California Women and Politics: From the Gold Rush to the Great Depression

Wednesday, October 5, 2011, 6:00 p.m.

California Women and Politics: From the Gold Rush to the Great Depression

Book Event with editors Robert Cherny and Mary Ann Irwin and contributor Susan Englander

Free Event at the California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco

Robert Cherny, Mary Ann Irwin, and Susan Englander discuss their book, California Women and Politics: From the Gold Rush to the Great Depression. In 1911, as progressivism moved toward its zenith, California granted women the right to vote. However, women’s political involvement in California’s public life did not begin with suffrage, nor did it end there. Across the state, women had been deeply involved in politics long before suffrage, and—although their tactics and objectives changed—they remained deeply involved thereafter. The contributors consider not only white middle-class women’s organizing but also the politics of working-class women and women of color, emphasizing that there was not one monolithic “women’s agenda,” but rather a multiplicity of women’s voices demanding recognition for a variety of causes. Book will be available for purchase at event. RSVP to 415.357.1848, ext. 229 or rsvp@calhist.org.

San Francisco Schuetzen Verein

I have just completed the online finding aid for a wonderful – and oddly lovely – collection, the San Francisco Schuetzen Verein records, which were donated to CHS by Carolyn Kuri (whose grandfather was a member of the Schuetzen Verein) in 1998. CHS would like to thank Tierney Haupt for processing this collection during her enormously productive internship here this summer.

            The San Francisco Schuetzen Verein was founded in August 1859 by Jacob Knell, H. Millemann, and John Reinhart as a militia and shooting society for the city’s new German American residents. In its early days, the organization held shooting tournaments, parades, and eagle-king shoots, as well as regular target practice in Hayes Park. After President Lincoln’s assassination in 1865, the Schuetzen Verein patrolled the streets of San Francisco for two days and two nights until they were relieved by federal troops. The organization later evolved into a social and athletic club, sponsoring festivals and events around the Bay Area, with headquarters at the corner of Polk and Turk Streets.

            Dated between 1860 and 1946, the collection contains a wide variety of materials: administrative records, ephemera, publications, and surprisingly ornate artifacts, including a silk badge with gold brocade, embroidered silk sashes, a leather belt, targets with bullet holes, stamps, and an embossed seal press for the San Francisco International Shooting Festival Association. Like other nineteenth-century San Franciscans, members of the Schuetzen Verein had a passion for regalia, parades, and colorful ephemera – perhaps only to be surpassed by their love of the prize shoot.

            This image shows the cover of the San Francisco Schuetzen Verein’s 1909 Golden Jubilee souvenir:

            I love the armed cherub astride a grizzly bear. He squints as he takes aim at a target affixed to a column emblazoned with grape vines. Meanwhile, the sun is setting on the Pacific.

            The link to the online finding aid for the collection can be found here: http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt696nf4s4

Marie Silva

Archivist & Manuscripts Librarian

History's Anteroom: Photography in San Francisco 1906 - 1909

Wednesday, September 28, 2011, 5:30 p.m.

History's Anteroom: Photography in San Francisco 1906 - 1909

Free Event at the California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco

The California Historical Society and William Stout Architecture Annex present authors Rodger Birt and Marvin R. Nathan. They will present and discuss the historical context of History's Anteroom, a collection of vintage photographs made in San Francisco, California, during the years 1906-1909. In April 1906 the San Francisco Bay Area fell victim to a powerful earthquake, and in October 1909 the city hosted a "regional rebirth" with a celebration named the Portola Festival. The photographs and illustrations reproduced here - some only rarely shown or seen now for the first time - have been given a close reading and placed within the specific historical context. The result is a journey back into the early history of the twentieth century and its first great urban catastrophe. Book will be available for purchase at event. Space still available, please RSVP to 415.357.1848, ext. 229 or email rsvp@calhist.org.

Hollywood Left and Right: How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics

Hollywood Left and Right: How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics
Book Event with author Steven J. Ross

Thursday, September 15, 2011, 6:00 p.m. at the Lummis Home, 200 E. Avenue 43, Los Angeles,CA
RSVP required, email rsvp@calhist.org or call 415.357.1848, ext. 229.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 6:00 p.m. at the California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco
RSVP required, email rsvp@calhist.org or call 415.357.1848, ext. 229.


On September 15, 2011, the California Historical Society in partnership with the Historical Society of Southern California presents a lecture and reception with author Steven Ross featuring a discussion of his newly released Hollywood Left and Right:How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics.We hope you can join us for this special event at the Lummis Home in Los Angeles.


If you are in northern California, we hope you can attend this event at the California Historical Society in San Francisco on September 21, 2011 when author Steven J. Ross will also discuss Hollywood Left and Right:How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics.

In Hollywood Left and Right, Steven J. Ross tells a story that has escaped public attention: the emergence of Hollywood as a vital center of political life and the important role that movie stars have played in shaping the course of American politics.  Through compelling larger-than-life figures in American cinema, Hollywood Left and Right reveals how the film industry's engagement in politics has been longer, deeper, and more varied than most people would imagine.  Hollywood Left and Right challenges the commonly held belief that Hollywood has always been a bastion of liberalism. The real story, as Ross shows in this passionate and entertaining work, is far more complicated. An eminent historian of film, Steven J. Ross is recipient of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Film Scholars Award and author of the prize-winning book, Working-Class Hollywood: Silent Film and the Shaping of Class in America.Hollywood Left and Right will be available for purchase at event.RSVP required, contact 415.357.1848, ext. 229 or email rsvp@calhist.org.

