Images of Brown | c u r i o

Photographing the Break Up of Time

January 16, 2014 by lelgin | Comments Off on Photographing the Break Up of Time

While the vast majority of my work involves photographing items in collection, it may also have become clear in my blog posts that I’m occasionally asked to document library events and library spaces. All of Brown’s libraries have some incredible spaces – for research, for teaching, for collaboration, and for study – and Brown has been diligent in their efforts to maintain their libraries as 21st-century learning environments. As a result, I often have the opportunity to document the renovation of these spaces, as well as the items in Brown’s collections that are on view in the libraries.

This past October, Brown alumna and generous Brown University Library supporter Elizabeth Z. Chace (’59, PHB ’96 hon., GP ’13, GP ’15) donated Break Up of Time, 2006, by John Okulick. The approximately 6′ x 6′ aluminum, resin, and wood sculpture was installed in our Sciences Library, in a bustling open landing right behind the main entrance.

The challenging part about photographing the sculpture is its location; it’s great for visibility, but it’s tough to get a nice, straight-on shot of it. The sculpture is also lit by three light sources – overhead fluorescent, tungsten light underneath, and window side lighting. Because it’s a fairly high-polish metal, the sculpture is highly reflective and picks up the colors of the light and walls reflecting off of it.

Using my tilt-shift lens, I was able to get a straight-on shot without actually having to be directly in front of the piece. I bracketed for exposure and white balance to get a clean image (when layered in Photoshop). I also took some images that show a little more of the environment around the sculpture, again trying to avoid as much glare, color cast issues, and unnatural skewing of the object as possible.

This image (left) gives a view from the entrance to the staircase, where most people encounter the sculpture for the first time.

College Hill: What Was There

October 4, 2013 by rness | 1 Comment

Brown University Library Digital Collections are a rich resource for historical photographs. The collection Images of Brown contains over 4,000 digital objects alone, with more being added all the time. This collection contains many historical photographs of the campus, but also of the surrounding neighborhood of College Hill (upon which the University sits). The WhatWasThere project allows users to tie historical photographs to Google Street View and makes it possible to envision how your environment looked in the past by fading the photograph in and out. I chose to work with two photographs taken between The John D. Rockefeller Library and the John Hay Library. The photographer in each would have been standing close to the gates to the University looking down College Hill. In the tree lined views, neither library exists. The Hay was completed in 1910, and the “The Rock,” as it is commonly known, wasn’t built until 1964. The first photograph I chose to “fade” represents a view looking down College Street, sometime in the latter part of the nineteenth century. The street is deserted but for a solitary figure caught in motion. What is now the RISD College Building can be seen in the distance. The second photograph appears to be slightly more recent, with the addition of tracks in the street for trolley service. A streetcar filled with passengers approaches the east side. Not all opted for public transit on this sun-filled day; several men in bowlers and boys can be seen walking (even running) up the hill. A dog seems to be accompanying them on the trek (click images for zoomable views.) The interactivity which comes from being able to fade historical photographs from a past era to the present illuminates the past, sparks our imagination, and prompts us to see our daily environment us quite differently.

I encourage you browse the Brown Digital Repository for historical photographs, and to also find interactive ways to experience them. It’s fun navigating familiar streets as they appeared in the past. We would love to hear from you @BrownCurio if you make a successful fade using an image from Brown’s Digital Collections!

Looking up College Hill from South Main Street, in the winter of 1880.

College Hill seen from the gates of Brown University, 1870

Dorm Life

June 6, 2013 by rness | 1 Comment

North Slater Hall, North West corner, room 20. February 1910

A quiet lull has settled upon campus following the Magnolia bloom, end of semester, and graduation. The dormitories are empty after a mad flurry of packing, shipping, and mountainous sidewalk disposals.

A glimpse inside what typical student housing looks like on campus today can be had by taking a 360 virtual tour of the “Green Dorm Room”, but what was student housing like on campus during the first half of the 20th century? Photographs from the Brown University Archives, part of the recently published Images of Brown collection, give an inkling to what dorm life looked like in days gone by.

Up until 1935, students were able to furnish their own rooms in a style of their choosing. The image above shows Edgar G. Buzzell and Dana G. Munro relaxing in their 4th floor Slater Hall room, on a February night in 1910.

Student housing first became available at Brown with the completion of the second floor of University Hall in 1772, but it wasn’t until October 1891 that the first female students arrived on Campus. The first dormitory for women students was a building known as the Slater Homestead, on Benefit Street. John Slater’s widow gifted the building to the Women’s College at Brown University in 1900. In 1910, Miller Hall was built to accommodate about fifty women students, replacing the Homestead (now a nursing home named Hallworth House). The Women’s College became Pembroke College in 1928, and over the years Pembroke and Brown merged student organizations and classes to become a truly co-educational university. 1969 brought the first co-ed dorm, when fifty-seven Pembroke Freshman moved into the top two floors of Diman House in the Wriston Quadrangle. Below is a Brown News Agency photograph showing a group of Pembrokers (as they were then known) at leisure, playing cards, reading, knitting, and eating chocolates.

Dormitory scene in Pembroke College, 1949

BrownTown and Traces of the Past

March 1, 2013 by rness | Comments Off on BrownTown and Traces of the Past

BrownTown with Marvel Gymnasium in background, c.1947

Historic photographs of a particular place often depict a community no longer present, while exhibiting architectural and geographic traces that we can recognize. It is these traces that connect us to the past, and which also distance us from it. The work that I did preparing digital images for Images of Brown, allowed me an often nostalgic, and sometimes surprising view, into a place that I have called home for nearly 30 years, the East Side of Providence, Rhode Island. The area is an historic one, much of the architecture and terrain today is similar to as it was a over a century ago, and very familiar to me. Which is why, I stopped and took notice when I was reviewing several images which were captioned BrownTown. What was this BrownTown? I recognized surrounding buildings, but never knew that a BrownTown existed. I crossed the street to the Brown University Archives and began consulting the folders of material on the construction, maintenance, and eventual destruction of BrownTown, Providence, Rhode Island.

