Dorothy Gillespie had a long history with Radford University. She served as a Distinguished Professor of Art (1997-99), and as Visiting Artist 1981-83 where she initiated the University’s permanent art collection through a gift of her own work. Radford Unuversity has 80 pieces of her art, which turns out to be the largest collection anywhere. She led a very interesting life which included being an educator, artist, lecturer, presenter, curator, etc. After her death, Sept 30, 2012, her son Gary donated several boxes of papers to the Radford University Archives and Special Collections department, and these items have been processed and are available for public viewing as The Dorothy Gillespie Collection.
Dorothy Gillespie in McConnell Library. One of her paintings is in the background.
Dorothy Gillespie was born in Roanoke, Virginia in 1920, and was an artist whose works include paintings, sculpture, jewelry making, and film, although she was best known for her enamal/aluminum sculptures. After graduating from Jefferson High School in Roanoke, Virginia, in 1937, she attended and studied art at the Maryland Institute College of Art (graduated in 1941). From there, she moved to New York and worked from a studio in Greenwich Village, married Bernard Israel, and had her first solo art exhibits. In the following years, she relocated several times, including to Peru, Long Island, and Florida before returning, in 1957 to New York where her career and reputation as an artist blossomed. In addition to her many shows and exhibits, she became Artist in Residence at the Women’s Interart Center in New York, and acted as Co-coordinator there from 1973-76.
In addition to being an accomplished artist, she was also a frequent lecturer, guest artist, artist in residence, exhibitor, curator, and educator. Among her many honors, she has received The Alice Baber Art Fund, Inc. Grant Award; a Doctor of Pedagogy, Niagara University, Niagara Falls, NY 1990; a Doctor of Fine Arts (Honoris Causa) Caldwell College, Caldwell, NY 1976; an Allied Professions Award,Virginia Society; The American Institute of Architects, Richmond, VA 1986; Distinguished Alumni Award, Maryland Institute, College of Art, Baltimore, MD 1983; Outstanding Services Award, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, AR 1983; and, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Women’s Caucus for Art in 2001. The Gala 8 ” Distinguished Woman” Award at Birmingham Southern College in 1987 honoring women who have made lasting contributions to our society in the fields of endeavor ranging from the arts, medicine, philanthropy, journalism, government, sports, entertainment and business”. In addition, she served as a Distinguished Professor of Art, Radford University, Radford, VA 1997-99; on the Board of Trustees, Maryland Institute, College of Art, Baltimore, MD 1996-99; on the Board of Trustees, Maitland Art Center, Maitland, FL 1996-99; and on the Art in Public Places Committee, Broward Cultural Affairs Council, June 1993-June 1994; and as Visiting Artist, Radford University, Radford, VA 1981-83 where she initiated the University’s permanent art collection through a gift of her own work and where her work is now archived. Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow from 1985-1993. During that period she made week-long visits to small private colleges throughout the country and gave public lectures, coached and taught young artists.
Included in the Dorothy Gillespie Collection, are newspaper and magazine articles about her life and works, exhibit flyers and advertising, Women’s Interart Center schedules and event brochures, and other items.
We actually have a few small associated collections of interest, one is the Women’s Interart Center digital collection, which is composed of audio recordings of lectures and panel discussions mostly from 1975 and including talks and interviews by June Blum, Alice Barber, Alice Neel, Lila Katzen, Betty Parsons, Dorothy Gillespie, and others. These recordings give an insiders view of the women’s art movement and are a (sometimes hard to hear but) fascinating listen.
Other collections of interest can be found amongst the Public Relations Photo Collection (Binder 208)– in this binder are photographs of Gillespie’s works et while at RU; the RU Art Museum Collection contains a few publications featuring the works of Dorothy Gillespie.
For years I have walked by a framed diploma in one of our archives offices and never knew its significance. Today, however, I was looking through some old Tartan newspapers (December 10, 1987) and saw a brief article titled “Diploma donated for RU collections”, which caught my eye.
The article briefly talked about the first bachelor’s degree granted by The State Normal School for Women- now known as Radford University. I immediately thought of the framed diploma and went to check and sure enough, it was Sallie Lorena Caldwell’s, and I was then curious to learn more so went right to my favorite book of our school’s history- History of the State Teachers College
For the first several years of our school’s existence, the graduating classes were quite small, and so Dr. McConnell could give each graduate a bit of special attention. According to M’Ledge Moffett’s History of the State Teachers College (p.324-5):
Until the classes became too large in number Doctor McConnell introduced a unique feature into the delivery of diplomas. As each girl was presented for graduation it was his custom to relate some anecdote of her own or ancestral history: to trace her relationship or to give some analysis of her vollege achievements. The witticism and humanness of these remarks were looked forward to from one commencement to another. Many a girl as her college life would develop would punctuate it by saying, she hoped that Doctor McConell would not tell that about her when she graduated.
