TAKE FIVE: PART FIVE OF FIVE!

REFLECTIONS ON THE SPIRIT OF GIVING AND THE LAST FIVE YEARS OF LIBRARY

DONATIONS

After taking notice of some of the many generous donations of large collections and “big ticket” items, I thought in this final installment that I would acknowledge some of the smaller, individual gifts to the library collection made by Wolfsonian staff and the Florida International University academic community. Although there had always been a natural synergy between FIU faculty and students and our research center, the relationship really blossomed following the incorporation of the museum into the state university system in July 1997. As more FIU administrators, professors, and students toured the galleries, scheduled research appointments, and organized class visits to the museum and became more familiar with our general holdings and specific strengths, some of our FIU colleagues began to send a few items our way. Several FIU professors have applied to and received residential fellowship grants and many others have scheduled visits to our rare books and special collections library. Some of those visits have not only helped us further document the artifacts in our collection, but have ultimately resulted in the publication of books and scholarly articles that spread the word about our holdings to the wider community of scholars. It is especially gratifying to have professors using our collection and then donating a copy of their published works to our reference holdings.

GIFT OF LARA KRIEGEL ; GIFT OF JOHN STUART

Several other members of the FIU family also donated rare materials from their personal collections to the Wofsonian. David Rifkind, who has researched, lectured, and written extensively about Italian rationalist and colonial architecture in the Fascist era, recently donated a couple of original Italian State Tourist Department tickets to our library’s ephemera collection. Steve Sauls (a political and public affairs advisor to FIU’s long-serving president, Modesto Maidique) also recently gifted a few items to our library collection

GIFT OF DAVID RIFKIND ; GIFT OF STEVE SAULS

the collection have even come from FIU students. Although most students are not in the position to make gifts to a museum of high monetary value, that has not stopped a couple of students from finding, buying, and then donating rare ephemeral items of historical value or reference materials to the library collection. After investigating some of the World’s Fair materials in our collection, FIU student Brandon Viani found a historically-significant artifact from the Century of Progress Exposition (Chicago: 1933-34) and donated it to the library. Similarly, Natasha Marie Solis was engaged in research about the Arts & Crafts artist Violet Oakley, and afterwards donated a reference work about the artist that was not in our reference holdings.

GIFT OF BRANDON VIANI

Most persons journeying down the career path of the museum professional are not primarily motivated by monetary compensation or the prospect of fame and glory. More often than not, persons choosing to devote their lives to museum work are committed to the preservation and care of the world’s historical and artistic heritage, and to making that patrimony available to the public. It is therefore a testament to the extraordinary level of commitment to the institution, that many of the persons working at the Wolfsonian have not only devoted time and energy to keeping the museum operating, but that many have also gone the “extra mile” by donating items to the collection.

As so many staffers have donated reference books to help us document the rare items in our collection, I will focus only on the gifts of rare items. As noted in an earlier blog, (Oct. 30, 2009), Silvia Barisioni, the curator at our sister institution, the Wolfsoniana in Genoa, Italy donated a rare World War I period postcard to the collection. After sifting through family memorabilia from the World War Two era, our own Exhibition Designer Richard Miltner found and gifted a number of items to the library collection.

GIFT OF THE MILTNER FAMILY

In addition to donating a number of reference works to the library, Special Projects Coordinator, Regina Bailey and her husband Michael Spring also gifted several rare International Studio periodicals over the course of the last couple of years.

GIFT OF REGINA BAILEY AND MICHAEL SPRING

Our accountant, Lawrence Wiggins, an avid vintage postcard enthusiast, rummaged through his own collection and gifted a number of duplicates illustrating the Art Deco hotels and buildings on Miami Beach.

GIFT OF H. LAWRENCE WIGGINS III

Digital Library Specialist David Almeida and his wife Gina Wouters donated a large collection of vintage sheet music with extraordinary graphic design cover they had purchased at an estate sale.

GIFT OF DAVID ALMEIDA AND GINA WOUTERS

While organizing an exhibition on automobile design, curatorial assistant Lisa Li noticed that we lacked any promotional materials on the Model-T and decided to find an appropriate item and to donate it with her husband Ricardo Celorio.

