The GNOA Newsletter is published three times each year in the Spring, Fall, and Winter.
Submissions can be sent to Susan Tucker, care of Newcomb Archives,
Center for Research on Women, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118
(susannah@tulane.edu)

Next Meeting:

Wednesday, April 25, 2001
Time: 6:00 p.m.
Nunez Community College
Chalmette, LA.

Our Spring meeting is being hosted by Nunez Community College on Wednesday, April 25, at 6:00 in the evening. This will be our first meeting at Nunez and is special for us in that we become truly the Greater New Orleans Group as we venture out to St. Bernard Parish.

The meeting will be held in the new Arts and Science Building auditorium. This is located behind the Stewart Administration Building (3710 Paris Road). The Arts and Science Building is the only structure on the block bordered by Montesquieu Street, Magnolia Street, LaFontaine Street, and Liberaux Street. The entrance faces Montesquieu Street and there is parking in front of the building. There is an outside entrance to the Auditorium on the left side of the building. If you want a map and more specific directions, either call or email Barbara Vaughn at 680-2609 or bvaughn@nunez.cc.la.us.

A handout on the archives and special collections located in the college library will be available. A short tour of the archives will be available. Prior to the business meeting, Ron Chapman, Instructor of History at NCC, will briefly share his research project goals on Fazendeville, a small African-American community nestled between the Chalmette Battlefield and the National Cemetery. Fazendeville dates its origins from after the Battle of New Orleans to 1963 when 30 families were relocated to accommodate an expansion of the Chalmette Battlefield park.

The last meeting was held January 17, 2001 at the University of New Orleans in the Long Library. In attendance were Ray Nussbaum, Robert Sherer, Siva Blake, Carol Bartels, Lillian Conaghan, Dorothy Dawes, Wayne Everard, Collin Hamer, Rebecca Hankins, Michelle Hudson, Florence Jumonville, Catherine Kahn, Fred Kahn, Theresa LeFevre, Philip S. MacCleod, Norbert E. Raacke, William D. Reeves, Rodney Smith, Irene Wainwright, Marie Windell, and guest speaker Michael Sartisky.

Ray Nussbaum opened the meeting by announcing that Susan Tucker offered to assume secretarial duties. Sister Dorothy Dawes moved to accept.

Guest speaker Michael Sartisky gave a brief talk about the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, noting that it is the largest member of the National Endowment for the Humanities. He talked about Dr. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall's efforts to raise consciousness and to prevent theft of historical documents, and showed a taped news segment featuring Dr. Hall on that subject. William D. Reeves followed with a description of the work LEH is doing, in response, to encourage the conservation, preservation, and organization of parish records throughout Louisiana.

Robert Sherer passed out a budget report. Ray Nussbaum concluded by thanking the UNO members for hosting the meeting.

News from the Archives

Amistad Research Center at Tulane University

The Amistad has had a very busy spring semester. Selected Saturdays have seen a series of Professional Development Seminars for Teachers, which have included information on such topics as Afro-Caribbean Literature, African Americans in Louisiana, African American Women Writers, and African American Visual Artists.

The Amistad also co-sponsored Fighting on Two Fronts: The African American Experience of World War II. Working with the Center for African and African American Studies at Southern University at New Orleans, The Eisenhower Center for American Studies at the University of New Orleans, and the National D-Day Museum, this conference received wide publicity.

On March 24, the Amistad held an Open House for Teachers, inviting them to a tour of the Center and to an introduction to collections.

The Amistad also hosted on April 6, "Art, Music, & Movement", a concert with music composed and performed by Hannibal Lokumbe. This event was sponsored by the Amistad Research Center in partnership with the Regional Humanities Center at Tulane University and the Contemporary Arts Center.

Historic New Orleans Collection,
Williams Research Center

Marie Adrien Persac: Louisiana Artist, a retrospective of the works of one of Louisiana's most important nineteenth-century artists, is on view at HNOC, January 16 through April 14, 2001. The exhibition presents a rare opportunity to see in a single location a display of Persac's works gathered from public collections and those privately owned and rarely exhibited.

Taking the Measure of Marie Adrien Persac A Symposium was held Saturday, February 17 in the Williams Research Center.