Miss Lorena Caldwell was the first student to receive a degree from the college. From 1921 to 1928 a kneeling service was used as a feature of the graduation exercises at the time the degree was conferred by the President of the College. A pillow, made of grey satin with a band of purple satin, was brought in and placed in front of the Dean. As each student was presented for graduation she knelt on the cusion facing the President of the College, as he conferred the degree the hood was put over the student’s head bythe Dean of Women and the tassel was turned.
In 1988, while camping on his family’s abandoned farm on the Little River, and reflecting on his studies at he Harvard Graduate School of Education, it occured John Hargrove Bowles that this land might be put to better use somehow. Through his studies with “street youth” and runaways, Mr. Bowles knew the value of outdoor activities an settings to both troubled youth and those who work with them.
John Hargrove Bowles
His share of the land was 185 acres, and with the idea of putting it to better use, Mr. Bowles contacted Radford University’s Department of Recreation and Leisure Services and proposed the idea of donating his farmland and asked what the university would do with it.
Soon, several university departments were involved and all submitted documents indicating what they would do with the land in terms of classes, teaching, and enrichment activities for RU students. These proposals satisfied Mr. Bowles and so in 1985, he donated his 185 acres of Little River land to the Radford University Foundation. Because of his interactions with the university and his satisfaction as to how the land was being used, he worked with other family members and in 1989 they donated an additional 195 acres of adjoining land.
At this point, the 380 acre conservancy had no name. John Hargrove Bowles had been very involved with the university by this time, and had participated in several university functions both on the land and at the university. One of the university events that Mr. Bowles had participated in and was impressed with, was the Highland Summer Conference. This was a yearly event during which influential Appalachian writers were brought to the university to teach and to mentor other writers and students. At one of the conferences, Mr. Bowles met Appalachian poet and writer Awiakta and the two became friends. He sent her a letter asking her to come up with a name for the conservancy, and in his letter he mentioned wanting some representation of the Cherokee people who had traditionally used the land for hunting and gathering. After careful consideration, Awiakta settled on and suggested the name Selu and explained her reasoning in this letter-
Awiakta and John Hargrove Bowles investigating the Selu retreat center under construction.
When it was donated, The Selu Conservancy had included several buildings and remnants of homesteads of families who had lived there over the years. In 1990 it was decided to begin restoration of some of the log buildings and to use the rebuilding process as a hands-on learning tool for RU students. After careful consideration, it was decided that Thurlowe Scudder, of Pilot Virginia would be in charge of the project, and any interested university students would be included in the project. Mr Scudder taught students how to use traditional hand tools to shape logs, how to place the logs in the structure and how to finish traditional log buildings.
Another rebuild project that has helped make Selu an important learning tool, was the creation of a living museum. An aging farmhouse still stood on the property, and it was decided to have it rebuilt as close to the original as possible, yet with all of the modern and legal improvements necessary to make it accessible and useable to visitors. The Duayne Grubb Construction Company was chosen to do the work building the new farmhouse, but before he could do that, a design needed to be done. It was decided to interview people or relatives of people who had lived in the farmhouse, and on other parts of the Selu Conservancy land to learn more about the construction, design, uses, and life on the land. Many of these interviews were done by Appalachian Studies student Christi Leftwich. Ms. Leftwich’s work was and is an invaluable tool for anyone wishing to learn about the history of this culturally valuable land. Between Ms. Leftwich’s and others’ interviews, much was learned about the original design and arrangement of the farmhouse, and from that, a design was created and Mr. Grubb built it. The farmhouse, the new log buildings, gardens, donated and found tools and more all work together to create the living history part of the Selu Conservancy.
On the left, a photo of the original farmhouse. On the right, a photo of the newly built farmhouse.
Over the years, Selu has become a very important part of Radford University and several departments use the land to enhance teaching and to give students a hands-on experience. Among other things, there is a biology lab, physical education ropes course, an astronomy observatory, archaeological digs, a living history museum, a retreat center, nature trails, and much more.
