Special Collections and Archives blog

For the past four years, Special Collections & Archives has been honored to work with two outstanding members of Northern Arizona University’s undergraduate class of 2020: Britney Bibeault and Will McMullan. This week, we are thrilled to congratulate Britney and Will on their graduation!

To celebrate Britney and Will’s accomplishments and their contributions to the department, student supervisor Cindy Summers asked each student to participate in an oral history interview regarding their experiences at SCA and NAU more broadly. As most SCA staff are now working remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Cindy invited Will and Britney to join her over Zoom to talk about their dearest SCA memories.

In the clip below, Britney discusses her favorite archival collection held by Special Collections & Archives, the Stanley Swarts photographs.

While Will was unable to participate in an oral history interview before commencement this coming Friday, May 8, 2020, we happen to know that for years, he’s been obsessed with a mystery he discovered in the Martin Litton collection.

Litton, a noted conservation activist, environmentalist, and river runner, donated his archives to Special Collections & Archives over the course of two decades, with a final posthumous donation in 2016. His collection includes textual material like business records, correspondence, pamphlets, and publications, photographs, and films. Will spent several years at SCA exhaustively inventorying the later donations to Litton’s collection.

The mystery centers around this photo, which Will uncovered while processing later accruals to Litton’s collection.

As Will speculates in his notes about “The Murder Case,” the image appears to show a crime scene, possibly in Los Angeles, California, based on the police officers’ uniforms. It seems to be a violent crime rather than a car accident, though it’s hard to tell what might be happening in the image. By examining details of the photograph, such as the clothing and uniforms, the make and model of the cars and their wheels, and even the film itself (ANSCO Safety Film), Will deduced that this event, whatever it was, likely took place in the 1940s or ’50s.

But even Will’s eagle eyes couldn’t solve the mystery of why Martin Litton had this photo, or why he kept it. For now, that remains unknown…

Special Collections & Archives thanks Will McMullan and Britney Bibeault for their years of hard work, dedication, and commitment as SCA Student Assistants, and congratulates them both on their upcoming commencement as members of the class of 2020! We wish them both continued success and encourage them to come back and visit.

While Lumberjacks near and far, past and present, struggle with the changes to their lives caused by the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), Special Collections & Archives (SCA) staff are focused on ensuring that future generations of scholars can access a historical record of these strange and difficult times to better understand the pandemic’s impact on the NAU community, on campus, on the Colorado Plateau, and beyond.

Like many other libraries and archives across the country, SCA is currently working to preserve snapshots of NAU’s response to the coronavirus pandemic by capturing born-digital content like websites, emails, blog posts, and other publicly available material produced by the university which reflects the university’s actions and communications.

The goal of the project is to collect a body of otherwise ephemeral, web-based materials that will help future researchers understand NAU’s COVID-19 response in context. Some of these items may eventually be added to University Archives as historic records documenting the university.

Beginning in mid-March 2020, the Archivist for Digital Programs, Kelly Phillips, began using SiteSucker to regularly download local copies of two NAU websites, as well as the Arizona Board of Regents, City of Flagstaff, and Coconino County’s COVID-19 response pages:

• https://nau.edu/coronavirus
• https://nau.edu/library/covid-19/
• https://www.azregents.edu/news/novel-coronavirus
• https://flagstaff.az.gov/4299/COVID-19
• https://www.coconino.az.gov/covid19

SCA staff are also using the Internet Archives’ Wayback Machine to periodically capture NAU’s official COVID-19 webpage (https://nau.edu.coronavirus) as the content on that site is updated over time.

While SCA is currently unable to accept physical donations of material, those who are interested in contributing digital content which documents the NAU community’s experiences with COVID-19, such as digital photographs, videos, documents, etc. are encouraged to contact the department at SCA.CollectionsManagement@nau.edu to learn more.

In response to the continuing COVID-19 situation, Special Collections and Archives is now providing online consultations and support. Virtual appointments can be scheduled via email at special.collections@nau.edu. Staff will respond within 24 hours.

