Bicycles, Babies, and Circus Parades: A Glimpse at Life and Leisure in Late Victorian Tuscaloosa

We have just added a new digital collection to the UA Libraries' Digital Collections -- selections from the Perkins Family Papers (Perkins Family Papers, 1813-1928, mss no. 1127). The Perkins digital collection consists of 294 incredible photographs of a broad array of subjects, including intimate family photographs, photographs of rivers, people, buildings, activities, and much more -- including images the circus coming to town! The image above captures the Jim Robinson Circus Parade in downtown Tuscaloosa.

A Picnic in the Park

The Perkins online collection offers a unique glimpse into leisure life and activities in late Victorian America. The Perkins Family Papers spans the period from 1813 to 1928, with the bulk of the collection being from the 1840s to the 1910s.

The Perkins Family Papers as a whole consists mainly of photographs and correspondence between family members. Within the collection, there are diaries, ledgers, a scrapbook, an unpublished novel, printed invitations, death notices, receipts, legal documents and other financial papers, and memorabilia. The Perkins collection relates to Stephen C. and Carolina A. Perkins; their son Julian C. and his wife Mamie Kennedy Perkins, and their children: Edwin, Brook, Julian H., and Maud. The majority of the correspondence and papers were generated by Caroline A. Perkins and Mamie Kennedy Perkins and concern mainly family matters.

The finding aid for the entire collection is available at http://www.lib.ua.edu/libraries/hoole/findingaids/pdf/ms_1127.pdf

The digitization of this collection was made possible by EBSCO Industries.

"Mrs. Perkins & her Wheel"

The family life of Julian and Mamie Perkins and their children are well documented in pictures compiled by their son, Edwin. Here are a few fun highlights Edwin captured that are part of the nearly 300 photographs now available online.

"Fancy Bicycle Rider"

"Baby Dan" and the family dog -- with someone behind them camera shy!

Brook K. and Julian Herbert Perkins in their HMS Pinafore costumes

Brook K. Perkins and his cat, Wang

Recognizing Peace and Remembering the Peacemaker: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Please join us in remembering Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whose life was taken forty years ago today. This letter was sent by Dr. King in recognition of Burford Boone's receiving the 1957 Pulitzer Prize "for his fearless and reasoned editorials in a community inflamed by a segregation issue, an outstanding example of his work being the editorial entitled, 'What a Price for Peace,' published on February 7,1956" in the Tuscaloosa News.




Dr. King's poignant personal note echoes his message and legacy as a champion of human rights, of justice and equality, and as an inspirational unifying force for Peace.

Turning Japanese: How Winnifred Eaton became Onoto Watanna in Victorian America

Join us Tuesday, March 11, 2008 at the Hoole Special Collections Library, 2nd Floor Mary Harmon Bryant Hall at 4:30 pm for a lecture by Dr. Edward Tang, Associate Professor of American Studies, The University of Alabama. [flier for event here]

His talk, Turning Japanese: How Winnifred Eaton became Onoto Watanna in Victorian America explores the complicated life of Winnifred Eaton (1879-1954), one of the first known writers of Asian descent to be published in America. She wrote several popular novels set in Japan, yet she tried to hide her own ethnic identity – she was born in Canada to an English father and Chinese mother who had been adopted by missionaries. Eaton published under the Japanese pen name -- Onoto Watanna.

Many of Eaton’s novels revolve around romances between American men and Japanese women. In Me, A Book of Remembrance, which was published anonymously, she wrote a thinly veiled autobiography in which she discussed her work as a writer but avoided mentioning her half-Chinese background.

“Eaton’s identity as a writer relied on cultural borrowings and blurrings,” Tang said. “By assuming the identity of a Japanese woman, she bowed to market demands for things Japanese but also challenged distinct racial or ethnic categories that many people at the turn of the century assumed to be fixed and stable.”

The lecture is in conjunction with an exhibit of books by Eaton/Watanna from the Hoole Special Collections Library and the 2008 Sakura Festival at UA and in Tuscaloosa. The books on exhibit are from the Richard Minsky Collection at the W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library, and from a gift from Dr. John Crowley. Some of Eaton/Watanna's works are featured in the UA Libraries collaborative digital project, Publishers' Bindings Online, 1815-1930: The Art of Books.

It was in Chicago that Eaton/Watanna published her first novel, Mrs. Nume of Japan (1899), which told the story of a romance involving two couples, one American and one Japanese, who switch partners during a series of romantic and tragic encounters. It was an immediate success. From then on she published almost a novel a year. Moving to New York she wrote her next novel, A Japanese Nightingale in 1901. It was translated into many languages and was even made into a Broadway play and film (1919). She lived in New York until 1917. During that time, she married and divorced Bertrand Babcock with whom she had four children. She had much financial and writing success. In 1910, she wrote the bestseller Tama, which is shown here.

This lecture is part of the Sakura Festival in Tuscaloosa and The University of Alabama. A reception will follow. This event, is of course free and open to the public.