The corner of Elmgrove Ave. and Sessions St., 1946

Cement posts being installed on the corner of
Elmgrove Ave. and Sessions St., c.1946

After the end of World War II, The G.I. Bill encouraged many World War II veterans to seek a college education. Brown reacted by opening The Veterans Extension Program in the fall of 1946, bringing the University into the national spotlight as a leader in assuring veterans education. From 1,400 applicants, 486 WWII veterans were accepted to the University through a streamlined application process. Over 100 of these students were married and either had children or were expecting. There was a critical housing shortage nationwide, including Providence. Where would they live?

The problem was uniquely solved when the U.S. Government War Surplus Division donated a dozen former Navy barracks to the University, and the city offered to lease to Brown, the Sessions Street Playground at the Corner of Elmgrove Avenue and Sessions Street. (Currently, the site of the Jewish Community Center of Rhode Island). Eight barracks would fit on the lot. They were brought in sections from the Coddington Point site in Newport, and set up on cement posts. This temporary emergency housing was given the name, BrownTown, and on December 9^th, 1946, 100 families moved in to the furnished apartments.

Brown Town, Joe Schaefer’s room

Each of the units had an icebox, hotplate, and a tiny iron sink. Flower pots and flower beds distinguished the different residences, as did the informal naming of the “streets”, or rows, between the barracks after wartime locales, Guadalcanal, Normandy, Pearl Harbor, etc. In local newspapers, Brown is described as being a good landlord, pets were allowed, and rent was low at $26-$42 a month. BrownTown’s population exploded. At one time, the hundred families in Brown Town had a total of 120 children. Fifty babies were born during the summer of 1947. Student residents juggled academics with family life, attending baby caring clinics, forming babysitting pools, and building play pens, to keep children out of Elmgrove Avenue, described at the time as a speedway for motorists.

Brown Town was a thriving community for four years, but it was erected as a temporary community, and in 1950, after the inaugural class graduated, half of the buildings were removed. BrownTown was fully razed on June 1951. The fleeting phenomena of BrownTown is summed up in a student essay titled The Suburban History of BrownTown 1946-51, as a “quick life and death of a suburban suburbia.”

Interior Designs

January 4, 2013 by lelgin | 1 Comment

Much of the work that we do here at DPS involves objects and items from the Brown Library’s Special Collections. These are housed in the John Hay Library, which just recently celebrated its Centennial. It is a gorgeous building, and many of the simple, white wooden doors belie the beautifully curated spaces beyond.

The Bruhn Memorial Reading Room is one such room. When I was asked for photograph it for Brown’s new version of the History & Guide to Special Collections, I had never actually been in the room before. Home to part of the Special Collections, and featuring warm wood paneling and tall windows that overlook Prospect Street, the Bruhn Room is used for a variety of purposes within the library, from classes and private study, to candidate presentations and meetings, to videotaped interviews with students and visiting scholars.

It’s a beautiful space, to be certain, but it’s difficult to capture all of this photographically. To capture all the elements of the room; from the paneling and windows, to the many books, objects, furniture and chandelier, I had to make many exposures that I could use to blend together to create one single, merged image. I shot a great many images, varying both the exposures (to pick up the detailing under the tables, in the bookcases, and on the ceiling), and the white balance (to correct for the overhead lights as well as the window light from outside). Although I did use a specialized lens (a 24mm tilt-shift lens, like the one in this video) to correct for perspective issues, I also had to make a final perspective correction as well.

The final image came out very strong, and ended up being published in The Manuscript Society News (vol 31, no. 4). Below you will see the progression of images as I compiled the final image, building up exposures and color balance. n.b.: You can click on any image to make it larger, and then click through the images to view one at a time.

Image 1: Overexposure to capture shadow detail under table, in bookcases.

Image 2: A darker exposure to bring out the richness in the wood paneling, floors and walls.

Image 3: A MUCH darker exposure, to bring out the details in the ceiling, washed out in the previous exposures.

Image 4: Image correction in Photoshop to correct the ceiling color and luminance but preserve the detail of the chandelier.

Image 5: An additional, darker layer, to bring in ONLY the detail of the overexposed window.

Image 6: An exposure the same as Image 5, but set to daylight white balance to correct the blue tone.

Image 7: A slight darkening on the ceiling, along the strips of light that outline the arch.

Image 8: A minor contrast adjustment on the same strip of ceiling, to show the detailing and sculptural quality of the ceiling.

The final image, with perspective adjustments to compensate for shooting at a wide angle in an enclosed interior space.

Hurricane of 1938

September 21, 2012 by Ann Caldwell | Comments Off on Hurricane of 1938

Today, September 21, 2012, is the anniversary of the Great Hurricane of 1938 which struck New England, killing approximately 600 people and causing millions of dollars in damage.

As a typical New Englander who is obsessed with weather-watching, I was excited to find this recording of barometric pressure for the week of the hurricane among the items Digital Production Services has digitized for the Ladd Observatory. The enormous dip in the pressure occurred the day of the hurricane.

Although Brown was fortunate in that it did not experience the same level of devastation which hit much of the state, there was still damage. Here an automobile (can you identify it?) is crushed by one of the stately trees on the campus.

c u r i o

Imaging rare, unusual, and intriguing objects at the Brown University Library

Category Archives: Images of Brown