Each year on March 25, Greeks in Greece and the diaspora celebrate Independence Day. The holiday, celebrated on the same day as the Orthodox feast of the Annunciation of the Theotokos (Virgin Mary), marks the anniversary of the start of the Greek War for Independence from the Ottoman Empire. This war took place from 1821 to 1829 and was the first of several major armed conflicts throughout the nineteenth century that liberated parts of what is now the nation state of Greece. The Villanova Digital Library, in particular its newspaper collection, preserves numerous articles and other works that highlight this period in history.

The Truth Teller, a Catholic newspaper published in New York, seemed especially interested in covering the War for Independence as it was occurring. The topics covered in this newspaper ranged from updates on decisive battles to reports of foreign involvement. The uncredited writers of these segments seemingly adopted a largely Philhellenic approach to their news coverage.

At the same time, The Truth Teller advertised newly published books covering the Greek Revolution. The following segment promotes A Picture of Greece in 1825 (1826) by James Emerson Tennent (1804-1869), Giuseppe Pecchio (1785-1835), and William Henry Humphreys. The advertisement provides an excerpt focusing on Kostas Botsaris (1792-1853), a Greek general and senator who was active during the revolution. It also makes reference to Kostas’ brother Markos Botsaris (1790-1823), who died during the revolution, as well as to the two brothers’ hometown of Suli, or Souli, in Epirus, Greece.

The following advertisement, published on September 13, 1928, in Philadelphia’s Saturday Evening Post, promotes Samuel Gridley Howe’s (1801-1876) An Historical Sketch of the Greek Revolution (1828). Howe was an American doctor, abolitionist, and education advocate who volunteered as a surgeon and commander during the Greek War for Independence. In this regard, he was similar to many Phihellenes of his time who became deeply invested in the Greek Revolution, such as English poet Lord Byron (1788-1824), who died in Missolonghi, Greece, during the war. (Among other poems by Byron, “The Isles of Greece” celebrates the cause of Greek independence, but remains disillusioned about the assistance offered by Western Europe: “Trust not for freedom to the Franks—/ They have a king who buys and sells; / In native swords and native ranks / The only hope of courage dwells”).

The National Gazette and Library Register was another newspaper that provided updates on the war in Greece. The following segment reprints a letter addressing the political dimension of the Greek uprising.

This segment, also from The National Gazette and Library Register, describes the situation at the fortified city of Missolonghi in 1853. Though the article seems hopeful about the city’s ability to defend itself, Missolonghi would fall to Turkish-Egyptian forces in 1826, following a lengthy siege that drove the city’s inhabitants, most of whom were ultimately slain, to exit their defensive position en masse. Missolonghi’s last stand has since held a prominent place in the Hellenic cultural memory and has been memorialized in works such as Theodoros Vryzakis‘ (1814-1878) painting The sortie of Messologhi (1853).

Throughout the rest of the nineteenth century, revolutions and political turmoil continued throughout Greece, with various parts of the mainland and islands gradually joining the newfound Hellenic Republic. Newspapers in the Villanova Digital Library report on many of these occurrences, ranging from political troubles surrounding King Otto of Greece (1832-1862) to an uprising on the island of Crete, and even a report that Greek Revolution veteran married famous French stage actress Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923).

Even twentieth-century newspapers in the Villanova Digital Library address military conflicts in Greece. Issues of Philadelphia’s Public Ledger from 1928 were recently uploaded to the Digital Library, along with other titles that entered the public domain at the start of 2024. The January 15, 1928, issue includes an article by Adamantios Th. Polyzoides (1885-1969) on the European armament in the lead-up to World War II and how this phenomenon affected Greece. From 1907 to 1933, Polyzoides served as the editor of Atlantis, a Greek-language newspaper published in New York from 1894 to 1973. The Public Ledger article also relates to another major Greek holiday: Ohi Day (i.e., “No” Day), which commemorates Greece’s refusal to allow Italian forces to occupy strategic locations across Greece in 1940, a decision that brought Greece into the second World War.

These newspaper segments comprise a larger set of materials in the Villanova Digital Library that are relevant to Greek history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. (Examples include a 1914 English-Greek, Greek-English dictionary used by the Greek diaspora in the U.S. and an 1840 pamphlet on the British Empire’s presence on the island of Corfu, both of which have been previously featured on Falvey Library’s blog.) Additional coverage of Greek history is waiting to be discovered through keyword searches in the Digital Library’s Newspaper collection.

