This exhibition celebrates the 50th anniversary of William S. Burroughs's novel Naked Lunch and Columbia University's extensive holdings of rare books and original manuscripts related to the novel's creation, composition, and editing. The exhibition includes Burroughs's original manuscript of Naked Lunch, and correspondence from Lucien Carr, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac.

About the Exhibit

     More than 150 scrapbooks comprise the core of the Alexander Gumby Collection of Negroiana, part of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Columbia University. Together, these volumes contain a diverse array of manuscripts, photographs, pamphlets, artwork, clippings, and ephemera primarily related to African-American history from the nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. At the time of its creation from about 1900 to 1950, the collection's curator, L.S. Alexander Gumby, explained that this "History of the Negro in Scrapbook . . . could well be called 'The Unwritten History'" of the United States, due to the lack of general scholarly attention paid to African Americans by contemporary historians.

     This exhibition introduces visitors to the remarkable Gumby and situates his life and project in the context of the Harlem Renaissance--his acquaintances included luminaries such as Richard Bruce Nugent, Countee Cullen, and Langston Hughes--and in relation to other contemporary pioneers of African-American history such as Arthur Schomburg and Carter G. Woodson. Showcasing pages from nearly fifty of Gumby's scrapbooks, it highlights both the rare and the seemingly mundane items that Gumby argued could combine to document an otherwise forgotten history of the United States and its African American contributors.

Exhibit Structure

     "The Unwritten History" seeks to provide insight into both the intellectual nature and context of Gumby's project as well as its content and execution. It is therefore structured in a manner that emphasizes the curatorial authority that Alexander Gumby exercised in both his selection of subject matter and his use of the scrapbook form. Beginning with an introductory section ("The Great God Gumby") that provides background information about Gumby and the origin of his scrapbook project, the exhibit proceeds to Gumby's Peers, a section which describes contemporary efforts similar to Gumby's and that in part inspired his own.

     Following are five sections that provide a broad overview of the types of items that Gumby spent his life collecting. Gumby's Past presents his interest in identifying and preserving items--particularly those related to the African diaspora--from or about a history that he worried might otherwise be lost. Though contemporary to Gumby's own life, the items in Gumby's People and Gumby's Institutions similarly represent the types of noteworthy individuals and organizations of the first half of the twentieth century whose careers Gumby avidly followed and which he felt needed to be documented so that future generations would be able to write their histories. In contrast to these people-focused sections, Gumby's Events includes pages related to specific occurrences that Gumby felt deserved documentation, while the pages in Gumby's Culture showcase his attempt to capture in a condensed form some long-developing themes of popular discourse.

A Note on the Images

     Each image that appears in this exhibit is a reproduction of a full page from one of Alexander Gumby's scrapbooks. Wherever possible, each image appears with a caption that lists the page number and title of the scrapbook from which it has been reproduced. Larger views and additional bibliographic information can be accessed by clicking on most images in the exhibit.

The occupation of five buildings in April 1968 marked a sea change in the relationships among Columbia University administration, its faculty, its student body, and its neighbors. Featuring documents, photographs, and audio from the University Archives, 1968: Columbia in Crisis examines the the causes, actions, and aftermath of a protest that captivated the campus, the nation, and the world.

This online exhibition is based upon a physical exhibition of the same name which was on display in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library from March 17 to August 1, 2008.

Unless otherwise noted, all images and documents are from collections found in the Columbia University Archives.

“A Church Is Born” depicts the 1947 inauguration of the unified Church of South India.

This film and commentary, originally produced by the India Committee of the Foreign Missions Conference of North America, provides a brief overview of the history of Christian Missions to India, explains the appeal for unity amongst Protestant denominations in India, and shows the inauguration of the Church of South India.

The collection is housed at the Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary, Columbia University Libraries.

Arthur Mitchell: Harlem’s Ballet Trailblazer celebrates the extraordinary career and legacy of the New York City Ballet’s first African-American star and the founder and longtime director of the Dance Theatre of Harlem.  Born in Harlem, Mitchell studied at the High School of Performing Arts, danced on Broadway and with several modern dance groups.  He discovered ballet at the Katherine Dunham School, worked tirelessly with Karel Shook, a brilliant teacher who became his mentor and later co-director of DTH, and in 1955 was invited by NYCB’s artistic director George Balanchine to join the internationally acclaimed company.  Poet Marianne Moore called him a “slim dragon-fly too rapid for the eye to cage,” and this mobility, coupled with his winning stage personality, made him an audience favorite.  Balanchine created several great roles for him, including the pas de deux in Agon (1957) and Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1962).

Although Mitchell attended integrated schools, he encountered racism throughout the dance world of the 1950s and 1960s.  On Broadway he danced in all-black musicals, in ballet with all-white companies.  On network television he could not partner a white ballerina, even if he did so routinely on stage.  Only modern dance in the early 1950s was integrated, and Mitchell forged a happy partnership with Mary Hinkson, a black Martha Graham dancer who performed with him on television and abroad.