To learn more and to see what is in our Selu Conservatory collection, please consult the finding aid-
The May Day celebration, was an annual event that took place in “The Sunken Garden”, which was the field in front of Russell Hall. A very nice description of this yearly event can be found in M’Ledge Moffett’s History of the State Teacher’s College (page 354-5):
“MAY FESTIVALS
Miss Ninde, director of physical Education conducted the first May Day festival in 1919. Miss Mamie Lush of Burksville, Virginia was the first May Queen. The queen dressed in a white dress with a royal purple train was crowned with a gold pointed crown in the Oak Grove directly in front of the Administration Buidling. She was attended by a group of students as honor maids. From her throne she presided at the festiveal of oflk dances, drills, and gymnastic exhibitions by the students of Physical Education.
From this simple beginning the May festivals have become very elaborate and beautiful. It is customary to select the May Queen by popular vote of the students. The student receiving the highest number of votes as the most queenly, beauyiful, and gracious is declared the Queen. She is then attended by the students receiving the next highest votes as maids of honor.
For several years the program included marches and drills by all the students enrolled in physical education courses. Miss Ellis has made it her practice to choose some central theme sa the morif for the festivbal. Around this she has woven group and individual dances. Some of these themes have been: “Pan”, “The Japanese Sun God”, “Spring”, “Health”, “Robin Hood”, “The Circus”, Grecian Games, “Nations of the Earth”, “Southwest Virginia”.
The crowning of the queen is the climax of the festival. For many years the queen was crowned on a throne erected in front of Tyler Hall. The queen and her attendants approached the throne from the Administration Building. Many children of the city have participated as flower girls and train bearers Eleanor Bowers, Warren Bowers, Chandler Noblin, Dorothy Smith, Betty R. Roberts, Rob Roy Thomas, Elicabeth and William Cooper Gilbert, Lois Miller, Nancy and Robin McConnell.
Until 1926 the costuming of the May Queen and her attendants was very simple. Beginning at this time the students decided on a more elaborate costumes. For the last several years the queen has been attired in a beautiful white robe. The college owns a train and a crown embroidered in peals and rhinestones. This forms the nucleus around which the costuming for the pageant is centered. Organdie and taffets dresses have been used by the maids.”
The Home Management House (or “Cottage”) provided Home Economics majors at Radford to live together in a house situation and actively practice skills such as home budget planning, cleaning, cooking, meal planning, housekeeping, and other tasks. Living in the Home Management Cottage carried credit, and was listed as “Home Economics 46: Home Management Cottage” in the 1934 Radford State Teachers College Bulletin as described below.
From the 1934 Bulletin: “Home Economics 46: Home Management Cottage. This unit of work is an experiment in co-operative living, giving ample opportunity for each student to put into practice the knowledge gained previously and to develop responsibility. Each of the housekeeping activities – cooking, table setting and serving, cleaning, acting as hostess and manager, budget-making and buying – is done in the home atmosphere rather than in a laboratory. Here classroom theory and laboratory experimentation are converted into real home-making knowledge. Emphasis is placed on development of appreciations, ideals and standards rather than skill. Required of all seniors one quarter. Credit, one session hour.”
Our archival collection includes handwritten diaries kept by the students who lived in the Home Management Cottage from 1932-1937, a guest book, and a paper written by M’Ledge Moffett that describes the diaries and the purpose of the Cottage. In the paper, Dr. Moffett explains that the Cottage program was started in the Fall of 1927 and that it was closely associated with the foods laboratory and was housed in the Madame Russell dormitory until Spring of 1932. There was a small cottage on campus that was not being used, and it was decided to move the program to this building and out of the dormitory. One year later, 1933, the college acquired the Norwood home from Miss Picket Heth. This acquisition included a white log cabin which was built between 1885-90 and needed renovations to modernize it.
June 19, 1934 the newly renovated cabin became the home of the Home Management House, otherwise known as the Cottage. Our collection of Home Economics House Diaries are in the process of being transcribed from their original cursive, to type to assure they will be useable by future generations. We have digitized some of these diaries, as well as a few other items pertaining to the Home Economics Department- https://monk.radford.edu/records/?&refine[Categories][]=Radford%20University%20Archives$$$Home%20Economics%20Collection
In 1996, Radford University student Jennifer Bunn was taking Grace Toney Edwards’ class “Appalachian Literature”. In the class, among many other things, they read a play by Earl Hobson Smith called The Long Way Home, which tells the story of Mary Draper Ingles and her kidnapping and escape from Indian captivity.