During this time, our online resources are still available for use. Please visit our digital archives and the Arizona Archives Online to discover content and collections that can support your research, teaching, and intellectual endeavors. We are still fulfilling reproduction and permission to use requests, with some limitations.

If you have a reference inquiry or need to speak with an archivist, please email special.collections@nau.edu. We will respond to your inquiry within 24 hours. To learn more about changes to the Cline Library and the broader NAU campus, click on the linked text.

Today, October 23, 2019, would have been Katie Lee’s 100th birthday. For those of you fortunate enough to have known Katie while she was alive, you know she could celebrate her birthday in very creative ways. Each year, a couple of us from the department would travel down to Jerome on or near Katie’s birthday and take her out to lunch in Jerome, frequently at the Asylum.

Although we can’t celebrate her 100th birthday with her, we would like to recognize her birthday by sharing a photograph of Katie in her beloved Glen Canyon. This photograph was one of her favorites and it was found in a slide carousel labeled “Glen Canyon Slide Show.”

Katie like to celebrate her birthday (actually everyday) with a vodka and tonic. Katie, we lift our glasses to toast your life and “we drink to thee, oh Colorado/ Mighty river full of wonder.” Happy birthday, Katie!

The Cline Library and Special Collections and Archives would like to announce the opening of the Full Circle: The Life and Legacies of Katie Lee exhibit. The exhibit opened this Friday, October 18 and was well attended. Full Circle is now open for public viewing through the fall of 2021.

Guests at the exhibit opening included friends of Katie Lee from Jerome and around Arizona. Several of Katie’s extended Jerome family joined us including Candace and Michael Gallagher, Jay Kincella, James Tomlinson, and Tracy and Nancy Weisel. Tracy also brought in a framed image of an 86 year old Katie, naked of course! The opening allowed friends to reconnect, remember Katie, and teach those who didn’t know her a little about who she was and her achievements.

Full Circle documents the life of Katie Lee, a singer, songwriter, author, actress, activist and river runner. The exhibit features photographs, manuscripts, a guitar, and other 3D objects connected to her many talents and life. The physical exhibit will be up for two years and can be visited on weekdays.

The exhibit was developed by the 2019 Elizabeth M and PT Reilly intern, Britney Bibeault, under the careful mentoring of archivists Sean Evans and Kelly Phillips. Britney is an NAU senior Honors College student studying anthropology. She’s also a student assistant at Special Collections and Archives since the fall of 2015. Britney did an amazing job with exhibit and enraptured all of us with her personal story of determination, strength, and commitment during the remarks portion of the opening…all qualities Katie would appreciate and admire!

 The online version of this exhibit can be found at https://library.nau.edu/speccoll/exhibits/katielee/ and features additional information, photographs, manuscripts, and videos.

            Katie grew up in Tucson, Arizona where she lived in houses her parents designed and built. Her childhood was spent learning music and art from her mother and spending time outdoors with her father and younger brother. In high school, Katie and two close friends explored Sabino Canyon and the Catalina Mountains when they weren’t in school or socializing with friends in town. Through high school and her time as a student at the University of Arizona, Katie acted and sang, furthering her entertainment skills. The experiences Katie had in Tucson set her on the path to become a professional entertainer and to explore nature. Her diverse upbringing allowed Katie to have the confidence to move to Hollywood to pursue an acting and singing career and her connection to the desert environment around her cultivated a deep appreciation for nature and water.

The Katie Lee Exhibit will be constructed primarily from materials digitized from The Katie Lee collection now housed here at NAU.

However, there are other collections, both at Special Collections and Archives at NAU and elsewhere, in which Katie Lee has been mentioned or photographed. At NAU, these collections include the Tad Nichols Collection and the Richard (Dick) Sprang Collection. The Tad Nichols Collection has been especially helpful for understanding who Katie Lee was and her deep connection to Glen Canyon.

For more information about collections with Katie Lee at other institutions in Arizona, please refer to Arizona Archives Online (http://azarchivesonline.org/xtf/search?keyword=katie+lee).