The Villanova Digital Library provides access to numerous serialized and standalone short stories through its Dime Novels And Popular Literature collection. Most authors whose works appear in these publications are now considered obscure, while many of them remain unidentified. However, the digitized collections also include stories by nineteenth- and twentieth-century writers whose works are still widely read today. Here are some lesser known stories by well-known authors that are preserved in the Villanova Digital Library:

 

“What It Cost” by Louisa May Alcott

Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) is primarily remembered as a novelist. Her most widely read novel, Little Women (1868-1869), was adapted into an award-winning film as recently as 2019. A lesser known work by Alcott is “What It Cost,” which appeared as a cover story in the sixth issue of the children’s periodical, The Young Crusader. Like many stories published in The Young Crusader, “What It Cost” promotes the anti-alcohol stance of the temperance movement.

 

“Heart” by James Fenimore Cooper

Like Alcott, James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) is mainly remembered for his novels, in particular The Last of the Mohicans (1826). His story, “Heart,” appears as a cover story in two segments in the March 13 and March 20, 1841, issues of The Boston Notion. A full transcript of the story is also available through Project Gutenberg.

“The Jolly Roger” and other stories by Robert W. Chambers

Robert W. Chamber (1965-1895) wrote the short-story collection The King in Yellow (1895), which is one of the most influential works in the history of weird fiction. The first four stories in the collection directly impacted the “Cthulhu mythos,” a literary universe shared by H. P. Lovecraft (1890-1937) (whose astronomical journal is housed at Falvey Library) and other writers of the early twentieth century. The King in Yellow continues to excite the popular imagination, having been the basis for much of the acclaimed first season of the television series True Detective. However, most of Chambers’ writing was not in the horror genre. The Villanova Digital Library offers access to parts of three stories by Chambers: “One in a Million,” “The Shining Band,” and “The Jolly Roger” (the last of which is available, in its entirety, as digitized microfilm through the Internet Archive).

 

 

“Houdini, the Enigma” and other stories by Arthur Conan Doyle

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1870) is the creator of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, who appears in several stories, starting with “A Study in Scarlett” (1887). The Villanova Digital Library offers access to three works by Doyle that do not feature his famous detective: “Houdini, the Enigma,” which focuses on Harry Houdini (1874-1926), a famous magician and friend of Doyle’s; “An Alpine Pass on Ski”; and “De Profundis.”

Bonus: The Digital Library also includes one story, “The Affair of the Glenranald Bank,” by Doyle’s brother-in-law, E. W. Hornung (1866-1921). Hornung was influenced by Doyle’s work on Sherlock Holmes and created the character A. J. Raffles, a gentleman thief who is, in essence, the reverse Sherlock Holmes. The character first appeared in the short story “The Ides of March” in 1898 and the first collection of A. J. Raffles stories was subsequently published in 1899.

 

“Hunter Quatermain’s Story” and other stories by H. Rider Haggard

H. Rider Haggard (1856-1925) was a writer of adventure fiction, mainly remembered for creating the character Allan Quatermain. The most widely known tale featuring the character is the novel King Solomon’s Mines (1885), a reprint of which is available in the Villanova Digital Library. However, the site also includes other stories by Haggard (some of which feature Allan Quatermain), such as “Hunter Quatermain’s Story.” Allan Quatermain has continued to appear in literature since Haggard’s death, having played a central role in the comic-book series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (1999-2019) by Alan Moore (b. 1953) and Kevin O’Neill (1953-2022).

 

“The Blockhouse Mystery” and other stories by Upton Sinclair

Upton Sinclair (1878-1968) was a writer, political activist, and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. He wrote The Jungle (1906), a novel about working conditions in the meat industry, which raised awareness of unsanitary practices and influenced the passing of the Federal Meat Inspection Act. The Villanova Digital Library preserves four stories written by Sinclair under the pseudonym Douglas Wells for The Starry Flag: “The Blockhouse Mystery, or, Hal Maynard’s Cuban Romance”; “Hal on the Outpost, or, With the Army Above Doomed Santiago”; “The Hero of Manila; or, Hal Maynard Under a New Commander”; “Hal Maynard at West Point, or, The New Member of the Seven Devils”.

