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Peek in the Stacks: archives

The Crescendo

The International Guitar Research Archives (IGRA) holds some of the earliest articles ever published about the classical guitar, dating back to 1908. One of IGRA’s most noteworthy publications is The Crescendo: A Monthly Publication Devoted to the Interests of the Harp, Mandolin, Guitar, and Banjo, and Kindred Instruments. This monthly magazine was produced by the American Guild ....

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The Raymond C. Fleming Diaries

Fleming writes, "Here we are with no adequate guns or defenses, and trying to work as usual . . . If we put up a defense everyone will be killed, + we will put up a defense. I have a machete ready in the office." Later that same day, he learned they'd have a "blackout every nite, + no matches even are allowed..."

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Bud and Louise

On March 14, 1947, a yacht in Newport Harbor exploded with two people aboard, Walter Overell, a wealthy businessman, and his wife, Beulah. Both were seemingly killed by the blast, and the yacht sank to the ocean floor. While the initial report suggested the explosion might have been caused by an engine malfunction and leaking gasoline, it was soon discovered that the blast was actually caused by dynamite....

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School Desegregation and Busing in Los Angeles

In 1961, Mary Ellen Crawford, an African-American teen, attempted to enroll at South Gate High School, the closest high school to her home. The Los Angeles Unified School District refused her request, and directed her to enroll at the more-distant Jordan High School. Jordan’s student body was 99% African-American, while South Gate High's was 98% caucasian. Crawford's parents filed suit in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging that the Los Angeles Unified School District exercised discriminatory attendance boundary practices....

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Lectures in the Vahdah Olcott-Bickford Collection

The Vahdah Olcott-Bickford Collection consists primarily of scores and correspondence, which may cause some of its smaller parts to go unnoticed by researchers. One of these interesting parts is a small series of lectures concentrating on the guitar's history, pedagogy, and even some of Vahdah's philosophy.  These lectures outline many of her ideas on music and the guitar...

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California Water Collections

Water history, particularly the controversy surrounding water rights and access, has dramatically and incontrovertibly shaped the growth and development of Los Angeles.  Nearly 100 years ago, the dedication and opening of the Los Angeles Aqueduct on November 5, 1913 was the culmination of many years of work on the part of William Mulholland and others at Los Angeles' Department of Water and Power. More than any other ...

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Agness M. Underwood Collection

Agness Underwood was a Los Angeles newspaperwoman for forty-two years. During the 1930s and 1940s she was one of the city's best-known court and police reporters. In 1946, she became city editor of the Herald Express, a post she held for seventeen and a half years. No man had ever held the job more than four years. At the time she was the only female city editor of a major American metropolitan newspaper. During her ...

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William Gaddis Collection

William Gaddis, born in Berkeley, California in 1920, was twelve years old when his father, a Captain in the US Navy, was posted to command a ship in the Far East.  The William Gaddis Collection consists of materials saved by Gaddis during the two years he spent living in China and the Philippines, and traveling around the region with his mother and sister while his father was at sea ...

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Season's Greetings!

As the semester winds down across campus, enjoy some holiday-themed materials from our rare book, manuscript, and archival collections.  From the rare book collections are several holiday-themed works, including 1844 and 1899 editions of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, as well as a work from Special Collections' Children's Books Collection, The Birds' Christmas Carol, about a young girl born on Christmas Day who plans a holiday ...

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John M. Sell Civil War Collection

A native of Erie, Pennsylvania, John M. Sell enlisted in the 83rd Regiment of the Pennsylvania Volunteers on July 29, 1861. He was commissioned First Lieutenant on August 27 of that year, and promoted to Captain on September 4, 1862. After fighting in numerous battles over two years, Sell was shot in the left leg on July 2, 1863 during the Battle of Gettysburg. In one of the most commonly-performed medical procedures of the war, a ...

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