Day Twenty

My final day was great! During the coffee break, the employees held a small party for me and wished me luck. I've been invited to work in the summer and I was kindly given some recommendations. It was good excellent junior project.

Day Nineteen

I spent most of the day cleaning up and getting ready to leave. It was a good project, but now I'm ready to be done. I'm looking forward to hear about how the projects of other juniors have gone. I hope there will be more to report about on the last day.

Journal entry with 19th century leaf:

Day Eighteen

Winding down the internship now. I checked the inventory of two disaster supply closet and finished another draft of my article. I may take some photographs of the vault and all the things stored in the library building. The American Philosophical Society has a pretty impressive inventory.

Detailed scribble

Day Seventeen

I finished reboxing the collection today. It was another quiet day, but I do get to start working on two disaster supply closets tomorrow. I have a feeling that this next project will not take all day and I will have extra time to possibly spend some time reading or studying for the SAT. I do not feel angry at all that I have less to do right now, I think it is hard enough already for the library staff members to find me a job for only a month. I only have 3 more days and I don't think it is easy to find 3 day projects.

Another drawing:

Day Sixteen

I stayed dry today in the library as it poured outside for most of the work day. Although reboxing the Eastwick collection is not the most interesting thing I have done during this internship, it is not very stressful. I was able to make a couple corrections to the work I did during the beginning of the month, nothing spectacular.

Here is a doodle I found in a diary the other day.

Day Fifteen

I finished another draft today and began to rehouse the Eastwick collection into new folders. I am excited to be close to finishing my internship, but not so excited to go back to school. I still really enjoying the project (particularly the later wake up), but I it is an awkward job. I don't have any job training and because I'm only at work for a month, I don't get very large projects. The fact that the job does not follow me home after work hours is however much better than homework.

Here is a drawing of a house somehow related to a "Rittenhouse", possibly a house in Rittenhouse Town, Philadelphia.

Day Thirteen and Fourteen

Sorry for the lack of a post yesterday. I was sick and stayed home for the day. Today I finished up my draft of my article and enjoyed the feeling of being almost done another project. Tomorrow I will probably start a new project and revise my paper in the evening. The most interesting thing to see today was the original charter for the colony of Pennsylvania.

Here is what I believe is a drawing of Grumblethorpe by Charles J. Wister Jr.

Day Twelve

I am getting pretty close to finishing the first draft of my paper, but it will still be a while before I'm finished. I found an online copy of Manuel Crisóstomo Náxera's De lingua Othomitorum dissertatio. This page in particular is interesting. That is about it for today. The most interesting of the day may have been during coffee break when some of the American Philosophical Society's employees talked about fall out shelters from the 1950's. It was interesting to think of abandoned underground structures in Philadelphia.

Here is another piece I found in the diary of Charles J. Wister Jr.

Day Eleven

I started this week by continuing my project from last week. The paper is going rather slow, but it will get easier. It was a rather calm day with very little to talk about it. Here are two drawings of Charles J. Wister Jr. to give you something of worth for reading the blog.

Day Ten

Today the APS celebrated the birthday of Benjamin Franklin. Although Franklin's birthday is January 17, 1706, it was celebrated today. There was a lecture about American "Character" and a march to Franklin's grave at the burial ground of Christ Church. A large crowd showed up to pay their respects and honor his memory.

I found it odd to think that I'm already half way through my project. The paper I am writing may be difficult, but I am still enjoying the break from school. Most of next week will probably be spent writing my paper, but I still think I will have time to experience other aspects of the American Philosophical Society.

Day Nine

I began on my next project today. It will be what I thought was going to be my last project, but it is not a problem. I will be writing an article about the American Philosophical Society's connections with Latin American. I will have to use the library's resources and come up with my own ideas from primary materials and perhaps a couple of secondary sources. For example, there is an article written by a Mexican member of the American Philosophical Society in Latin about the similarities between the native languages of Mexico and Chinese. The subject of the article is interesting and so is the fact that it was written in the early 1800's.

I was able to take several pictures of drawings by Charles J. Wister Jr. and I will trickle them in while I write my article.

Day Eight

I finished with the Eastwick Collection today, but I forget my camera. I'll try to take some pictures later of some interesting things I saw in the collection today. There were some pencil and ink drawings by Charles Wister Jr. of Grumblethorpe , Rittenhouse Town, and I think Newport. I had lunch at the Bourse today. Here is a photo of the building in 1930:

Day Seven

The end is in sight! I have less than 20 items to catalogue out of 1500 item collection. There is hardly anything new to report, but I have one old picture I took when it snowed and a couple from today. Here is a statue of Robert Morris outside the American Philosophical Society and a link for more information about him:

Wikipedia-Robert Morris

Also here is a photo of the letter of disownment to Charles J. Wister from the Society of Friends:

Finally, here is a picture of an illustration in a notebook of Charles J. Wister:

