The cartoons in the first three books all were originally in black and white. That was a conscious decision, both for aesthetic and practical reasons. The cartoons were designed to be easily copied on to overhead transparencies for display in classes, workshops, and other learning environments. A group called Alliance for Inclusive Education (ALLFIE) requested permission to use one of the cartoons on the cover of their magazine and subsequently colorized it. Prompted by Giangreco’s colleagues associated with ALLFIE, Giangreco and Ruelle began to colorize the rest of the images. In this complete digital collection, we have included a total of 335 different digital images; including the 315 different cartoons from the four earlier books, 12 cartoons that were on the CD only, and eight that were not included in any of the previously published books or CD.

Cartoons from the early books have found their way on to the pages of many newsletters disseminated by schools, parent groups, disability advocacy organizations, and professional associations. They have appeared in books, manuals, and journals; a few were even published in a law journal. The cartoons have been used extensively as projected slides or within learning activities in college classes, at conferences, in workshops, and at other meetings. Parents have framed cartoons that closely reflected their own experiences and hung them in their homes or offices. Other parents have used them in meetings with professionals to help get their points across. They have been given as gifts to people who "get it" and handed out as door prizes. The Vermont Coalition for Disability Rights used them as part of "Disability Awareness Day" at the Vermont legislature. The cartoons can be used in innumerable creative ways.

Cephas Kent (1754-1813), late 18th century diary. The first part of Kent’s diary details his religious experiences between the ages of 12 and 21, while the remainder describes his participation in the Continental Army’s campaign into Canada in 1775, especially the Siege of Fort St. Jean (“St. Johns”).

Erastus Root (1789-1829), medical student diary covering 1815-1818. Topics in Root’s diary include UVM’s medical program, John Pomeroy, medical practices, teaching, and modes of travel in the early nineteenth century.

Chester Way (1897-1973), two student diaries from 1918 and 1919. Topics in Way’s diaries include the 1918 influenza pandemic, fraternities at the University of Vermont, Kake Walk, World War One and UVM’s SATC program, Vermont farm life in 1918, and male friendships and relationships in the early twentieth century.

Roswell Farnham (1827-1903), UVM student diary covering 1848-1849. Topics in this diary include the curriculum, faculty, and student experience at UVM in the late 1840s; Burlington and neighboring towns in the late 1840s, UVM’s Lambda Iota fraternity, Zachary Taylor and the Whig Party, and teaching in Vermont and Canada in the mid-nineteenth century. Near the end of the diary are several essays written by Farnham during his senior year at UVM. Topics in these essays include religion, natural history, and King Lear.

Mandana White Goodenough (1826-1924), diary covering 1844-1845 and part of 1861. Topics in this diary include employment opportunities for women in the 1840s, courtship and marriage, illness and death, and the beliefs and practices of Christians in mid-nineteenth-century Vermont.

Mary S. Davis Kelley (1866-1917), diary covering 1883-1893. Topics in this diary include women’s health and other subjects relating to health and medicine; the experiences of working women circa 1890, turn-of-the-century courtship and marriages, and the local social and cultural history of Fairlee, Vt.

Genieve Lamson (1887-1966), three diaries covering 1908-1912. Topics in Lamson’s diaries include teaching (as well as the process for becoming a certified teacher in Vermont circa 1910), major cities of the West Coast, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle; turn-of-the-century fashion and home clothes-making, the sinking of the Titanic, turn-of-the-century slang, and the local history of Randolph, Vt.

Charles Blinn (1843-1926), two civil war diaries covering 1861-1864. Topics in Blinn’s diaries include the experiences of Union soldiers in camp, on the battlefield, and as prisoners of war in Confederate prisons; the experiences of Southerners in Union-occupied towns, illness and medical practices in the military, and the Battle of Gettysburg.

Mary Farnham (1828-1913), civil war diary covering 1862-1863. Topics in Farnham’s diary include living conditions in Union camps and towns near the front lines, the roles and expectations of women during the American Civil War, Washington D.C. in the 1860s, mid-century modes of travel, and health and medicine during the Civil War.

H.O. Fisher (1872-1954), diary covering 1894-1897. In 1894, Fisher was hired to sell Merino sheep and left Vermont for New York City. In November of that year, he and his brother-in-law, Carlton Watson Sprague, sailed to South Africa with 35 sheep. Fisher returned to South Africa the following year, selling sheep in Port Elizabeth and Molteno on behalf of C.W. Mason. Fisher made a third trip overseas in 1897, this time selling sheep in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Topics in this diary include the international Merino sheep trade, selling livestock in Africa and South America, the perils of turn-of-the-century sea travel, and meteorological phenomena on the Atlantic Ocean.

