Personal History
If you were a student at Dartmouth between 1890 and 1950, chances are you would have kept a scrapbook. “I suspect that scrapbooking was a social, communal activity much like quilting,” says archivist Peter Carini. Special Collections has about 300 scrapbooks, many donated by the creator or his family. “Some donors seek immortality,” says Carini, “while some just can’t bring themselves to throw things away.” He acknowledges, however, that the contents of scrapbooks provide an interesting, if sometimes crinkled, peek at the past.
Most of the scrapbooks in Rauner are oversized, with thick leather bindings. Some are overstuffed and crumbling, others are tidy and organized with tiny photographs arranged and labeled in a perfect grid. Their contents trumpet Dartmouth’s seemingly unstoppable football team and announce speech contests and “Smoke Talks” on subjects such as “The Typical American” or a recent coal strike. Chock full of ticket stubs, hotel brochures, menus, even cigarette butts and bottle caps, the scrapbooks live up to the name.
Some are mundane—one student devotes a page to four editions of the College’s “Regulations of the Faculty.” Others include old bills and overdue library book notices.
“If you look closely you’ll see not all scrapbookers were good, upstanding citizens,” says Carini. In the scrapbook compiled by Robert Williams ’26—actually just a pile of papers stacked in the back of a binder—is a letter from a dean addressed to Williams’ father. “It is with sincere regret that I find myself under the necessity of informing you that your son has been separated from college because of his unsatisfactory record,” writes the dean. Did Mr. Williams ever receive the letter, or did his son somehow intercept it and stash it away?
Student scrapbooking declined as other social opportunities, such as the car, presented themselves, says Carini. On one hand it seems unlikely that Dartmouth students today would pursue the hobby. Then again, they have Facebook.
Joe Babcock is a high school writing instructor. He lives in Chicago.
