Here are your historical highlights for another week!
To start off is another story of a serendipitous discovery in an archives, this time a letter from a dying soldier penned by Walt Whitman.
Just this week the patent for the Wright brothers’ Flying Machine was rediscovered; it “had been misfiled among more than 269 million pages of patent records held by the National Archives” since 1979. See the images here.
Did you know that the British Museum opened in 1759?
This article caught my eye because my novel The Cause of These Disturbances also involves altering archival documents.
If you’re interested in audio archives, you’ll want to check this out.
In “Future Proofing the Digital Record” Carolyn Rance talks about the work of Dr. Richard Lehane to move “government records created in sometimes already obsolete formats to a new digital state archive.”
This is so cool! “Aboriginal ochre fingerprinting helping researchers trace ancient Indigenous trade routes”
I didn’t know competitive book collecting was a thing. And in case you mistakenly think your hoard of paperbacks from the library sale applies: “it’s not enough to amass books to enter the competition. Rather, you have to demonstrate your bookish chops with a bibliography that shows how well you understand your collection and how it fits into the wider world.”
Take a peek at the world’s largest private collection of antique maps and globes.
“The Impossible Task of Writing Historical Fiction” is a worthwhile read by the author of Hard Red Spring, which spans 100 years of Guatamala’s history. She writes about the struggle of dealing with both too much and too little information, as well as the very definition of history.
Lastly, in this short interview with Canadian writer Yann Martel (author of Life of Pi), he waxes eloquent about the importance of public libraries.
Let me know if you found any of these links as fascinating as
I did!
P.S. I just stumbled upon another article that might be of interest: “Manuscript reveals Isaac Newton’s recipe for magical ‘philosopher’s stone.'”
I love the globe collection! So beautiful.
Me too! I own three globes and would love to collect more.
All these links are tremendous! I especially liked the article about “historical fiction”, and was amused to see that people were not supposed to tip the servants at the British Museum, and consider that Isaac Newton would have been an amazing person to know.
p.s. It was interesting to read the story of the law student who altered his record — so much like your novel, Margaret!
Yes to all your comments! Every week I’m surprised by how many interesting links I find to share.