 

All the abovementioned stories are available in the Villanova Digital Library’s Dime Novels And Popular Literature collection, while more are being added on a regular basis. The digitization project not only preserves the works of obscure writers, but also brings to light the lesser known works of well-known writers.

 

Note: The stories by Doyle, Haggard, and Sinclair were identified by Director of Library Technology Demian Katz.

A new exhibit is now on view at the Prince Family Veterans Resource Center in Vasey Hall. The exhibit, titled The V-12 Navy College Training Program: Villanova During World War II, showcases materials related to the V-12 training program hosted by Villanova College from 1943 to 1946.

During the second World War, Villanova’s student population significantly decreased, as numerous young men joined the armed forces. At this time, the US Navy selected Villanova, along with other institutions of higher learning, to house the V-12 Navy College Training Program. This program aimed to quickly increase the number of commissioned officers through an accelerated course of study that combined academic coursework and military training. During the years when the program was offered at Villanova, most of the college’s students were enrolled in it.

The exhibit features reproductions of photographs, drawn from our digitized collections, that depict V-12 students training and studying. The exhibit also includes three letters written by Villanova V-12 graduate James D. Reap, Jr. to his parents during and after his participation in the training program. In his letters, Reap recounts his experience as a V-12 student and how it positively affected his career trajectory. In a letter dated February 5, 1944, Reap writes that other enlisted men “kind of respect us boys from the V-12 Unit.” The digitized letters and their full transcripts are also available through the Villanova Digital Library, along with other digitized materials from the James D. Reap, Jr. Collection. Paired with the letters is a US Navy hat worn by Reap while he participated in the Pacific Theater of World War II. (He served as a radar and communications technician aboard the USS Proteus, which was anchored near the USS Missouri when the Japanese surrender was formally signed in 1945.) Lastly, the exhibit features the 1944 and 1945 Belle Air Villanova yearbooks, which provide further information about the curriculum and leadership of the V-12 program.

These materials come together to highlight the experiences of V-12 students and how their time at Villanova prepared them for leadership roles in the Navy, during one of the most critical moments in world history. You may view the exhibit, The V-12 Navy College Training Program: Villanova During World War II, during the spring and summer 2024 semesters at the Prince Family Veterans Resource Center in Vasey Hall!

If you are interested in additional projects that celebrate and preserve the legacies of Villanova veterans, make sure to also visit Honoring the Fallen: An Interactive Memorial Map, a Geographic Information System (GIS) map that shows where Villanova veterans died in service, as well as The Voices of Villanova’s Veterans oral history site, which includes interviews with Villanova veterans.

Tod Browning‘s (1880-1962) 1927 silent horror film London After Midnight has been considered lost to history since 1965, when a fire at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s Vault 7 destroyed the final known copy of the movie, along with numerous other titles stored on highly flammable nitrate film reels. London After Midnight starred Leonidas Frank “Lon” Chaney (1883-1930) as Edward C. Burke, a Scotland Yard inspector who is eventually revealed to be the villainous Man in the Beaver Hat. While various stills and ephemera survive, London After Midnight remains the most sought-after lost film of the silent era. The film’s lost status has not detracted from its significant cultural impact, as is evinced in films like The Babadook (2014), whose eponymous monster is based on the villain in Browning’s film.

Materials recently added to the Villanova Digital Library offer insight into the presentation and reception of this film in our area. A review was published on Tuesday, February 7, 1928, in the Public Ledger, Philadelphia’s premier daily newspaper in the early twentieth century. The newspaper issue, along with other titles published in 1928, entered the public domain at the beginning of 2024. A microfilm copy has been preserved on the Villanova Digital Library. The article reads thus:

 

STANLEY—The realm of the unnatural, with its objects unreal—spooks, ghosts, goblins, bats and vampires—rules supreme here in dusty, cobwebbed domains and eerie, mysterious moonlight. Everything is spooky, witches are around every corner, from the comedy in which the dusky Farina battles with the departed spirits to the murder mystery of the main feature.

