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Anecdotes brighten tour of Rosebach rare book Museum and Library

Rosenbach floor by floor

Docent Charlie Karl gives a floor-by-floor history tour of the Rosenbach Museum and Library in downtown Philadelphia. Known for its collection of important manuscripts first additions, illustrated copies of literary works and artifacts the Rosenbach houses the personal collection of the rare book dealer Dr. A.S.W, Rosenbach. With his brother, Philip, he had a 50 year run as a dealer in books and manuscripts. "Renowned dealers in books, manuscripts, and fine art, the brothers played a central role in the development of private libraries that later became our nation’s most important public collections of rare books, such as the Folger and Huntington Libraries."  (from the Museum's website). Karl sprinkles narrative with anecdotes. For an exhibition to celebrate Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, first published as “The Whale,” lamps were lit with whale oil. At the very top of the multi-floor staircase, we encounter a miniature model version of the Rosenbach’s New York office. So much attention is paid to detail that six tiny books in the model are actually miniaturized books. Watch video tour here.

MORE PHOTOS HERE

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Kemble for closeup

A portrait of the renowned actress Fanny Kemble painted by James Sully in 1833 is the departure point for docent Charlie Karl’s fact-filled and wry tour of the Rosenbach Museum and Library. Karl relates that Kemble, who came from a renowned British theatrical family traveled to the U.S. with her father in 1832 to do dramatic Shakespeare readings along the East Coast. During a stay in Philadelphia she met Pierce Butler and in 1834 they married. Britain had abolished slavery in 1833. The fact that her husband owned 700 slaves on a Georgia plantation and made trips there without the family was such a source of discomfort to Kemble that she insisted on going with her husband and children to visit. There she journaled and tried to improve the lot of the women slaves. The experience became the basis for her book “Journal of a residence on a Georgia plantation” not published until Kemble had divorced, returned to England and the civil war had ended. In her later years, Kemble, who saw herself more as an artist and writer, resumed dramatic readings, crisscrossing the ocean. Watch video of portrait and short life story of actress writer Fanny Kemble here.

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Rosenbach joyce
In a room of the Rosenbach Museum and Library dedicated to the literature of Scotland, Wales, England, and Ireland the James Joyce manuscript of Ulysses sits in several boxes behind a glass covered bookcase. Guide Charlie Karl recites a ditty Joyce had written exhibiting his distain for Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach, as a collector.

“Rosy Brook he bought a book
Though he didn’t know how to spell it
Such is the lure of literature
To the lad who can buy and sell it”
(According to the Rosenbach blog, a telegraph operator had apparently misspelled the title in a message)

Karl relates the backstory: At a manuscript auction, Rosenbach had purchased acclaimed Joseph Conrad manuscripts for a hefty sum but was able to acquire Joyce’s Ulysses manuscript from a collector, to whom Joyce had sold it, at a relative bargain. Subsequently, Joyce wanted the manuscript back but Rosenbach declined. Karl posits that Joyce didn’t really sufficiently appreciate Rosenbach as a bibliophile, who held literary works in such esteem that he mentored a generation of private collectors and enthusiasts dedicated to the preservation of these works. Watch video here.


Kushner envies Zuckerberg's Facebook Data - painted

Jared kushner envies data of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg painting
 
"These are some of the folks that have been haunting my dreams. These are the folks that I've been thinking about, watching on TV...and so much of the imagery... I feel a need to process it in some kind of way that helps me cathartically to just deal with everything that's going on. It's also a way of exercising my free speech. This painting is called "Data Envy." This is Jared Kushner [senior advisor to his father-in-law, President Trump] looking curiously or longingly at Mark Zuckerberg , Facebook founder. He's interested in data, how to use that data machine that is Facebook to potentially win over the whole country. There's moments that I can picture in my mind that results in what we are living through now." Germantown painter Colleen Quinn's other dark portraits depict former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Quinn was exhibiting at the Chestnut Hill Fall for the Arts Festival. Watch video of artist describing her painting of presidential advisor Jared Kushner longing for Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his data.