Long Pond, Westmore, diary of a summer camp covering 1889-1903. The Long Pond Westmore diary, which spans the years 1889 to 1903, contains a partial history of a summer camp on Long Pond in Westmore, Vt., as well as inventories of the camp’s supplies and accounts of property maintenance and recreational activities undertaken by its caretakers. Topics in this diary include local flora and fauna and outdoor recreational activities, such as hiking and fishing.

Caroline Crane Marsh (1816-1901), seventeen diaries covering 1861-1865. Caroline Crane Marsh’s diaries (1861-1865) document the Marshes’ day-to-day lives during their time in Italy, particularly during their stay in Turin, when Caroline’s husband, George Perkins Marsh, began his long tenure (1861-1882) as U.S. Minister to the Kingdom of Italy. Topics in the Italian diaries include the American Civil War, race and slavery, Catholicism, European political and social relations, British-American political relations, Napoleon III and Second French Empire, King Victor Emmanuel II and Italian politics, Giuseppe Garibaldi and Italian nationalism, religious and funerary practices in Italy, the status and treatment of women in Italy and elsewhere, problems within and interactions between the Italian social classes, the experiences of Protestants, Jews, and rural peasants in Italy; health and medicine in Italy, Italian industries and agricultural practices, the Italian education system, the Italian language, crime and punishment in Italy, Italian fashion and etiquette, tourism and hospitality in Italy and the Alps, popular books and reading habits during the 1860s, George Perkins Marsh’s diplomatic and scholarly activities in Italy, and the everyday experiences of upper and lower-class Italians.

The diaries in this collection were largely transcribed during the work-from-home portion of the Covid-19 pandemic by Special Collections staff (Ingrid Bower, Erin Doyle, Hannah Johnson, Sharon Thayer) and students (Ella Breed, Dorothy Dye, Ibrahim Genzhiyev, Tabitha Ireifej, Mike Maloney). Transcription work on the Caroline Crane Marsh diaries was greatly aided by previous work conducted by Mary Alice Lowenthal.

John Johnson -- surveyor, millwright, master builder, civil engineer -- was born in Canterbury, New Hampshire on December 2, 1771. He moved to north-western Vermont in 1790 and eventually settled in Essex, where he helped build a dam and several mills at Hubbells Falls on the Winooski River. Johnson's practical versatility soon made him the most prominent surveyor and engineer in northern Vermont and Lower Canada, and the growing demand for his services led him to move to Burlington in 1809. He was named Surveyor General of Vermont in 1813, and four years later received the appointment of superintendent of the survey of the United States-Canada border from the Bay of Fundy to the head of the Connecticut River. Although the survey was suspended after two years, Johnson's work along the Maine-New Brunswick line in 1818-19 served as a partial basis for the final settlement of the border under the Webster-Ashburton Treaty in 1842.

Johnson maintained his several careers in the 1820's and 1830's. He designed or constructed many of the finest residences and public buildings in Chittenden County, served as a consultant on engineering projects as far away as North Carolina and Illinois, and continued to run surveys throughout northern Vermont. He also served again as Surveyor General of the state in the 1830's, and worked throughout that decade as an inspector for the Vermont Mutual Fire Insurance Company. Johnson died of sudden attack of erysipelas fever on April 30, 1842 at the age of seventy.

HISTORY UVM's Kake Walk dates to the early 1890s when it resembled the popular American minstrel show. A dance known as the cakewalk, by then a standard act in minstrel theatre, originated on plantations as a competition among slaves. The pair that most entertained their white owners would be awarded cake. The cakewalk later evolved into a refined social dance whose accompanying music was a predecessor to ragtime. UVM's Kake Walk departed from these styles, however, to become its own unique tradition.

Early Kake Walks featured a pair of men in costume (one in drag) wearing blackface. In addition to the "a walkin' fo' de kake" competition, the event included grotesque stunts and a peerade; skits were soon added. In the 1930s and 1940s, the Winter Carnival weekend grew to include the election of a King and Queen and a snow sculpture competition. After World War II, male walkers wore suits in the colors of their fraternity known as "silks." The judging was codified as the high-stepping dances became more and more stylized. By the 1960s, the three-day festival also included a ball, a jazz concert, and winter sporting events. Local merchants benefitted from the influx of returning alumni and visiting guests, and the organizing committee made significant profits. Kake Walk was governed by fraternity brothers known as Directors, as well as a female student appointed Secretary.

