Campus Beautification Day

AU will be celebrating its 22nd Campus Beautification Day on April 14th. This university tradition incorporates campus beautification and sustainability goals. Activities include planting, mulching, and installing rain barrels. In 2014, over 4,000 plants were planted on campus and students and staff volunteers participated in a community service project to remove bamboo debris from the Battery-Kemble Trail in Rock Creek Park.

Campus Beautification Day has deep roots at AU. Starting in 1933, AU students and faculty participated in campus cleanup projects in honor of Arbor Day. Classes were cancelled for the day. The morning was spent on a set of designated projects which ended with a picnic lunch. Afternoon activities included softball games and dancing. In addition to landscaping work, students and faculty built rock gardens and wooden bridges and installed benches and railings across campus. By the 1940s, students adopted the name “Campus Day” as the event was no longer always held on Arbor Day. When cleanup activities were held in conjunction with May Day festivities, the winner of the onion pulling contest was named court jester to the court of the spring queen. Campus Day continued through 1957.

Arbor Day 1930s

Campus Day 1995

April Fools Issues in The Eagle

Between 1964 and 2013, The Eagle featured an April Fools’ issue in each year with the following exceptions: 1970, 1982-1984, 1987, 1989-1992, and 2010. The names of the issues varied from year to year but The Ego, The Beagle, and The Bagel were each used at least twice. Because of the production schedule of The Eagle, the April Fools’ issues were not always released on April 1, with publication dates ranging from March 27 to April 20. Editors played with issue dates as well. For example in 1974, the issue was dated April 1, 1984 while in 1986 the issue was dated March 32, 1986.

The Aprils Fools issues poked fun at campus, local, and national affairs. Some issues had both April Fools and regular content. Here are a few sample headlines: “Dread plague sweeps campus;” “Gone!! Artemas Ward stolen; campus in turmoil;” and “Dewey Defeats Truman.”

1974 April Fools Issue

AU students have produced a number of humor publications over the years. The original humor magazine was called The Beak. The Archives has a copy of its first and possibly only issue. Its successor, The Bald Eagle, began in 1959 and ran until 1965. The Archives has the complete run.

Primary Source Instruction at AU Archives

American University Archives and Special Collections welcomes class visits. We can provide an orientation to our holdings, design individual or group activities using primary sources, or help with research projects. The University Archivist will work with individual faculty members to develop assignments tailored for their classes.

This image is from a recent visit by Professor Dan Whitman’s AU Scholars Research Lab to AU Archives. The students got an introduction to our holdings as well as a peak at a couple of our treasures, including a letter from George Washington dated 16 March 1795 concerning the need for a national University and a book featuring the first printed mathematical multiplication table from 1488.

Students reading George Washington letter

If you are new to using primary sources, you should check out our new Primary Source Research Tutorial http://subjectguides.library.american.edu/primaryresearchtutorial which walks you through two different approaches to locating primary sources as well as provides links to databases and web sites.

Give us a call at (202) 885-3256 or email us at archives@american.edu for more information on instructional sessions.

Celebrating Women’s History at American University

For over fifty years, the AU Women’s Club hosted events ranging from welcome teas for foreign students to fundraisers. Founded in 1930 as the Faculty Woman’s Club, it offered an annual award to a woman student who made an outstanding contribution to life of university. The student’s name was engraved on friendship tray.

Faculty Women’s Club Friendship Tray

The AU Women’s Club membership included faculty and staff and wives of faculty and staff. Starting in 1972, they began awarding a scholarship for a woman student. By the 1980s, they were offering two awards for juniors to use in their senior year.

To learn more about women on campus, visit our exhibit, All About Women: 90 Years of AU History 1893-1983, on display on the first floor of the library.

Founders Day

Founders Day is one of American University’s most enduring traditions. It was first celebrated on February 21, 1931 with a banquet and pageant sponsored by the Women’s Guild of the University. There were over 200 guests and $5,000 was raised for the Guild’s scholarship fund. For AU’s golden jubilee in 1943, AU Professor Merritt Claire Batchelder wrote The Founders: An Historical Pageant which was performed on Founders Day. Over the years, the event has grown to a week-long series of activities including dinners, convocations, and musical and sporting events. AU’s eighth President, Hurst Anderson, was inaugurated on Founders Day in 1953 and major celebrations were held as part of AU’s 75^th anniversary (1968) and Centennial (1993).

AU President Hurst Anderson and actor portraying AU Founder, Bishop John F. Hurst, passing by Hurst Hall during 75th anniversary celebrations (1968)

AU students painted the fence around the construction site for the Ward Circle Building as part of the 75th anniversary celebrations.

The Founders Day Ball which is organized by the Student Government in conjunction with the Residence Hall Association and the Graduate Leadership Council is one of the signature events of modern Founders Day. This year’s ball will be held on February 21^st at the National Air and Space Museum which continues the recent trend of holding the ball in prominent city locations.

Fun Facts for Black History Month

American University fielded its first integrated basketball team in the 1956-57 season and went on to become the NCAA Eastern Champs in 1958 despite challenging playing conditions. Coach Dave Carrasco recruited several local players including Willie Jones and Dickie Wells who excelled both on and off the court to make their coach’s dream to develop a racially integrated basketball program at American University a reality.

Men’s Basketball team 1957-58

Did you know that before Bender Arena opened in 1988, AU played its home games in various locations including the Fort Myer, VA gymnasium?

Fort Myer

Currently on Display: All About Women: 90 Years of AU History 1893-1983

From its beginnings in the 1890s, inclusiveness and diversity have been hallmarks of American University. American University has always been coeducational. In 1949, AU merged with the Washington College of Law which was founded by two women with the express purpose of offering law courses for women. A new exhibit on the first floor of Bender Library uses brochures, newsletters, photographs, and programs to illustrate the activities of and numerous contributions to campus women have made over its first ninety years. The exhibit will be on display through the end of the spring semester.

Currently on Display: Selections from the Dorothy A. and Charles A. Moore Jr. Japanese Woodblock Print Collection

To celebrate one of its newest acquisitions, AU Special Collections will feature the Dorothy A. and Charles A. Moore Jr. Japanese Woodblock Print Collection in its third floor display cases. A selection of Ukiyoe and modern Japanese prints by a variety of artists including Chikanobu, Konubu Hasegawa, Tomikichiro Tokuriki, and Utamaro will be on exhibit through the end of the spring semester.

Patrick Frazier Political and Social Movements Collection

In addition to his day job as Reference Specialist at the Library of Congress, Patrick Frazier worked as a freelance writer and photographer. He assembled an impressive collection of broadsides, flyers, handbills, photographs and posters. The collection covers all of the major political and social movements of the 1960s, 1970s, and early 1980s including civil rights, gay and lesbian rights and feminism as well the anti-nuclear and the Vietnam War protests. The focus of the collection is the Washington, DC area.

Dorothy A. and Charles A. Moore Jr. Japanese Woodblock Print Collection

Dorothy A. Moore earned her MA (1959) and EDD (1970) from American University and is a generous donor to campus. Along with her husband, Charles, she built a diverse collection of Japanese woodblock prints.

In the spring of 2014, she donated forty-eight Ukiyoe and Shin-hanga prints by a variety of artists including Chikanobu, Konubu Hasegawa, Hiroshige, Kaoru Kawano, Kunichika, Kuniyoshi, Tomikichiro Tokuriki, Toyokuni, Utamaro, and Yoshitoshi. The subjects are as diverse featuring bathing scenes, Kabuki performances, landscapes, the Meiji government, and samurai. An exhibit of works from this collection is planned for the spring semester.