July 5, 2011 – NC Miscellany

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s character Dred may have never resided in the Great Dismal Swamp, but hundreds of other enslaved individuals did. And this fall, officials plan to open a permanent exhibit on the runaway slave communities that sought safe haven in the swamp. The Great Dismal became such a common hiding place for runaways that the N.C. legislature passed a law in 1847 requiring registration for slaves working in the swamp. Unregistered slaves working in the swamp could be arrested and subjected to 39 lashes on the back. The person who arrested the slave could also demand a 25 dollar reward from the slaveowner. Employers who hired runaways or unregistered slaves could be fined $100 and imprisoned for 3 months.

Greetings from the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives Technical Services!

We are pleased to announce that two new collections containing images from vast areas of N.C. now have finding aids containing enhanced arrangement and description.

Both of these collections were originally part of the North Carolina County Photographic Collection (P0001), but each is now an independent collection.

The two new collections are:

P73: North Carolina Railroad Station Photograph Collection
–Brand new EAD finding aid; Enhanced arrangement/description
–69 digital images in Digital NCCPA and available via the finding aid

The North Carolina Railroad Station Photograph Collection consists of 66 images of North Carolina railroad stations. Images depict railroad stations in over 40 counties in North Carolina and consists of photographic prints made from images taken by unidentified photographers. Materials are arranged by location, and many descriptions include the name of the railroad company that owned or managed the stations.

P74: Albertype Co. Collection of North Carolina Photographs
–Brand new EAD finding aid; Enhanced arrangement/description

The Albertype Co., headquartered in Brooklyn, N.Y., produced postcards and other printed materials from 1890 until 1952. The company utilized a specific photomechanical processes process invented by Joseph Albert in Australia in the late 1860s, which was an improvement on the collotype photographic process. The company had teams of photographers who traveled across the United States taking and buying images depicting people, places, and activities in all parts of the country. A majority of the images were published as postcards and marketed to be sold in the locales depicted in the images. The images in this collection, circa 1900-1930s, depict buildings, monuments, people, and scenes in a number of cities and towns across North Carolina in over 50 different counties. Included are black-and-white photographic negatives (original and duplicates) and black-and-white photographic prints.

Several of the negatives found in The Albertype Co. Collection of North Carolina Photographs (P0074) were used to created postcards that can be found in two other collection in the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives: The Durwood Barbour Collection of North Carolina Postcards (P0077) and the North Carolina Postcard Collection (P0052).

Digital versions of many of the postcards from both of these related collections can be viewed at http://www.lib.unc.edu/dc/nc_post/index.php

Enjoy!

-NCCPA Technical Services