Professors James Loewen and Larry McCrorey date dissent concerning Kake Walk to as early as 1954 when Phi Sigma Delta first refused to wear blackface. Various statements opposing Kake Walk were printed in the Cynic, published in local papers, and delivered at public events; two students picketed the last performance. In 1963, the Interfraternity Council (IFC) voted to eliminate blackface in favor of light green makeup but to continue using dialect. In 1964, due to audience complaints, the makeup was changed again to a darker green which, in black and white photographs, is impossible to distinguish from blackface. In 1969, due to successive decisions by a student-faculty committee, the Student Association, and the IFC, Kake Walk was officially eliminated from the Winter Carnival weekend.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF COLLECTION This digital collection contains a selection of records from the University Archives such as event invitations, recruitment flyers, documentation of ticket requests, press releases, financial records, committee minutes, and director's reports. There are several representative examples of correspondence from alumni and community members responding to the discontinuation of Kake Walk. Some notable records include the 1964 document "A New Face," which announces the switch to dark green makeup after one year of light green; the results of the 1969 student opinion poll on the future of Kake Walk; the October 31, 1969 announcement eliminating Kake Walk from the Winter Carnival weekend; and a 1977 letter describing the Greek and Panhellenic vote to oppose any Kake Walk revivals.

Fourteen student newspapers from the University of Vermont are included in this collection. Every year, The Vermont Cynic produced a Kake Walk special edition. A sampling of papers from 1923 - 1977 were selected for this digital collection, as well as an article from 2004. The Cynics include some advertisements and articles unrelated to Kake Walk, but the majority of the papers' contents document Winter Carnival planning, activities, and participants. Some of the later newspapers, such as the 1954 Cynic, include debates around Kake Walk and voices of dissent.

Twenty-one Kake Walk programs ranging from 1898 to 1970 document the increasingly well-designed and expensively-produced publications. The programs contain information about winter carnival events, judges, committee members, participants, scorecards, royalty candidates, and awards. The programs include advertisements from local businesses, photographs of activities and participants, and various accounts of the history of Kake Walk. Blackface first appeared on a program cover in 1938 and was depicted on subsequent publications, with varying degrees of realism, until the last performance in 1969. Researchers will notice two parody programs: a 1922 publication imitating a Communist "rag" and a 1924 program entitled The Bohemian Meow. The program for the 1970 film festival which replaced Kake Walk is also included.

More than one hundred photographs taken during the last decade of the University of Vermont's Winter Carnival are available in this collection. The photos were most likely taken by staff and student enthusiasts to document and publicize the committee's production work, Winter Carnival events, and Kake Walk performances. In some cases, professional photographers may have been hired.

This collection also includes many non-traditional archival formats. Starting around 1912, all Kake Walkers choreographed their high-stepping dances to the syncopated tune of "Cotton Babes." A 10 inch 78 rpm record of this signature musical piece has been digitized and made available online. Originally composed by Percy Weinrich, this version of the song was arranged by UVM Band Director Joseph Lechnyr. A bronze Kake Walk trophy and fraternity drinking souvenirs such as a metal cup and a ceramic jug represent the many artifacts associated with this event.

In 2004, the Howe Library held an exhibit entitled "UVM's Past: The Legacy of Kake Walk." This collection makes available exhibit materials archived at UVM, including newspaper articles which may have been on display, draft exhibit labels, and a notebook containing visitor comments.

PROCESSING INFORMATION Undergraduate and continuing education students enrolled in the summer 2010 ALANA US Ethnic Studies course "Curating Kake Walk: Race, Memory, and Representation" contributed to this collection overview and provided subject headings describing many of the collection's digital objects. They also developed several criteria in order to select the collection image thumbnail. In a statement reflective of class discussions and opinions, one group wrote that the Kake Walk at UVM materials "should be seen not as encouraging racism, but as an opportunity to learn from insensitivities from the past that can help us build a more unified future.

SUGGESTED READINGS For more information, see "The Black Image in White Vermont: The Origin, Meaning, and Abolition of Kake Walk" by former UVM Professor James Loewen. This chapter is included in this collection and was originally published as part of a book commemorating the University of Vermont's bicentennial. At the time this collection launched, it was the only known scholarly work on Kake Walk. Another secondary source which discusses Kake Walk, a 2004 speech on racism in Vermont by Professor Larry McCrorey, is also included here. See also a document in this collection entitled "Kake Walk Data" which compiles minutes and published information on committees, judges, programs, receipts, rules, and walkers.

Highlights of the collection include: a selection of recipes from Judith Jones, cookbook editor for Julia Child and part-time Vermont resident; published recipes from celebrated Vermont food establishments, including the Inn at Shelburne Farms, the Cobble House Inn, and the New England Culinary Institute; and recipes from community organizations, including local Vermont church groups, the Green Mountain Folklore Society, and the University of Vermont.

The materials in this collection are a small sampling of the cookbook collection in the University of Vermont Libraries Department of Special Collections.