Making tiny wearable books -earrings and necklaces

Wearable tiny book earrings
Bookish but fashionable types may be seen wearing miniature book earrings or necklaces. At a workshop at the Free Library Northeast Regional Branch presented by Valeria Kremser, whose weekday day job is conserving rare books, participants like your correspondent and his wife learned how to create these miniature books approximately one inch square. They are true books with stitch sewn folios, endpapers, hard board covers and hinged spines. One of Kremser's most prized miniature books in her collection is from the Gutenberg Museum containing the Lord's prayer in seven languages. It measures about 1/8" square, is hand bound in leather with gold plating and Kremser notes, "comes in one of those little plexi boxes with a magnifying glass on top that swivels open." Watch how to make tiny wearable books - earrings and necklaces - here"

Violet Oakley musuem exhibit totally impresses her

Art teacher extols painter Oakley at Woodmere Museum
“She was a fabulous draftsman, designer composer - her compositions - the values the colors...!” Retired artist and teacher Aurora Gold expressed feeling overwhelmed (in a good way) by Oakley’s artwork while touring through an exhibit at the Woodmere Art Museum of high resolution photos of the murals Oakley created for the Pennsylvania State Capitol. Upon discovering Oakley’s American Renaissance style paintings when she was younger , Gold immediately fell in love with them and questions why in art school, she wasn’t introduced to Oakley along with the great masters. Gold has been visiting the Woodmere for more than 65 years and began bringing her art students from the Stephens Country Day School in Chestnut Hill to the Woodmere back in 1952. Upon overhearing Gold wax poetic about the work on display conversing with a companion, your correspondent shortly afterward coaxed Gold to be recorded describing her fascination with the artist and how impressed she was with Woodmere's exhibit. Watch video interview of artist teacher extol American Renaissance painter Violet Oakley.

Violet Oakley's Grand Vision Woodmere Art Museum

Physical theater confronts violent rhetoric

Sarah physical theater

​Sarah Mitteldorf's physical theater ensemble, Kaleid ("As in Kaleidoscope. As in Collide") had a work in progress last fall and then, as she tells it, "November 8th happened" and they had to scrap the piece. In response to the nasty and violent rhetoric directed against women, people of color, and the LGBT community that led up to President Trump's election and in response to what Mitteldorf calls a developing "national narrative" of disconnect and exclusion, they are using the tools available to them as creative artists. In her director role, Mitteldorf asks her actors to express the emotions that the current social climate triggers, such as disbelief and anger, through layered text and movement. Kaleid Theater will perform "Scape-ing" at the First United Church of Germantown on April 27, 28 and 29. Watch video interview here.


Mail Carrier wears tank top to beat heat

Mail carrier beats heat in tank top

Kalam Shaheen a new United States Postal Service mail carrier hasn't yet received an official uniform allowance so when a guy came around the Post Office [in the hot weather] offering workers tank tops emblazoned with the Postal Service logo, she bought one out of pocket. Now she believes she is starting a style trend among "the girls."  Your correspondent recalled seeing her making deliveries Sunday, the day before. Shaheen says that substitutes are required to work Sundays, delivering Amazon packages. She knows she has a lot of hard work ahead of her the next couple years but as someone who hasn't attended college. she is hoping to turn this job into a career as it offers benefits and a pension. Watch video here.


Knitting in public, celebrated worldwide

About 20 women and your correspondent gathered in the park outside Lovett memorial library in Mount Airy on Saturday June 13, 2015 to celebrate World Knit in Public day. According to co-organizer Eleanor Pabarue of Ladies of the Knit and the Hooker Auxiliary, ours was one of 867 similar events that day worldwide. Many of the women knit for relaxation and oh what beautiful useful handmade clothing and accessories that relaxation was producing. With the steady patience of Teresa Glover, your correspondent managed to knit  a few not totally straight rows on his own and was rewarded with yarn and a pair o needles to practice his technique at home. The consensus was that he was not quite ready to learn to purl.