Day Six

After a relaxing weekend, I came back to work on the Eastwick collection. I catalogued a journal about a love affair, a travel log and among other things, a letter of disownment to Charles J. Wister from the Society of Friends. Here is the letter with the original punctuation:

At a monthly meeting of Friends of Philadelphia held 25th of 11th Month 1803 the following Testimony was agreed to : and a Copy directed to be delivered to the party

"Charles Jones Wister, of this City Merchant,
"Who had a birthright in our Religious Society, hath
"deviated from our peaceable Principles, by paying a
'Militia Time in lieu of personal service for which he
"hath been tenderly recited with but not appearing
"duly sensible of the nature of our Testimony in this
"Respect, We tertify that he hath separated himself
"from us, and we no longer consider him as retaining
" a Right of Membership amoung us, nevertheless
"devise he may become convinced of his Error

"and seek to be Restored.

I found some images of watercolors from the period of many of the letters I catalogued. They are interesting and help give an idea of what life was like.

Day Five

Today the snow made Philadelphia very photogenic. The snow was not too deep to impede my trip at all. The staff at the library celebrated a birthday and there was lots of food and extra break time.

Spent lunch eating "southern style" food at Delilah's in Reading Terminal Market with Jackson.

To finish off this week on the blog I'm leaving part of a letter I transcribed today:

Middletown May 27th 1828

From C.M. Poice to William W. Wister at Germantown (probably at Grumblethorpe)

Dear Billy,

I intended to have written you before this, but have been so much engaged I have hardly had time to write anyone. I hear that you are positively engaged to Miss H.L.M. To be sure I was not very much surprised to hear it, for it has been my opinion that it would be so for some time past. I wish you in answering this (letter) would let me know all about it, when it is to take place, and if you think proper, give my respects to her. I expect to see you and Jack this way before a great while, I shall be very happy to see you.

Day Four

I'm about half way through the Wister collection now. Today I saw lottery tickets from 1770's and 1790's. Working at American Philosophical Society is very interesting. The materials they have at the library are very diverse. As I was working on 18th century documents, the person next to me was working with photographs and signatures of Albert Einstein. (The following photo was not at the library)

The Ballad of Chestnut Hill and the spelling of "Miss"

Here are three photographs, one of the ballad I talked about on day one, another of the spelling of "Miss" in the late 1700's and finally the evidence that some spelling was sloppy.

Day Three

Today I got to handle some photographs taken in the 1840's and 1860's. It turns out that Charles J. Wister Jr. was one of the first to work with photography in Philadelphia. Here is a picture of him outside his Grumblethorpe estate in 1860:

The following are some pictures I took of the more interesting finds today.

I handled the passport of Carl Heutzeberg from 1764:

I looked at a letter to the Managers of the United States Lottery:

Other highlights including looking at a letter to George Washington, a proclamation of George III and eating at Reading Terminal Market for lunch with Jackson and Maya.

Day Two

Day two continued about the same as day one. I entered general information about various papers into a database for the duration of my work day (9:00am to 3:00pm). I recorded the authors and recipients of letters, dates, content length, and interesting facts about the papers I worked with.

I found several things amusing about the documents I saw. Spelling rules and letter forms seem to have not existed in the late 1700's and early 1800's. It was refreshing in a way, but made some letters very difficult to read. The letter 'f' was often used in place of the modern 's'. For example, "Miss Smith" in 2009, and "Mifs Smith" in 1789.

Here are pictures from the internet of buildings I pass and see on the way to work:

Day One

(Grumblethorpe, home of the Wistar family. Circa 1870)

Today I got acquainted with the society's main building, registered for the month and began working on my first project, rehousing the Eastwick collection. This collection of the papers relating to the Wister family in Germantown contains some interesting materials. One of papers I found was ballad written about the area of Philadelphia known as Chestnut Hill. The hand writing of many of the letters was pretty, but was not always particularly neat.

The Society and my Internship

I began work at the American Philosophical Society today at 9:00am. The society, founded by Benjamin Franklin in 1743, promotes "useful knowledge" in a wide area of intellectual fields. The American Philosophical Society has gathered and spread information and knowledge for centuries. The society's library not only preserves past knowledge, but allows for the continuation of learning by future generations. For the next four weeks I will work in various departments at the society's library.

The projects I will complete are as follows:

-The first week I am working on rehousing the Eastwick collection. The collection contains papers relating to the Wister family of Germantown from 1767-1903.

-The second week I will work on data entry at the library.

-The third week I will organize, restock, and inventory two disaster supply closets and then learn about environmental monitoring.

-The final week I will look at a variety of articles, newspapers, and books on Philadelphia's and the American Philosophical Society's connections with Spaniards and Latin Americans from 1775-1825. After researching this topic I will complete a short written guide.

Here are a few links that provide a more in depth view of the society's history and mission:

The American Philosophical Philosophical Society's website

Wikipedia

US History.org