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433 Total pages
0 Contributing members
Bohumil Shimek Papers, 1882-1936
Project Summary not available.
100% Complete
101 Total pages
105 Contributing members
Book no. 1, H.A. Allard, field collection specimen no. 1-1710
The first volume of a list of Allard's collected specimens includes numbers 1-1710 collected in the course of his work in Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia from 1930-1936. The specimen entries are dated and include locality, scientific name, and notes regarding growing conditions. A newspaper clipping was found in the book dated Sunday, September 29, 1946 from The Sunday Star, Washington, D.C. entitled "Harry A. Allard, 66, to retire; co-discovered botanical law". Help us to transcribe Allard's specimen collecting notes and make them more accessible to researchers and scholars.
100% Complete
103 Total pages
102 Contributing members
Book no. 2, H.A. Allard, field collection specimen no. 1711-3420
This second volume of H. A. Allard's field book list of collected specimens includes numbers 1711-3420 collected in the course of his work in Virginia, and West Virginia from 1936-1937. His dated specimen entries include locality, scientific name, and notes regarding growing conditions. Many of the specimens were collected in the Bull Run Mountains, an area in Virginia's northern piedmont which is home to several forest and woodland community types, some of them rare botanical communities. Help us to transcribe Allard's specimen collecting notes and make them more accessible to researchers and scholars.
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5 Total pages
5 Contributing members
Booklet with biography, poems, and correspondence of Phillis Wheatley
Phillis Wheatley Peters (c. 1753 – 1784) was born in West Africa and captured by slave traders as a child, whereupon she was sold to John and Susanna Wheatley of Boston, Massachusetts. She was named after the slave ship on which she was transported to the Americas and the name of her enslavers, but her surname of Peters is that of the man she married in 1778—John Peters, a free man of color. The story of the discovery of her talent by the Wheatley family is oft told—they taught her to read and write, and by age fourteen, she had begun to write poetry that was soon published and circulated amongst the elites of late eighteenth century America and Great Britain. Her first and only volume of poetry, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773), was published in London with the assistance of wealthy abolitionists. Peters’ poetry brought her renown in abolitionist circles as proof of the humanity of those of African descent and the inhumanity of the institution of slavery. The Wheatleys manumitted Peters in 1773 under pressure from critics who saw the hypocrisy in praising Peters’ talent while keeping her enslaved. They died within a few years of this decision, and Peters soon met and married grocer John Peters. Her life afterwards was indicative of the troubled freedom of African Americans of the period, who were emancipated but not fully integrated into the promise of American citizenship. Peters was also affected by the loss of all three of her children—the birth of the last of whom caused her premature death at age 31 In 1784. Despite being feted as a prodigy while enslaved, the emancipated Peters struggled to find the support necessary for producing a second volume of poetry and her husband’s financial struggles forced her to find work as a scullery maid—the lowest position of domestic help. Posthumous publications of Peters’ poetry in various anthologies and periodicals solidified her image as a child poet for the benefit of abolitionist activism and African American cultural pride in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the twenty-first century, the accumulation of this collection is a restoration of Peters the woman and the influence of her poetry and activism today.
Browse projects by National Museum of African American History and Culture
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3 Total pages
21 Contributing members
Boston Evening-Post Numb. 1982
Phillis Wheatley Peters (c. 1753 – 1784) was born in West Africa and captured by slave traders as a child, whereupon she was sold to John and Susanna Wheatley of Boston, Massachusetts. She was named after the slave ship on which she was transported to the Americas and the name of her enslavers, but her surname of Peters is that of the man she married in 1778—John Peters, a free man of color. The story of the discovery of her talent by the Wheatley family is oft told—they taught her to read and write, and by age fourteen, she had begun to write poetry that was soon published and circulated amongst the elites of late eighteenth-century America and Great Britain. In June 1773, Wheatley Peters joined her enslaver John Wheatley for a trip to London to help with her chronic asthma and to meet a series of British and American dignitaries in celebration of the upcoming publication of her first and only volume of poetry, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, to be published later that year. This newspaper documents her return to Boston in September 1773. Also in this issue is a notice for another young enslaved woman, 22-year-old Nancy, who had escaped from her enslaver. The notice gives a physical description of Nancy and her dress, promises a reward for her return, and reminds readers of the fugitive slave laws that forbid aiding Nancy in her self-emancipation. Under pressure from critics who saw the hypocrisy in praising Peters’ talent while keeping her enslaved, The Wheatleys manumitted Peters soon after her return to Boston and the publication of Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral.
Browse projects by National Museum of African American History and Culture
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1 Total pages
4 Contributing members
Bottle tag from the Cotton Club
The Cotton Club was Harlem’s premier nightclub in the 1920s and 1930s during the Prohibition Era. The club featured many of the greatest African American entertainers of the era, including Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Nat King Cole, Billie Holiday, and Ethel Waters. However, while the performers were black, the club only permitted white audiences. Nonetheless, the Cotton Club launched the careers of many African American performers including Fletcher Henderson, who led the first house band in 1923, and Duke Ellington, whose orchestra was the house band from 1927 to 1931. Cab Calloway's orchestra took over for Ellington’s group in 1931 and Jimmie Lunceford’s band followed in 1934. Lena Horne began her career as a chorus girl at the Cotton Club and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson and Sammy Davis Jr. performed as tap dancers. Help us transcribe this bottle tag, which highlights the role of night clubs during the Prohibition Era.
Browse projects by National Museum of African American History and Culture
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500 Total pages
32 Contributing members
Brittlewoods and others - complete
Please contact Sylvia Orli, Department of Botany, or tweet us at @sylviaorli @TranscribeSI for any questions or comments about the transcriptions.
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63 Total pages
20 Contributing members
Britton Diary, 1918 June-Sept
Help us make James Britton’s handwritten diaries more accessible to readers and researchers. James Britton (1878–1936) was a portrait painter, art critic, and editor. His papers include 49 diaries dating from 1918-1935, plus notebooks of diary excerpts, that chronicle Britton's daily activities and include lists, illustrations, and drafts of correspondence.
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67 Total pages
52 Contributing members
Britton Diary, 1918 Sept-Dec
Help us make James Britton's handwritten diaries more accessible to readers and researchers. James Britton (1878-1936) was a portrait painter, art critic, and editor. His papers include 49 diaries dating from 1918-1935, plus notebooks of diary excerpts, that chronicle Britton's daily activities and include lists, illustrations, and drafts of correspondence.
100% Complete
42 Total pages
28 Contributing members
Britton Diary, 1919 Apr-June
Help us make James Britton's handwritten diaries more accessible to readers and researchers. James Britton (1878-1936) was a portrait painter, art critic, and editor. His papers include 49 diaries dating from 1918-1935, plus notebooks of diary excerpts, that chronicle Britton's daily activities and include lists, illustrations, and drafts of correspondence.
100% Complete
50 Total pages
40 Contributing members
Britton Diary, 1919 Aug-Dec
Help us make James Britton's handwritten diaries more accessible to readers and researchers. James Britton (1878-1936) was a portrait painter, art critic, and editor. His papers include 49 diaries dating from 1918-1935, plus notebooks of diary excerpts, that chronicle Britton's daily activities and include lists, illustrations, and drafts of correspondence.
100% Complete
33 Total pages
44 Contributing members
Britton Diary, 1919 Feb-July
Help us make James Britton?s handwritten diaries more accessible to readers and researchers. James Britton (1878?1936) was a portrait painter, art critic, and editor. His papers include 49 diaries dating from 1918-1935, plus notebooks of diary excerpts, that chronicle Britton's daily activities and include lists, illustrations, and drafts of correspondence.