GIFT OF LISA LI AND RICARDO CELORIO

After more than twenty years of working at the Wolfsonian, I too have picked up the collecting bug, and have on occasion donated a number of rare items to the collection to help fill in gaps in our otherwise strong holdings of children’s propaganda books; American WWI and WWII postcards; New Deal ephemera; and colonial propaganda.

GIFT OF FRANCIS XAVIER LUCA AND CLARA HELENA PALACIO-DE LUCA

GIFT OF FRANCIS XAVIER LUCA AND CLARA HELENA PALACIO-DE LUCA

Our former coordinator of Special Arts Projects, Angelika Jung, who has since moved back to her native Austria sent us a family heirloom with historical significance that made it a perfect fit for our library’s research collection. And while visiting in-laws in Germany, our former Associate Librarian, Nicholas Blaga discovered, purchased, and donated to the collection a couple of rare periodicals with beautiful covers by important artists documenting the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin.

GIFT OF ANGELIKA JUNG ; GIFT OF NICHOLAS BLAGA

Our former Membership Coordinator, Naomi Honig and her husband Burton also donated a 1940s era book of cartoons and caricatures. even as our former Art Director, Anthony DiVivo donated a rare children’s book from the 1930s.

GIFT OF NAOMI AND BURTON HONIG

In the course of weeding through his own library, our former Art Director, Anthony DiVivo discovered and donated a rare children’s book from the 1930s to the library collection.

GIFT OF ANTHONY DIVIVO

While serving as Associate Director for Development, Jeffrey G. Fischer donated a number of vintage World War II postcards and other ephemera to the library collection.

GIFT OF JEFFREY G. FISCHER AND MICHAEL SMITH

Leslie Sternlieb, who stepped in as publications word smith and editor of the Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Art, also donated a number of rare books and programs documenting the crowning of Great Britain’s heads of state in the 1930s.

GIFT OF LESLIE STERNLIEB

The spirit of public generosity has not been limited to the donation of rare and reference books, periodicals, and ephemera, however. More than a half-dozen persons have generously donated their time helping the librarians to process, catalog, and conserve the new acquisitions streaming into the museum. Noting that the old self-healing mats in our conservation lab were beginning to decay and fray, Cheryl Price, an FIU student already donating her time creating protective enclosures for some of the rare and fragile works in the collection, donated money as well to fund the purchase of new conservation materials and supplies. Laurence Miller, whose incredible collection I referred to earlier in the blog, was not satisfied solely with gifting his cruise line materials; he has since been coming in three days a week to help us organize, accession, catalog, re-house, and digitize that collection. Another Wolfsonian staffer in the Business department, Armando Suarez has sacrificed his Saturday afternoons to come in and work as a volunteer cataloguer. And a number of young college students and graduates from FIU and the University of Miami, including Miriam Kashem and Al Pena, have also pledged their time this summer to unpaid internships in the library.

VOLUNTEER LIBRARY INTERNS ARMANDO SUAREZ, MIRIAM KASHEM, AND AL PENA

In concluding this series of reflections on the spirit of giving, I thought I would return full-circle to the question of motivation. Perhaps, as the expression goes, giving is its own reward. But then again, maybe the people who give to museums do not do so solely out of a sense of altruism, or because they have a heightened philanthropic spirit. Perhaps they give because they expect to get something of value in return for their donation. For some collectors, the dividend that they might reap beyond a break on their taxes is the knowledge that they have found a permanent home where cherished items will be cared for and preserved for posterity. For others, the reward may be the knowledge that that gift that they so value will now be placed in an institution where others can also share and appreciate its artistic, cultural, or historic significance. For those individuals who volunteer and freely donate their valuable time and energy, perhaps that labor is compensated for with practical work experience that will reap dividends when applying for schooling or careers in the profession. Or perhaps they take pleasure in the opportunity to work with and around a fascinating array of objects that tell us so much about the art, design, history, and culture of another epoch. Who wouldn’t want to spend their free time poring over and contemplating such cool stuff!