Those old reliables, Lon Chaney and Tod Browning, the director, are at it again with one of their spookiest and spine-twitching melodramas, “London After Midnight.” It shows the solution of a murder, with Lon Chaney in the part of Burke, a Scotland Yard detective. But it is no ordinary solution, for few of the material forces are called in to solve the clews. Instead, there is the moon-eyed man, an old, tottering reminder of Phantom of the Opera, gruesome and weird, with a chattering smile upon its distorted features—and yes, it may be Lon Chaney, that black bat there in the corner with the luminous eyes—but we’re not telling. Chaney taps a new character as a detective, with very little make-up—but a perfect portrayal. So excellent, is his work, that one almost regrets that he was not cast in a strongly molded, logical detective yarn of the caliber of the famous Sherlock Holmes. In the supporting cast are Conrad Nagel, Marceline Day and Henry B. Walthall to add surprise.

An offering which will doubtless draw many theatre fans is presented by Donal [sic] Brian, a famous musical comedy star in his first appearance in a picture theatre. His ingratiating personality, and smooth, easy manner register nicely in the all-too-brief period assigned to him and he leaves some twinkling tunes, culled in most part from former successes, and just a few stories. Mention should be made of the dance offering done in splendid spook style to introduce the picture. It is “Dance Macabre,” by Saint-Saens.

It seems that London After Midnight played during the week of February 6, 1928, at Philadelphia’s Stanley Theatre. This theater, which existed from 1921 to 1970 on 1902-10 Market Street, showed silent films accompanied by a 55-piece orchestra. It was a popular venue that attracted celebrities of the day, such as Frank Sinatra and Abbott & Costello. (Al Capone was even arrested there the year after the premiere of London After Midnight.) It was one of two major venues in Philadelphia to show horror films, including Browning’s most famous work: Dracula (1931) starring Bela Lugosi (1882-1956), which is available in DVD format at Falvey Library. According to the 1928 Public Ledger article, as well as this article published on the same day in The Philadelphia Inquirer, the screening of London After Midnight at the Stanley Theatre was introduced by Broadway star Donald Brian (1877-1948), who performed excerpts from his previous roles.

The following month, the film would be shown at another local theater. An advertisement in The Suburban and Wayne Times, published on March 23, 1928, informs us that London After Midnight played at Bryn Mawr’s Seville Theatre from March 26 to March 28. Decades later, the Seville Theatre would become the Bryn Mawr Film Institute, which still operates in the same historic building that has stood since 1926. As numerous advertisements in The Suburban and Wayne Times attest, the Seville Theatre regularly showed films starring Lon Chaney during the 1920s, including The Phantom of the Opera (1925), which is compared to London After Midnight in the aforementioned Public Ledger article.

Browning eventually remade London After Midnight as a “talkie” starring Lugosi, titled Mark of the Vampire (1935). In 2003, Turner Classic Movies released a reconstruction of the 1927 film using extant stills as part of the Lon Chaney Collection, available through inter-library loan. Nonetheless, decades after the MGM Vault 7 fire, Browning’s original film remains lost. It was screened in at least two theaters in our area, and one of these showings included a live performance by a major Broadway star of the day. London After Midnight was commercially successful and remains culturally significant, but that did not stop it from disappearing. The afterlife of this film demonstrates how easily cultural production can become lost to history. It speaks to a larger need for preservation, especially preservation of media whose storage and access are dependent on ever-evolving technologies like film.

American cartoonist Jeff Kinney is widely known as the creator of the successful children’s book series Diary of a Wimpy Kid. The series was first published in 2004 on the website FunBrain, followed by a print series starting in 2007. Since then, the popular franchise has seen 18 main entries, as well as several supplementary books and spin-off projects. While characters like Greg Heffley, Rowley Jefferson, and Manny Heffley are widely recognizable by both children and adults, a lesser-known character created by Kinney is Igdoof.

Igdoof was the eponymous protagonist of a comic strip that Kinney wrote and illustrated as a university student from 1989 to 1993. The series was originally published from September 8, 1989, to April 20, 1990, in The Villanovan, volume 65, issues 1-20; the rest of the series was published by the University of Maryland’s newspaper after Kinney transferred there. Unlike Kinney’s later creations, Igdoof did not feature entirely child-friendly humor, but was instead aimed at a college-student audience. In the comic strip, the character of Igdoof gets into trouble and has a hard time adjusting to college life, generally to comical effect. Sometimes, he makes jokes at the University’s expense.

