photographs taken during the last four years of Richard M. Nixon's presidency. Maroon, a freelance photographer known for his images of Washington's monuments and landscapes, recorded Nixon's presidency from 1970, through the 1972 reelection campaign and the Watergate controversy, to the impeachment hearings and Nixon's resignation in 1974. The site is divided into four chronologically-arranged sections. The "White House" contains photographs taken in 1970 and 1971 while Maroon worked on a behind-the-scenes book about the White House Staff; "Reelection" records images of Nixon's 1972 reelection campaign; "Hearings" offers photographs of the White House staff during the Watergate crisis and impeachment hearings; and "Final Days" captures the events leading up to Nixon's resignation in 1974. The site offers more than 25 images selected from the museum exhibit as well as a timeline of the Nixon presidency from 1968 to 1974 and a 200-word biography of Maroon. For those interested in Watergate and the Nixon administration, this is a good site.