Ms. Ingles, was born Mary Draper in Philadelphia in 1732. She married William Ingles in 1750 and the two moved to the Draper’s Meadow settlement on what is now the campus of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. The French and Indian war was raging at the time, and several settlements in Virginia and elsewhere were being invaded by Shawnee warriorsm and at some point in late July of 1755, the settlement in Draper’s Meadow was one of these. Several people were killed and injured, five were taken prisoner, and among the prisoners was Ms. Ingles and two of her children. The captives were taken to Lower Shawneetown, a Shawnee settlement in Kentucky were to live among the Shawnee, and were later moved to a settlement in Big Bone Lick, Kentucky. In the Shawnee camps, Ms. Ingles was apparently respected because of her courage, strength, and knowledge of medicinal herbs and plants. Despite this respect, her children were taken from her and given to Shawnee families. In October 1755, Ms. Ingles and another captive, escaped and made a treacherous 800 mile journey, on foot, back to Draper’s Meadow in Virginia. One of her children was later ransomed and returned to the family, the other apparently did not survive.
The Appalachian Literature class required a final project, and Earl Hobart Smith’s play made such an impression on Ms. Bunn, that she decided to create a board game based on it as her final project. Dr. Edwards was impressed with her project, and encouraged her to pursue having the game professionally published. She introduced Ms. Bunn to Mr. Bob Nicholson of the Radford Heritage Foundation, who in turn encouraged her to make a presentation to the foundation to apply for aid in producing it- which she did and used the money to professionally produce the game.
Ms. Bunn registered the game with the Library of Congress and then arranged with local Radford area business’ to print various parts of the game: Prestar Packaging (Christiansburg) manufactured the game box, Plymouth Inc (Radford) computerized the cough copy of the game, Kinkos (Blacksburg) to print the directions and background information, Game Quest (Radford) made the pieces and dice. Assembly of the game parts were done at Ms. Bunn’s house and the games were then made for sale at The Long Way Home site, Glencoe Museum, Books-A-Million, and the Radford University Bookstore. Profits from the sale of the game were split between Ms. Bunn and the Radford Heritage Foundation. The sales of the game were so successful that she was able to finish paying for her education from the proceeds!
This play was performed in Radford, Virginia for many years and was even designated as Virginia’s “Official Outdoor Historical Drama of hte Commonwealth” by the Virginia General Assembly. Our copy of this game is special because it was signed by each member of the 1996 cast.
Jennifer Bunn graduated from Radford University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Elementary Education, later returned to earn a Master’s Degree in Curriculum and Instruction in 2004, and again returned to earn an endorsement in Library Science for K-12 in 2008. She has been named Virginia Lottery Super Teacher of the Year, 2008; Indian Valley Elementary Teacher of the Year, 2013; Fancy Gap Elementary Teacher of the Year, 2016; and Carrol County Teacher of the Year, 2017-18. She continues teaching and is currently working in the Hillsville, Virginia school system.
To see this boardgame in person please contact us!
One of the things I like most about working in the Archives and Special Collections area is that I never know what I will find next. The following is an item I ran across in a box of donated items that mostly were concerned with concerts and ceremonies held on campus in the 1940s. This however stood out in that box as something really special. I felt obligated to share.
There are two things that have always fascinated me, photographs and sound recordings. In a lot of ways, it seems like some sort of actual magic that we can take a photograph of a single moment in time and then look at it later, or that we can record a voice or a sound and listen to it later. I love looking at old photographs and noticing the clothes, the facial expressions, the subtle body language in people in the backgrounds- it is fascinating. Old sound recordings hold this sort of fascination for me too. Listening to the way people talk, their pauses, their “go-to” words, background sounds- fascinating.
The problem with sound recordings though is that over the years we have changed the way we make recordings. In 1857 Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville invented the phonautograph, which basically took a picture of sound. Then in 1877 Thomas Edison invented the phonograph which made a sound recording of sound. Since then there have been several popular recording methods used and many of them have fallen by the wayside. Occasionally in my travels, I come across an Edison sound cylinder (not the proper name for those, I am sure), or an 8 track tape, reel-to reel tape, or various other out of style recording types and I always wonder what moments in time are saved on them. Most times I never find out, but sometimes I do….
