Americana

The Beinecke Library’s major strengths in general Americana span the colonial period to the middle of the nineteenth century, complemented by important collections of twentieth century writers and photographers.

  • Martin Luther King Jr. helped to change America, with poet Langston Hughes’ help (Sedona Red Rock News)

    January 13, 2024

    King and Hughes maintained a friendship until Hughes’ death in May 1967, even traveling together to Nigeria in November 1960. Hughes wrote about King’s civil rights efforts in at least 40 articles in the Chicago Defender and penned several poems about King’s activities. King quoted or paraphrased at least seven Hughes poems in various speeches before he was assassinated in April 1968, according to W. Jason Miller’s book, “Origins of the Dream: Hughes’s Poetry and King’s Rhetoric.” Hughes had written his poem “Harlem” in 1951, which begins, “What happens to a dream deferred? / Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun?”

  • Writing and Resistance: 2024 Black History Month Display

    January 8, 2024

    Materials related to a temporary display on the Beinecke Library mezzanine, January 8 - March 18, 2024, for the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Day, Black History Month, and in conjunction with the publication of Yale and Slavery: A History (Yale University Press, 2024) and the exhibition Shining Light on Truth: New Haven, Yale, and Slavery, on view from mid-February at the New Haven Museum.

  • Through Justice’s Papers, Students See Supreme Court Behind the Scenes

    December 19, 2023

    In a first-of-its-kind course this fall, Yale Law School students delved into the working papers of a former Supreme Court justice for an intimate view of the making of landmark decisions. Through hands-on use of these archival materials, students gained research skills once used mainly by scholars but now increasingly valuable for legal practitioners. Taught by lecturers in legal research Nicholas Mignanelli and Michael VanderHeijden, Research Methods in Judicial History centered around the papers of Associate Justice Potter Stewart ’41, which are held at Yale’s Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Through Stewart’s papers, the course explored how judges and legal scholars use historical court materials to make sense of judicial decisions.

  • Sixth Henry Roe Cloud Conference celebrates Native and Indigenous legacy at Yale (Yale Daily News)

    November 16, 2023

    This weekend, hundreds of Native and Indigenous students, faculty and alumni attended Yale’s sixth Henry Roe Cloud Conference — a celebration of Native and Indigenous excellence that is hosted every four years. The conference, which began in 2005, is named for Henry Roe Cloud (Winnebago), who graduated from Yale College in 1910 with a double major in psychology and philosophy and earned a master’s degree in anthropology from the University in 1914. With his Yale degree, Roe Cloud became a pioneer of Native American education and advocacy. The conference dedicates him as a standard bearer for current and future Native and Indigenous students of Yale to emulate.

  • Lector of Cherokee is Yale’s first faculty member in an Indigenous language

    October 6, 2023

    In its search for a lecturer, the search committee did not specify Cherokee, Bowern said, but rather left it open to any North American Indigenous language. “We just really wanted to get a fantastic teacher, and Patrick emerged as the successful candidate,” she said. “Cherokee makes sense as a language at Yale because we have a lot of related materials in the Beinecke Library, and we have students who are members of the Cherokee Nation pretty regularly.” Del Percio attributed their proficiency in Cherokee — which is considered one of the more difficult languages to learn — to the many first-language speakers who supported, accepted, and welcomed them over the years. Having that personal interaction is crucial in learning Cherokee, they said, because it’s a tonal language.

  • Pondering the power of art in protest

    September 26, 2023

    “Art, Protest, & the Archives,” an exhibition at the Beinecke Library, explores the connections between dissent and artistic expression over the past century.

  • Fall exhibit at the Beinecke Library explores art and protest (Yale Daily News)

    September 14, 2023

    The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library’s newest exhibit, “Art, Protest, and the Archives,” probes the relationship and tensions between aesthetics and dissent. The exhibit premiered on Aug. 4 and will run through January. The first floor offers a chronological look at protest art over time, while the work upstairs is arranged by topic. Kevin Repp, a curator at the Beinecke, worked with other museum staff to create an exhibition that covers a vast geographical and temporal span.

  • Beinecke event highlights failed effort to make New Haven the site of America’s first HBCU (Yale Daily News)

    September 12, 2023

    Yale’s Beinecke Library hosted an event reflecting on the unsuccessful effort to establish the United States’ first Historically Black College/University in New Haven. The event, which was called “New Haven 1831: What Was and What Could Have Been,” was held on the 192nd anniversary of the very town meeting in 1831 where the proposal for the college was struck down in a 700-4 vote.