September 24, 2012: Label folders, re-folder materials, remove all metal. 3 1/2 hours

I did much the same stuff that I worked on last week Friday.  I was able to finish the first 2 1/2 boxes.  I am amazed at how long it takes to relabel things so that my handwriting is neat.  I am anxious to get back to finishing this part of the organization.  I am really enjoying it, more than I thought that I would.  I am getting nervous about the finding aid though.  I have done a little research and as far as I can tell “American Bilateral Conversations” is not an organization but more of a label linking like documents together.  I think I am going to have to do a little bit of research on each of the organizations involved.  Like “The American Baptist Convention’s Commission on Christian Unity and the Bishops Commission for Ecumenical and Inter-Religious Affairs.”  It’s quite a mouthful and I’m not even sure I’ll find anything on it.  The more interesting part of all of this is to come.  I hope I can write something that makes sense and is useful.

September 28, 2012: Crossing Borders lecture and exhibit at The Jewish Museum. 2 3/4 hours

Crossing Borders lecture by David Wachtel, Senior Consultant for Special Collections at The Library of The Jewish Theological Seminary and Senior Consultant for Judaica at Sotheby’s.

I was so impressed with this exhibit, it is fantastic.  Crossing Borders is done in conjunction with the Bodleian Library.  I am sitting here trying to describe to you what is in this exhibit and I’m finding it difficult to pare it down into a small journal entry.  I think a quote my tour guide gave the group sets up the idea behind the exhibition quite well.

“Writing did not take place in a vacuum, but is a reflection of various cultures and propensities of various times and it provides a window on the mentality, preoccupations and tastes of the people who were responsible for it in it’s variegated forms.” ~Leonard Boyle, Oxonian Latin palaeogrpaher.

These manuscripts are not only beautiful, they are evidence of more than just what is written down in them, they show the prevailing artistic tastes, cultural mores and give a window into the minds of people who created them.  They are more than words on a page they are proof of individual tastes (one example was from a manuscript that was illuminated by the owner himself) and history.  I enjoyed the lecture.  I loved how they were able to integrate modern technology seamlessly along with these old manuscripts.  A number of iPads were located in each room.  Each one contained high quality images of other pages of the books on display.  One room contained around 6 iPads all to show each page of the Kennicott Bible that was on display.  You could zoom in and look at tiny details.  It was wonderful.  I hope I get a chance to go back and look at things a little more carefully.

This fable was about Chatty Turtle, who fell from his ride after making comments about people who were passing by. Moral: Silence is golden.

Total hours:  6 1/4

Running total: 39