TAKE FIVE -- PART TWO OF FIVE!

REFLECTIONS ON THE SPIRIT OF GIVING AND THE LAST FIVE YEARS OF LIBRARY DONATIONS

WANTED: INCREDIBLE COLLECTION ASSEMBLED WITH LOVE AND CARE SEEKS COMMITTED, LONG-TERM RELATIONSHIP WITH A VIBRANT, SOCIALLY-EXTRAVERTED, RESPONSIBLE REPOSITORY. MUST BE WELL-ENDOWED, STABLE, AND WILLING TO OFFER PERMANENCY AND A BRIGHT FUTURE

Following Mitchell Wolfson, Jr.’s donation of the museum to Florida International University in 1997, other members of the Wolfson family have stepped up to the plate to help ensure that the institution would have the funding to make targeted acquisitions of additional objects and artifacts appropriate to the museum and library’s collecting mission. Just months ago, for example, several rare and important pieces were added to the library thanks to the generosity of the Wolfsonian-FIU’s Collectors’ Council Fund, with contributions from Ellen and Louis Wolfson III and Mitchell Wolfson, Jr. These monetary contributions demonstrate the faith and confidence the Wolfson family has in the competence of the curators and librarians to guide the growth and future development of the museum collection.

PURCHASED WITH COLLECTORS' COUNCIL FUNDS, CONTRIBUTED BY ELLEN & LOUIS WOLFSON III AND MITCHELL WOLFSON, JR.

Soon after The Wolfsonian became part of Florida International University, I was tasked with organizing and installing an exhibition of some of the Wolfsonian-FIU library’s material in the Green Library on the University Park campus with the aim of introducing our collection to the faculty, staff, and students. The choice of theme was an easy one: the Wolfsonian library holds an incredible collection of interwar period steamship company travel ephemera, and we knew that then director of libraries at FIU, Dr. Laurence A. Miller was an ocean liner buff.

http://www.librarydisplays.wolfsonian.org/Bon%20Voyage/Bon%20Voyage.htm

What I did not know at the time, was that Dr. Miller was not only an avid cruise line enthusiast, (contributing articles and reviews to a number of trade periodicals), but had been amassing and assembling a collection of post-war cruise line promotional materials since the 1950s. Years later, associate librarian Nicholas Blaga and I were invited to lunch by Larry, who had since retired and was enjoying even more time aboard ship. At that meeting, Dr. Miller showed us his exhaustive collection of books, periodicals, and original cruise line industry materials from the post-war period and expressed interest in donating the same to the Wolfsonian. Needless to say, we were delighted at the prospect of acquiring such a comprehensive collection that complemented rather than duplicated our own. It took fifty banker’s boxes to transport the collection to the museum and we have yet to come up with a definitive number of items, though something hovering in the neighborhood of 25,000 to 35,000 would not seem too far off. Even as our interns have been working with Dr. Miller to catalog the materials, Royal Caribbean International CEO Adam Goldstein and the Director of global facilities and properties Russ Bogue visited and had the opportunity to meet the collector and to see a wide variety of archival materials documenting their company’s history and ships. Naturally, with such an extensive collection to choose from, this blog will only be able to provide a small teaser of the many wonderful items in the collection.

HIGHLIGHTS OF GIFTS FROM THE LAURENCE A. MILLER COLLECTION

After the passage of a number of years, I sometimes find it difficult after so many subsequent visits and conversations to remember exactly when first contact was made with a particular collector-turned-donor. Such is the case with Robert J. Young. What I do know is that Mr. Young was living in Deland, Florida (where some of the Wolfsonian staffers involved in the publication of the Florida Theme Issue of The Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts had traveled in researching one of the entries), and afterwards journeyed down to Miami Beach to pay the museum a visit. During that visit, Mr. Young (an octogenarian) talked with enthusiasm about his idol Bernarr Macfadden and the American Physical Culture movement and expressed interest in finding a permanent home for his collection of rare periodicals and books. Since our curator Marianne Lamonaca had long been contemplating a health and hygiene themed exhibit, she and I encouraged Mr. Young to send down some materials on approval. What arrived soon thereinafter were numerous boxes of rare periodicals and other materials that have greatly enhanced our coverage of the subject and period. With Mr. Young’s recent passing, we decided to organize a library display of some of those materials as a tribute to his generosity. http://www.librarydisplays.wolfsonian.org/Physical%20culture/PC.htm