In 1968, galvanized by the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he began teaching at Harlem School of the Arts and, with Karel Shook, formed what became the Dance Theatre of Harlem.  Like The Studio Museum and Negro Ensemble Company, DTH was forged in the crucible of the Civil Rights and Black Arts Movements.  “Whenever I danced,” Mitchell once said, “I danced for my mom and my people.”  DTH was a company of dancers on a mission, intent on proving that African Americans could dance classical ballet.  Harlem was their home, but they also belonged to New York City and to the world.  Above all, they were a community that believed that making art was also an act of justice.  Performing Giselle set in antebellum Louisiana, Firebird in a mythical African rainforest, or Dougla among the mixed African and Indian population of Trinidad, DTH danced its own vision of the African diaspora.

Arthur Mitchell: Harlem’s Ballet Trailblazer pays tribute to a lifetime of creative achievement, while also celebrating the artists – white as well as black – who helped bring to life Mitchell’s vision of a more just world through dance.

This website, created in tandem with the exhibition Arthur Mitchell: Harlem’s Ballet Trailblazer, on display at the Wallach Art Gallery from January 12 to March 11, 2018, highlights material from the Arthur Mitchell Collection, Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University.  It also includes commissioned essays, timelines, links to publicly available sources, and other resources in addition to material from the physical exhibition.  Please share this website with friends, students, and colleagues, using it to explore the rich histories behind Arthur Mitchell’s career and the Dance Theatre of Harlem, which celebrates its fiftieth anniversary in 2019, and encourage new scholarship about African Americans and ballet.

Exhibition Curator

Lynn Garafola

Image credit: Michael D. Harris, Aspirations + Inspiration (detail), 1985, limited edition print 7/30, Arthur Mitchell Collection, Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

Architectural Novelties at the Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library

Avery Classics is one of the largest collections of rare architectural books in the world. Among its thousands of volumes are the first printed book on architecture–Leon Battista Alberti's De re aedificatoria of 1485–and over one hundred editions of Vitruvius, who wrote the lone surviving classical text on the subject. In addition to printed books, the collection also includes manuscripts, photographs, and broadsides that reflect the library's scope.

However, certain items in Avery Classics have distinctive forms that fall outside all these categories. Such items, which we will call Architectural Novelties, are best explained in images. This exhibition highlights a selection of items from the Avery Classics collection that are both comprehensive and eccentric in their treatment of architecture.

In celebration of the 75th anniversary of the building of Butler Library, an exhibit of more than 100 photographs decorate the bulletin board display on the third floor of Butler Library. The photographs span the decades and showcase the excavation and rise of South Hall (as it was originally named), design details throughout the building, reading rooms, services such as research assistance and student activities -- which include sleeping as well as studying!

Special Feature: Your Stories

As part of our 75th anniversary celebration, we are gathering and sharing stories from alumni and students like you about discovery, personal reward, and fun. If you have a story or just a thought to share, we would love to read it.

In 1892, Charles A. Platt traveled to Italy with his brother, William, to view Italian Renaissance villas and gardens.  Many of the photographs he took were used to illustrate his Italian Gardens (Harper & Brothers, 1894). Additional images were included in the 1993 reissue of Italian Gardens, with an overview by Keith Morgan (Sagapress/Timber Press). The remainder of these images remained unpublished.

The images displayed in this exhibition have been photographed from the original 8" x 10" glass plate negatives held in the Charles A. Platt Architectural Records and Papers Collection, Drawings & Archives Collection, Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library.

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This 1964 issue of Human Events featured an article by Barry Goldwater attacking Group Research.

About the Exhibit

      The Group Research, Inc. Records, housed in the Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Columbia University, comprise a rich resource documenting the organizations, people, and campaigns of conservative activists in the United States from the early-1960s to the mid-1990s. Drawn from that collection, the items in this exhibit highlight the important role that illustrators, cartoonists and designers played in the dissemination of conservative points of view during this formative period for modern US conservative ideology.

      Whether concerned with the strength of the federal government, the power of communists, the public and personal roles of religion, the freedom of private enterprise, the validity of taxation or the social effects of civil rights legislation, each artist whose work is displayed here illustrated his or her particular issue of concern in a way that both advocated a political position on the subject and implied that any alternative stance was un-American. Though not every issue displayed here was shared by every artist or organization represented, all of the items demonstrate such a propensity to divide the righteous from the pernicious. Collectively, these works demonstrate the central role that the ideology of being “with us or against us” played in US conservative activism long before George W. Bush used the concept as a defining feature of his “War on Terror.”

Exhibit Structure

      The form of the exhibit highlights this theme of division. Two brief essays in the Introduction section describe the ideological motivations of both conservative artists and the organization, Group Research, Inc. that collected their work. Picturing Partners showcases images of sympathetic people that conservative artists felt were either in need of protection by or further support from conservative campaigns and activists. Envisioning Enemies reveals the darker half of America that these activists feared: the individuals, groups and organizations that threaten true patriots. The final section, Portraying Patriotism, demonstrates how conservative activists manipulated politically neutral images such as the US flag or the Statue of Liberty to make partisan arguments about US values and the future of the country.

This digital exhibit features images from a small collection of photographs documenting the construction of Union Theological Seminary located in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of New York City. The third location for the Seminary, the buildings were constructed from 1908-1910.

The collection is housed at the Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary, Columbia University in the City of New York.