Kinney attempted to continue Igdoof in professional newspapers after his time at the University of Maryland, but never actualized this goal; this 1994 article from The Washington Post provides context for this period in Kinney’s career. However, Kinney was able to rework various aspects of Igdoof in Diary of a Wimpy Kid. While the jokes in Igdoof were often inaccessible to or inappropriate for younger children, the comic strip nonetheless influenced Kinney’s famous children’s book series. Several characters in Diary of a Wimpy Kid are based on Igdoof characters, most notably Greg Heffley’s younger brother Manny Heffley, who bears a strong resemblance to Igdoof himself.

All Igdoof comic strips from the 1989 and 1990 issues of The Villanovan have been digitized and are available to view on the Villanova Digital Library. Later Igdoof stories have been digitized by the University of Maryland and are available to view here. Falvey Library also offers digital access to several entries in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, including Big Shot, The Deep End, and Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Special Disney+ Cover Edition).

Note: In recent years, Igdoof has attracted the attention of the internet’s lost media community, which seeks to track down and preserve media that is in danger of becoming lost to history. This page on the Lost Media Wiki website chronicles the attempts at uncovering the comic strip, which was believed to be lost for a time. The website credits Villanova University with making Igdoof available, but provides a hyperlink to digitized copies on the Internet Archive, rather than the Villanova Digital Library.

My case in the exhibit, “Poetic License: Seven Curators’ Poetry Selections from Distinctive Collections,” showcases examples of weird and fantastical poetry from Falvey Library’s holdings. Here, the term “weird” is used not colloquially, but rather in reference to the genre of weird fiction, which emerged in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Owing much to Gothic horror, weird fiction reinvented the creatures and themes of Gothic horror and other forms of speculative fiction, as portrayed by writers such as Edgar Allan Poe. In fact, H. P. Lovecraft, the most widely known practitioner of weird fiction, considered Poe’s writings the origin of the genre. While writers like Lovecraft are now remembered largely for their contributions to prose, my exhibit case highlights their lesser known, but equally interesting, poetic works. Examples are drawn from Weird Tales, arguably the most popular periodical to ever publish weird fiction and poetry. These poems explore themes that are central to the genre, including the supernatural, the passage of time, and the futility of human pursuits in an indifferent cosmos. Formally, the poems tend to implement consistent rhyme and meter, which amplify the haunting quality of these works.

Some poems in the case are quite literally fantastical, like Lovecraft’s “Night Gaunts,” which describes the dreadful flying creatures that first appeared in the author’s posthumously published novella, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kaddath (1943). Other poems adopt a more grounded approach, such as Sudie Stuart Hager’s “Inheritance,” which examines how folklore can pass fantastical notions from one generation to the next. Meanwhile, Leah Bodine Drake’s “The Steps in the Field” uses fantastical motifs to develop a resonant metaphor about the afterlife, but also emphasizes the idea that some knowledge is dangerous and best left undiscovered—a popular theme in weird fiction and poetry. Together, these and other poems in the case paint a vivid picture of weird and fantastical poetry, its primary thematic concerns, and its formal techniques in the first half of the twentieth century.

The case also displays four covers of Weird Tales issues, illustrated by Margeret Brundage, Matt Fox, and Virgil Finlay. These expressive, colorful images, which depict eerie and otherworldly scenes, nicely complement the similarly evocative poetic works that accompany them.

Lastly, the case includes two works by authors who influenced the poetry in Weird Tales. First and foremost, Poe’s 1845 narrative poem “The Raven,” with its exploration of a depressed man’s desperate attempt to derive meaning from a bird’s repetitive sounds, lays the groundwork for numerous character arcs in weird fiction and poetry. The edition of this poem that is displayed in my case has been digitized and made available on the Villanova Digital Library, and may be read in full here. Furthermore, the case includes the Anglo-Irish author Lord Dunsany’s “A Walk in the Wastes of Time,” a metaphorical poem about communal memory, which was published in The Smart Set in 1917. This title has also been digitized and is available here. (A couple of years after this poem’s publication, Lovecraft would attend a talk by Dunsany in Boston; Dunsany’s influence on Lovecraft’s writings during this period is evident in many of Lovecraft’s works. Comic-book writer Alan Moore portrays the Boston talk in his Lovecraftian series Providence, which serves as both sequel and prequel to Moore’s Neonomicon.)