Bernard Maybeck: Architect of Elegance

Thursday, September 8, 2011, 6:00 p.m.
Book Launch with author Mark A. Wilson

Free Event at the California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco

Architectural historian Mark A. Wilson will present a slide lecture on the life and work of Bernard Maybeck, and sign copies of his new book Bernard Maybeck: Architect of Elegance. The author's 22-year friendship with Maybeck's daughter-in-law, Jacomena Maybeck, gave him unique insights into the life and work of one of America's most important architects. The book includes personal letters and drawings by Maybeck, as well as family photos, many of which have never been seen by the general public. Maybeck's granddaughter, Cherry Maybeck Nittler, wrote the foreword, and there are over 220 color photos of Maybeck's buildings by Joel Puliatti, who did the interior photos for Wilson's previous book Julia Morgan: Architect of Beauty.

Back to School

Take a look at some of our favorite school photos from the collections of the California Historical Society.

AAA Junior Safety Patrol student members, California, 1947

Photographer: Duke Downey

California Historical Society, San Francisco Chron Coll., CHS2011.618

Students on first Antelope Valley Union High School bus, which ran between Palmdale and  Lancaster, ca. 1909.
California Historical Society at USC Special Collections. chs-m5348.

Arcadia City School bus, ca. 1922.
California Historical Society at USC Special Collections. chs-m5375

Group portrait of the students at Cahuenga Township School, ca. 1890
California Historical Society at USC Special Collections, chs-m3336

Teacher Alice Robinson Bennett and her class in 1915.
California Historical Society TVP17

Chinese Primary Public School, 920 Clay St., Chinatown, San Francisco
California Historical Society, FN-23272

School Recess, San Jose, CA ca. 1931
California Historical Society, CHS2011.619

Kindergarteners working on projects in front of a school on City Terrace Drive  north of Boyle Heights
California Historical Society at USC Special Collections, chs-m4692

Four children using wooden blocks, 1932
California Historical Society at USC Special Collections,  chs-m7132

Bounty of the Golden State

Thursday, August 18, 2011, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m.

Evening with the Collection 

$4 Suggested Donation
Free for California Historical Society members

Please RSVP to 415.357.1848, ext. 229 or rsvp@calhist.org.

Ah, the bounty of the Golden State! California boasts the widest variety of crops and livestock of any state.  The California Historical Society is celebrating the fall harvest season during our August Evening with the Collection. During this special one night reception, take a special peek into the California Historical Society’s permanent collection of harvest- and agriculture-themed items. View colorful and creative fruit crate labels: Jewel Oranges, Blue Mountain Pears, Old Mission Olives, and more. Take a gander at lovely promotional brochures that counties produced to proclaim that their land is the best, the most fertile, the most pleasant.  From apples to vineyards, pigs to peaches to poultry, we’ve got it in California! At this Evening with the Collection, you will be able to enjoy light refreshments while perusing the fascinating harvest items as well as our current exhibition, A Century of Landscapes: Selections from the California Art Club.

This event continues the California Historical Society’s introduction of the California Ephemera Project, which provides access to the finding aids of ephemera collections at California institutions. The ephemera collections span from 1850 to the present, and contain advertisements, announcements, brochures, catalogs, menus, pamphlets, billheads, theater programs, clippings, bylaws, flyers, tickets, travel guides, and more. Collections represent California businesses, associations, schools, institutions, and clubs; events ranging from world’s fairs and earthquakes to parades and protests; buildings and structures, including the construction of Bay Area bridges; and extensive biographical files on both well-known and little-known Californians.

I Always Pay My Debts

Check out this World War I era photo from the San Francisco Parades collection of the California Historical Society. On this grand float, Uncle Sam assures us, "I always pay my debts."

The Left Coast

Thursday, July 28, 2011, 6:00 p.m.

Book event with photographer Alex Fradkin and writer Philip Fradkin

Philip Fradkin, one of California’s most astute environmental historians, felt drawn to the coast as soon as he arrived in California in 1960. His first book, California: The Golden Coast, captured the wonder of the shoreline’s natural beauty along with the controversies it engendered in 1974. In this book, the author and his photographer son Alex Fradkin revisit some of the same places they explored together in the early 1970s. From their written and visual approaches, this father-and-son team brings a unique generational perspective to the subject. Mixing history, geography, interviews, and personal experiences, they present a realistic portrait of a dramatic coastline within the context of their close relationship. Alex Fradkin’s expressive photographs contribute an additional layer of meaning and enrich the subject with their distinctive eloquence while adding another dimension to his father’s words.  In this way, the book becomes the story of a relationship as well as a probing study of a varied and contested coastline. Book will be available for purchase at event. Please RSVP to 415.357.1848, ext. 229 or rsvp@calhist.org.

Labor Oral Histories: Available Now on the Internet Archive

            Thanks to Pamela Jean Vadakan and the California Audiovisual Preservation Project, four of CHS’ labor oral histories have been digitized and are available on the Internet Archive:

http://www.archive.org/details/californiahistoricalsociety

            Created in the late 1970s for CHS, these oral histories provide a fascinating and intimate glimpse into the California labor movement, its leadership and rank-and-file membership; its progress, setbacks, and internecine struggles; and some of its defining events, including the San Francisco General Strike of 1934. Finding aids to CHS’ collection of labor oral histories are available on the Online Archive of California.

           

            Now, scholars, students, and others can listen to four of these important stories, narrated in real time by the voices of the past.

Marie Silva, Archivist & Manuscripts Librarian