NPR radio series on U.S. Military "Women in War"

photo: Ingrid Ruffin in bomb shelter in Iraq, 2003 (WV0400)

There is a fascinating 5 part series that examines women's experiences in the U.S. Military:
http://www.npr.org/series/133869535/women-in-combat

• Women in War: 'I've Lived out there with the guys'
• Silver Star Recipient: A Reluctant Hero
• General Remembers her 'Different' Military Days
• A Soldier's Life for a Mother and her Daughter
• A Lonely Club for Women in Top Army Jobs
  

There is also a time line of Women on the Front Lines:
http://www.npr.org/2011/02/24/133870632/timeline-women-on-the-front-lines

The Elizabeth Cowling Celebration

The Elizabeth Cowling Cello Celebration March 24-26, 2011

UNCG School of Music, Theatre & Dance
Greensboro, NC

Honoring cellist and scholar Elizabeth Cowling

Cello choir showcases and master class performance opportunities available to registered participants.

Direct all inquiries to Alexander Ezerman

aezerman@gmail.com / 336 334 5518

Event Website
Elizabeth Cowling Collection
Cello Music Collection

Lois Lenski: Voices of Children

February 7 - March 18, 2011
Hodges Reading Room

Lois Lenski (1893-1974) was one of the most popular and most gifted among children's authors and illustrators of the twentieth century. This small exhibit is an attempt to document her talent and to show, in her own words, her intense feelings for the proper literature and education for children.

Born and reared in Ohio, Lenski gravitated early to a career in art. Although she majored in education at Ohio State University and prepared for a career in teaching, she took many art courses in college, decided on art as a vocation, and pursued this career at the Art Students' League in New York, furthering her art studies in England and Italy. At the Art Students' League,she became an assistant to the muralist Arthur Covey and married him in 1921. Advancing from part-time jobs designing greeting cards and drawings for advertisements, Lenski spent the decade of the 1920s illustrating the works of others, primarily for children's books. In addition to illustrating works such as Padraic Colum's The Peep-Show Man and Kenneth Graham's The Golden Age and Dream Days (which allowed her to exercise her passion for medieval costume and culture), she developed an association with the New York publishing firm Platt and Munk, illustrating such well-known works as Cinderella and The Little Engine That Could.

At the suggestion of an editor, Lenski decided to try her own hand at writing for children, publishing in 1927 Skipping Village, based on her own childhood experiences in Anna, Ohio. In her long and illustrious career as both writer and illustrator, Lenski authored more than eighty books for children of various ages, including the immensely popular "Davy" and "Mr.Small" series for younger readers and the influential and provocative "Roundabout America" and "Regional America" books for older children, as well as historical novels and poetry. In addition to providing riveting entertainment, her books invariably made a plea for tolerance and understanding among all people. Among her many awards were the Newbery Medal for 1946 for Strawberry Girl, one of her fifteen regional novels for young readers, and the National Child Study Association Award in 1948.

Special Collections & University Archives, Jackson Library, has many signed first editions, translations, manuscripts, original art work, artifacts, and ephemera in its Lois Lenski Collection, as well as a collection of miniature and early children's books collected by Lenski.

For her many contributions to children's literature, Lois Lenski in 1962 was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

-Dr. William K. Finley

What They Were Wearing While They Were Reading; The 1920s

January 24 – March 31, 2011
First Floor Lobby, Jackson Library

The 1920s was one of the most exciting decades in US history. It was a time of prosperity and excess when Americans embraced a modern culture, which included dancing to the “Charleston” and joyriding in Ford Model T automobiles. Women won the right to vote, attended colleges in droves, and sought out careers outside the home.

Prohibition began on midnight, January 16, 1920, making “intoxicating liquors” illegal to transport, consume, or sell. Prohibition created an underground bootlegging industry, which fueled widespread criminal activity. Men like Al Capone rose to power, ordering the largest gangland hits in crime history known as “the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.”

Jazz was hot! Singers such as Charles Peterson, Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and Rudy Vallee were popular and could be heard on a new invention, which allowed entertainment to be broadcast into America’s living rooms - the radio. Americans were also flocking to movie theaters to see popular stars as Rudolph Valentino and Gloria Swanson.

Other important milestones of the 1920s included Babe Ruth setting the home run record in 1927, celebrity pilot Charles Limbergh flying solo across the Atlantic in 1927, and archaeologist Howard Carter discovering the tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922.

The decade came to a screeching halt on October 29, 1929, with the most devastating stock market crash in US History. The panic of 1929 sparked the Great Depression and the economic downturn of the 1930s.

This exhibit focuses on the fashions, literature, and cultural aspects of the 1920s. It features the textile collection of Dr. James Carmichael, professor of the UNCG’s Library and Information Studies program.

-Kathelene McCarty Smith