For more content related to weird fiction and poetry, read our digitized copy of Lovecraft’s personal journal of astronomical observations from 1909 to 1915, as well as this blog article that explains the significance of this rare manuscript. The Digital Library also includes other nineteenth- and twentieth-century texts that explore the occult, including several issues of The Paragon Monthly, a handbook on spiritualism, and other examples.

Please join us on Thursday, April 20, from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in Speakers’ Corner, Falvey Library, for the official launch and introduction of “Poetic License: Seven Curators’ Poetry Selections from Distinctive Collections,” followed by an open-mic poetry reading. This ACS-approved event is free and open to the public. In the meantime, make sure to view the full exhibit on the first floor of Falvey, and check the library’s blog for additional articles on individual curators’ cases!

March 25 is Greek Independence Day. The holiday commemorates the start of the Greek War of Independence in 1821, which concluded a nearly 400-year period of Ottoman rule in Greece. The anniversary is commemorated with parades in both Greece and the diaspora. The Philadelphia parade, which is set for Sunday, April 2 this year, takes place along Benjamin Franklin Parkway and 22nd Street. The celebration includes Greek folk dance troupes, educational and religious organizations, government representatives, and members of the Evzones, or Greek Presidential Guard, who guard the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Athens, Greece.

While Greece’s conflicts with the Ottoman Empire are more widely known, the British Empire also exercised colonial rule over parts of Greece in the nineteenth century, specifically in the Ionian islands to the west of the mainland. This region had been under Venetian control from the fourteenth to the late seventeenth centuries, before it was conquered by the French during the French Revolution and again during the Napoleonic Wars. However, in the Congress of Vienna of 1814-1815, the British Empire acquired the Ionian Islands as a protectorate, named the United States of the Ionian Islands, with the island of Corfu (or Kerkyra) as its capital. The protectorate existed until 1864, when Great Britain ceded the Ionian islands to Greece upon the enthronement of the Greek King George I. Sakis Gekas’ Xenocracy: State, Class, and Colonialism in the Ionian Islands, 1815-1864 (2017) explores this period in detail; Falvey offers digital access to the Gekas’ book. The legacy of the Protectorate period is still felt in several landmarks across the Ionian islands, especially in Corfu. For instance, the Old Fortress of Corfu includes the Church of St. George, an Anglican church built for British soldiers in 1840.

A rare pamphlet that was recently added to the Villanova Digital Library as part of the Joseph McGarrity Collection sheds further light on this part of modern Greek history. Titled A refutation of the assertions of Sir Howard Douglas, in his despatch of the 10th April, 1840, concerning the faction which he imagined to exist in the Ionian Islands, the pamphlet was written by Greek historian Giovanni Petrizzopulo and published by Morton’s English and Foreign Printing Office in 1840. The pamphlet’s author describes it as a “remonstrance against one of the outrages of despotic power in the Ionian Islands.” Petrizzopulo’s criticism is directed at Sir Howard Douglas (1776-1861), who served as Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands at the time. Douglas was responsible for an official search of Petrizzopulo’s house in Corfu under suspicion of rebellious activity.

Even though Petrizzopulo appeals to British authority (his pamphlet is addressed to Lord John Russell (1792-1878), Secretary for the Colonies), and attempts to defend himself from accusations of treason, his writing nonetheless adopts a critical tone toward British policy. In a book chapter titled “The Philorthodox Conspiracy in the British-Ruled Ionian Islands,” Lucien J. Frary draws on passages from Petrizzopulo’s pamphlet and argues that “Petrizzopulo was disgusted with the British government and accused it of exercising despotic power.” Moreover, Frary frames the incident at Petrizzopulo’s home as a part of a larger British attempt to suppress revolt in the Ionian Sea, writing that “Any suspicion of communicating with Greece served as a pretext for the government to carry out a search.” Falvey offers digital access to Frary’s full book.

Petrizzopulo’s pamphlet joins several other items on the Villanova Digital Library that are relevant to modern Greek history, such as an early-twentieth-century French souvenir photo album, which is discussed in a Falvey blog article, as well as Divry’s vest-pocket English-Greek and Greek-English dictionary (1914), which is likewise highlighted on our blog. Petrizzopulo’s pamphlet can be accessed digitally on the Digital Library. Alternatively, it can be consulted in-person in Falvey’s Rare Book Room during walk-in hours (Wednesdays 9:30-11:30 AM and Thursdays 2-4 PM) or by appointment.