Pretty Uber driver knows where to hit you

Pretty 21 year old drives for Uber

Nine hundred dollars is how much Kabria Johnson’s friend told Johnson she made in one day driving for the ride-sharing service Uber. Out on just her third day on the job, the pretty, twenty-one year old “Uber X “driver says she is not afraid for her safety. She knows where to hit you. And since Uber tracks the time and distance through GPS and charges the customer’s credit card, drivers don’t need to carry cash.

Johnson holds down a job in customer service with U.S. Airways and is in the process of being approved, also, by the competing ride service, Lyft. She is saving up to pay off a loan on her other car, get an apartment and buy furniture. And she’s planning a big cookout for herself and five younger siblings this coming Mother’s day which, sadly, will be their first without their Mom who died last October.

It was a smooth ride in Johnson’s newly acquired 2006 Toyota Prius with over 200,000 miles on it, but seeming in good condition, that she uses exclusively when driving for Uber. She was unfazed when another driver rolled down his window at a stop to point out that one of our tires appeared to be flat. We pulled over into a gas station briefly to get some air. Johnson says she has Triple A service and family all over the city to come to her aid if need be. As for me, her rider, Johnson smiles, if she hadn’t been able to get me to my destination, another Uber driver would likely have been summoned to scoop me up for the final leg of my journey within a matter of minutes.

Watch video interview here.


Orphan Train - Objects, Memories, Improv

Langston Darby held an icepack to his jaw before his program on “Found Objects: Unleash the Voice of the Everyday through Performance“ at the Chestnut Hill Branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia. But the icepack was to ease the pain of an earlier dentist appointment and not part of his program, one of many events in the Library’s One Book One -Philadelphia celebration. This year’s selection, The Orphan Train, by Christina Baker Kline is about the relationship of an older woman, Vivian and a young woman, Molly. Molly is a Penobscot Indian who has lived in various foster homes and gotten into trouble. Molly is assigned community service to help Vivian sort through the many keepsakes Vivian has stored in her attic. These objects evoke memories of the older woman’s own traumatic childhood experiences after she was sent on an “orphan train” from New York City to the Midwest during the Great Depression subsequent to the death of her Irish immigrant parents and siblings in a tenement fire.

 

Darby led our small assemblage through improvisation centering on objects- like a certain knife from our own memories and then had us feel for and pick the thing out of a “magic bag”, instructing us to let the object choose us. A sparkly dark orange artificial pumpkin chose one of us, a large black plastic knight/horse from a chess set, another. A small book chose your correspondent. Recommended reading: The Orphan Train.

Watch video here.


Bhutan refugees renew farming in Philly

Bhutanese women farmers in Philly

At the age of six, Bishnu Kamar (left) fled her native Bhutan where, she says, the government was trying to kill its own people. She lived the next twenty-two years in a bamboo house in a refugee camp in Nepal, to where many ethnic Nepalis fled, under harsh, cramped conditions. She and her companions, Dropada Kafley (middle) and Mon Maya Bastola (right), now live with their families in South Philadelphia. With the help of an American friend they started a community farm and now tend nearly 100 beds. In Nepal, they had farmed rice, corn and “all kinds of vegetables.”

On Thursdays the threesome takes the bus up to the Weavers Way Henry-Got-Crops Farm in Roxborough to better learn American farming techniques.

In addition to farming, Kamar takes care of her mother-in-law, works in a pre-school and, after an intensive 6-month study of English, also works as a Nepali language interpreter in a hospital. 

HOW IS IT GOING FOR YOU NOW IN SOUTH PHILADELPHIA?

“It’s awesome. Because we spend our life -is a very good way. We are good now. And I think my future can be good. I can try hard…”

Watch video here.