New Orleans Public Library
Louisiana Division

The Louisiana Division of New Orleans Public Library continues to add photographs to NUTRIAS, the NOPL webpage. In recent months, images have been added from the Works Progress Administration, Mayor deLesseps S. Morrison, and Mayor Victor H. Schiro collections. Previously unprocessed photographs are added to a section in NUTRIAS called "Recent Additions to the Louisiana Photograph Collection." The online photos can be found at nutrias.org/photos/photolist.htm. Photographs from various Louisiana Division photograph collections continue to be used weekly in the "Nostalgic New Orleans" segment of WYES-TV's Steppin' Out program.

Recent additions to the City Archives include seven boxes of records from the Mayor's Office of Federal Programs; 1 box of papers from Edward A. Fowler, an engineer with the Sewerage and Water Board during the early 1900s, donated by Robert Swan from the Chief Administrative Office; and the Minutes of the Parkway and Park Commission, 1950-1996.

Two exhibits are currently on view in the Louisiana Division. "Designing Woman: The Carnival Art of Leda Plauche," features a selection of original Mardi Gras costume and float designs, donated to NOPL in 1959 by local artist Leda Hincks Plauche. The entire collection of several hundred designs is currently being scanned for preservation and for inclusion in NUTRIAS. A second exhibit, "African-Americans in New Orleans: City Government Employees," is the Louisiana Division's annual contribution to the celebration of Black History Month. It features photographs of African-American employees of the City of New Orleans from the Municipal Government Photograph Collection. Both of these exhibits will remain on view on the third floor of the Main Library at 219 Loyola through the end of April. They can be seen indefinitely in NUTRIAS at nutrias.org/exhibits/exhibits.htm.

In May, the Louisiana Division will mount a new exhibit, "Children of the WPA," which will remain on view into the Fall. The exhibit will include a selection of photographs of children chosen from among the 7000+ negatives that make up the Works Progress Administration photograph collection. The exhibit will also display some of the dolls representing historical New Orleans characters created by WPA workers in the 1930s. The exhibit will also be available in NUTRIAS.

Wayne Everard has been appointed by Governor Foster to the Louisiana Historical Records Advisory Board.

Tulane University
Latin American Library

Currently on display in the Latin American Library and online (www.tulane.edu/~latinlib/ecuadorexhibit.htm) is Visions of Ecuador, an exhibit of the Latin American Library's collection of Pál and Elisabeth Kelemen photographs of the Otavalo market and of other towns in Ecuador, taken in 1945. The exhibit was curated by Philip MacLeod, and will remain on display through Spring Semester 2001.

Tulane University
Special Collections

An online exhibit of materials from Carnival collections is now available online: www.tulane.edu/~lmiller/Carnival.html.

In December 1999 Assistant University Librarian for Special Collections Bill Meneray was chosen serve on the Board of Directors of the Amistad Research Center.

Louisiana Governor Mike Foster recently appointed Leon C. Miller, Manuscripts Librarian, to the state's Historic Records Advisory Board. Lee also recently won election as vice-president/president-elect of the Academy of Certified Archivists.

Tulane Univerity
Newcomb Archives, Center for Research on Women

As part of its 25th anniversary celebration, the Center recently held a symposium on the history of the Louisiana Women's Movement, 1965-1985. The symposium featured Louisiana women recalling and discussing their involvement in political, social and cultural movements, landmark legal cases, and professional endeavors that changed the lives of women in Louisiana and nationally. A display of documents from the Louisiana movement is on display in the Seltzer-Gerard Reading Room of the Nadine Vorhoff Library in Caroline Richardson Hall.

The staff at Newcomb Archives continues work on the NHPRC grant funded project to microfilm the early records of the College. In the summer, they will begin work on a jointly sponsored program with Howard Tilton Library, funded by the Newcomb Foundation, to update The New Orleans Guide to Collections on Women and to design a women's studies portal on the Tulane Website.

University of New Orleans
Special Collections, Long Library

At the 44th annual Missouri Valley History Conference in Omaha in March, Marie Windell presented a paper on 19th century conflicting land claims in Louisiana, based on landmark case files in the Supreme Court of Louisiana Collection in the UNO Library. The commentator noted that Louisiana's legal history is "a complex labyrinth."

News Notes

This February, the GNOA worked together to produce a traveling exhibit of selected nineteenth century images for the Tulane Educational Conference on Paul Tulane and Nineteenth Century New Orleans. The images are available for talks you might like to give on archives in New Orleans. For more information, contact Susan Tucker (865 5762).

The Greater New Orleans Archivists Newsletter

Please send submissions to Susan Tucker, Newcomb Archives, Center for Research on Women, Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana 70118-5698; Fax 504 862 8948; email: susannah@tulane.edu.