#thewritinghandknows

[librarycompany]

“this was my mother’s little book”

For #TheWritingHandKnows challenge, we are sharing this little book that was used as a notebook in the 19th century. The notebook contains entries dated from 1866 to 1884, many of which list the death date and relationship of deceased relatives. The inscription featured in this post reads “this was my mother’s little book” alongside a drawing with another inscription stating “my mother drew this picture”. Is it possible these inscriptions were added to the notebook after the original owner, the inscriber’s mother, passed away? Only #TheWritingHandKnows

[biodivlibrary]

National Handwriting Day!

It's #NationalHandwritingDay! Here is a lovely inscription inside a book from Thornton Burgess. 

Because I love the birds, I want you to. Will you? Perhaps this book will help you to become better acquainted with them. 

Your very sincere friend, 

Thornton W. Burgess. 

Springfield, December, 1919. 

I am not sure of the provenance of this book, so sadly I can't say to whom the inscription was given. Burgess certainly had lovely handwriting! 

The Burgess Bird Book for Children, by Thornton W. Burgess, with illustrations in color by Louis Agassiz Fuertes (1919). Contributed for digitization by University of California Libraries via Internet Archive.

[mysteriousplanchette]

For Wednesdays in September, @americanantiquarian, @sfplbookarts, and @transportationlibrary have proposed a great social media collaboration: #thewritinghandknows! The challenge is to post objects that exemplify the art and practice of writing. Today's post features an *actual* hand--a spirit rapping hand! Hands are an important symbol of the mediumistic art, as they guide the indicator to write or spell messages via #planchette or #talkingboard, or animate unconsciously to produce #automaticwriting. Magic companies like #Thayer recognized this, and produced this #rappinghand as a device for stage #séance and #spookshow performers to emulate the hand's importance in receiving communications from the dead. And while this hand raps, rather than writes, it is able to nonetheless provide messages from beyond for a bewildered audience. The #hand is paired with an actual specimen of automatic writing produced by the hand of nightclub innovator Don Dickerman in the 1940s, and holds a turn of the century planchette #pencil--a Derwentwater by the Cumberland Pencil Co. of Keswick, UK. Stay tuned next Wednesday for another remarkable writing device in September's #thewritinghandknows challenge!

[ahcwyo-blog]

The AHC celebrates #startrek50 with a look into some of our collection items dating back to the original series. Featured among these publicity shots of Lt. Uhura and Captain Kirk is Gerald Fried's original score of the Vulcan Fight Music. Check the link in bio for a blog post by our Digital Programs director Tyler Cline detailing more about Star Trek in the AHC archives! #thewritinghandknows #alwaysarchiving #archivesofinstagram #startrek #boldlygo (at American Heritage Center)

[ahcwyo-blog]

We are joining in #thewritinghandknows challenge devised by @americanantiquarian @sfplbookarts and @transportationlibrary! Starting off with a unique #autograph book known as The Ghosts of My Friends. Loved ones were invited to sign their names in #ink then the pages were folded in half to create an apparition of blots and puddles. This signature by 23rd #Wyoming governor Milward Simpson was a bit embellished, but the spookiest of the bunch! The date is October 23rd, 1971. #archives #archivesofinstagram #alwaysarchiving (at American Heritage Center)

[mysteriousplanchette]

For Wednesdays in September, @americanantiquarian, @sfplbookarts, and @transportationlibrary have proposed a great social media collaboration: #thewritinghandknows! The challenge is to post objects that exemplify the art and practice of writing, and I could think of few better examples than the myriad #automaticwriting #planchettes housed in the MysteriousPlanchette collection! My first post for this challenge is a special Kirby & Company #planchette from the height of the craze in 1868. Kirby & Co were the kings of planchette manufacturers, and variously claimed to have sold either 34,000 or 200,000 planchettes in the '68 holiday season alone. Offering four models, they had a quality #automaticwriter for every budget, and most models featured heavy #brass castors and #bone wheels. This heart-shaped specimen lacks the distinctive cutout in the heart's cleavage that became Kirby's trademark design, but includes a remarkable accessory only hinted at in some period accounts: a counterweight. Attached to the protruding pencil top during a writing #séance, the counterweight helped stabilize and balance the planchette, and is the only known surviving example! Stay tuned next Wednesday for another remarkable writing device in September's #thewritinghandknows challenge!