Probably because of my fascination with sound recordings, I have for the past almost 50 years kept up with my father’s old reel-to-reel tape recorder. It is very heavy and has been moved from house to house and over the years has played many reel-to-reel (and 8 track tapes) that I have found. This week while at work in the Archives in McConnell Library, I was brought several reel-to-reel tapes and the question of whether anything could be done to find out what is on them. I brought in my machine and have had a fascinating time listening to voices from days long gone. The machine is heavy and unweildy, so I decided to leave it here for a while, I figured it might come in handy again one day, and it didn’t take long before it did.
Our college radio station, WVRU 89.9 FM used to produce and air a show called Other Voices in which interviews of visiting speakers, or of various faculty members would be aired. This being a university, we often have authors, activists, critics, reporters, musicians, artists, politicians etc as guest speakers, so the radio show interviews are a quite important part of the archives. This month is Women’s History Month, and so I thought it might be fun to look through our archives of Other Voices and pick a few of the interviews that might be of interest and digitize them. The show was recorded on reel-to-reel tapes and as mentioned above, I happen to have a reel-to-reel machine sitting on my desk. Playing old tapes is sometimes scary, they tend to be delicate and were sometimes recorded in varying speeds and volumes- still though, being able to listen to an interview done 30-40 years ago made it all worth while. So have a listen!
Gloria Steinem– a leader in the American feminist movement, journalist, activist, author, and public speaker.
Bella Abzug– feminist, activist, author, U.S. Representative, co-founder of the American Women’s Movement.
Dorothy DeBolt– known for bringing attention and acceptance to the needs of handicapped children in public schools, and for educating the American public about the need for adoptive homes for special needs children.
I thought this might be a good time to repost a link to our interviews of participants in the Women’s March on Washington that happened on January 21, 2017. If you follow this link you will find 17 interviews and a montage type video overview of the project. Some of these interviews were done very soon after the march, some were done one year later. Some of the marchers were from the DC march and some were at various sister marches. We interviewed as wide a variety of people as we could to get various perspectives. We are beyond proud of each and every person who participated in this project and think in time this will be a very valuable snapshot of the time it happened and hopes of those participating.
Our thought in creating this collection was that the thoughts, ideas, and hopes of people participating in the event needed to be preserved. In addition, it was our hope that these interviews could serve as a way for people who did not participate, or who did not agree with the event to learn exactly why others did participate and what they hoped to gain from it. In doing these, we tried to think about questions we personally had, but also thought about criticisms we had heard from others about the march and the marchers. Our hope is that that those who were opposed could watch these interviews and hopefully have their questions and concerns addressed in a completely passive and non-confrontational way.
We mostly brought up a thought or question and just let the person talk. Wherever their answer went was OK. Sometimes one thought led to another in a surprising way. Several people mentioned that their interview was the first time they had really processed the march, or that was the first time they had thought about whatever question we had asked. At times people cried, laughed, become agitated or became lost in thought- all of it was genuine and sometimes raw. Other times, people had an amazing ability to recall details and gave wonderful descriptions of what was going on. This was a wonderful project.
Letter writing is something that I find truly fascinating. Honestly, I should probably say letter reading is something I find truly fascinating because I often don’t find much fascination in actually writing them. Letter reading then. In letters people give details about current events, tiny details about people related to them, opinions, ideas, and every other kind of thing. Reading books about historic times or events is one thing, but reading the actual words a person wrote while living through periods of time gone by is quite another. Our Archives department here in McConnell Library recently acquired two collections of personal letters, one collection was written by John Preston McConnell to his son Carl, the other is a collection of letters written by Carl McConnell to his father John Preston McConnell. It was discovered by careful ordering and reading that many of these letters went together- as in one letter was in answer to another. By interfiling these we actually see a conversation between J.P. McConnell and his son. As far as I know, this is the first time we have had a glimpse of the family dynamic of the McConnell family in such a real way. What makes this even more fascinating is that these letters were written during the Great Depression and we get to see some of the thoughts of a college president during those troubled times.
In these letters, J. P. McConnell gives fatherly advice, relates things that bother him (these were the Great Depression years and in several letters he mentions being told to cut employee pay by 30%!), he tells Carl about various acquisitions the State Teachers College (which would later be known as Radford University) had made, talks a bit about the library that I happen to be sitting in at this moment was being built, talks about student enrollment, and talks very very often about his relatives in real and personal ways. Seeing this side of our university founder is something I don’t believe we have had the opportunity to do before.
Because we think this collection will be of interest and value to researchers, we are presenting a digital collection of some of this correspondence:
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