HIGHLIGHTS OF A GIFT OF ROBERT J. YOUNG

Sometimes gifts to museums come after many years spent cultivating relationships with high profile collectors; other times museums are contacted “out of the blue” by collectors or their agents expressing interest in placing them in an institution where they can be sure that their materials will be cared for and appreciated. In 2009, our rare books cataloguer Dr. Nicolae Harsanyi was contacted online with an offer by Harry Gottlieb of a collection of 398 pristine color lithographic prints taken by William Henry Jackson. Jackson had been hired by the railroad companies to take scenic views of the railway routes to promote tourism and had produced beautiful color prints using the “Photochrom” process, and we were as eager to acquire a set as the collector was to find them an appropriate home.

HIGHLIGHTS OF A GIFT OF HARRY GOTTLIEB

Sometimes gifts are made to museums to memorialize loved ones who have passed away. John and Ideal Gladstone had always been active contributors and supporters of the Wolfsonian and Florida International University. John had contributed several articles to the Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts and they had gifted an archive of twenty-two publications and hundreds of issues of nineteenth century periodicals to FIU’s Archive Collections. After John passed away, Ideal began inviting the Wolfsonian’s librarians into her home to sift through her late husband’s library, allowing them to select whichever rare and reference books they considered appropriate for the collection. John was a real renaissance man and his library has proven to be a real gold mine for important reference works on such diverse subjects as: art history; the American labor movement; Communist art and aesthetics; World’s Fairs; technology and industrial design; and illustrated books by Rockwell Kent and others.

HIGHLIGHTS OF GIFTS MADE BY IDEAL GLADSTONE, IN MEMORY OF HER HUSBAND, JOHN

The Wolfsonian has always been interested in acquiring archives or large bodies of the work of individual artists from our period. The library, for example, has great collections of the work of a number of important book designers and graphic artists, including a group of Dutch artists working in the Nieue Kunst (or Art Nouveau) style; a collection of books, periodicals, posters and clippings of American graphic artist Bill Bradley; a collection of hand-painted book covers designed by the Rupprecht Presse in the mid-1920s; and a collection of books designed by Merle Armitage. While the Wolfsonian also had a fair number of limited edition books designed by Mac Harshberger (1900-1975), that collection was recently swelled by the generous bequest of a cousin of the family who donated scores of musical scores, song books, archival photographs and other ephemera left behind by Mac, his lyricist sister, and his partner and composer, Holland Robinson.

HIGHLIGHTS OF A GIFT FROM THE ESTATE OF WILLIAM WHITNEY

We were also recently approached by a local Miami resident Elinor Brecher, who had a gem in her possession that originally belonged to her grandfather. This rare oversized portfolio entitled Century of the Common Man: two speeches by Henry A. Wallace contains autographed color silk-screened illustrations drawn by Hugo Gellert. Born in Hungary in 1892, Gellert had moved to the United States where he used his artistic talents to support the Communist Party of the United States of America. The portfolio had been passed down to Ms. Brecher, who gifted it to the Wolfsonian in her grandfather’s memory. It joins more than fifty other illustrated works by that artist.

HIGHLIGHTS OF A GIFT OF ELINOR BRECHER, MADE IN MEMORY OF HER GRANDFATHER

As it would be impossible in such a short space to mention each and every donor to the collection, I will conclude this installment with a brief nod to a number of individuals who also donated significant rare pieces to the Wolfsonian librarian within the last five years. I thus conclude by recognizing the generosity of Dolores Trenner, Richard Schick, Tim Gleason, and Abbey Chase who gifted some of the wonderful items pictured below.