Last week, I posted an article on this blog in which I discussed the value of collecting comic books in special collections, while drawing on examples from Marvel Comics in Falvey Library’s holdings. This week, I have another comic-book collection to highlight: Falvey’s holdings in Classics Illustrated. This series, which was published by three separate publishers (Elliot Publishing Co., Gilberton Company, and Frawley Corporation) from 1941 to 1969, adapted literary classics to the comic-book medium. It has significant research value not only in comics studies, but also in adaptation studies, a field that is becoming increasingly central in the arts and humanities. With the tagline “Featuring stories by the world’s greatest authors,” the series sheds light on mid-twentieth-century cultural conceptions of texts that have traditionally been viewed as particularly significant in the United States and elsewhere, as well as how these texts were transmitted to new audiences.

The Tragedy of Macbeth and Paratext

These comics include not only abridged adaptations of their source material, but also paratextual material that assists readers to understand and appreciate the stories. For example, the adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Tragedy of Macbeth includes numerous explanatory footnotes, which make the early modern language of the text more accessible to twentieth-century readers.

Additional segments at the ends of issues often provide biographical and historical context for the preceding narrative, typically in the form of a text box. The following two examples, drawn from the Macbeth issue of Classics Illustrated, explain Shakespeare’s life and the relation between the play and King James I of England (you may click on all images in this blog article to enlarge them).

Other times, this type of supplementary content at the end of an issue takes the form of a comic book, like the following panels on British history, which are again drawn from the final pages in the Macbeth issue.

Another paratextual aspect worth noting is the banner that appears across the bottom of the final page in each adapted story, which urges readers to track down a copy of the original text in a school or public library. This inclusion demonstrates the comics’ goal of developing an appreciation of literature in younger readers. On the one hand, this is beneficial in that it encourages engagement with libraries and promotes further reading. On the other hand, it is potentially problematic in its suggestion that comics are valuable only if they serve as a stepping stone to a more highly respected (and supposedly more advanced) medium or mode of reading, namely prose and verse.

While seeking to cultivate a love of reading, Classics Illustrated promoted bibliophilia, especially as the notion relates to the material aspect of books. The following advertisement demonstrates this attitude, as it aims to sell a “handsome, durable, permanent” binder for storing Classics Illustrated issues, which is “made to last a lifetime of handling.” (However, the primary aim of any advertisement is, of course, to sell a product or service.)

The Murders in the Rue Morgue

Getting back to the adapted narratives themselves, it is important to note that Classics Illustrated sometimes altered or added to the source material. An illustrative case-in-point is the adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” which is collected alongside two other adaptations in issue #21 of Classics Illustrated. “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” published in 1841 in Graham’s Magazine, is widely considered the first modern detective story. It is a predecessor to popular detective fiction like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes series, as well as numerous dime novels and story papers available on the Villanova Digital Library, most notably Mystery Magazine (1917-1927). Poe’s full short story is available on Falvey’s website. A facsimile edition of the manuscript can also be consulted in-person at the library.

Famously, this short story ends (spoilers!) with the reveal that a runaway orangutan had committed the eponymous murders. In Poe’s story, the orangutan’s fate remains ambiguous. However, the comic book adds an extra page at the end of the story, where detective C. Auguste Dupin and his associate (the unnamed narrator of Poe’s story, who is named “Poe” in the comic-book adaptation) track down and fight the animal, which was changed to an ape for the comic book. These changes and additions to the source material may have happened for a variety of reasons. In this case, perhaps the creators wanted the story to fit more neatly into the conventions of the adventure comic-book genre, hence the action-packed ending. Alternatively, they may have felt uncomfortable depicting an ambiguous ending, where a dangerous animal is still on the loose, especially if their target audience was mainly composed of children. (I have no explanation, however, for why the animal was changed from an orangutan to an ape.)

Robin Hood

Besides detectives like Dupin and Holmes, another famous character portrayed in Classics Illustrated is Robin Hood. Two early issues of Classics Illustrated in Falvey’s collection feature the character. Robin Hood has had a long history of popular culture portrayals (having even become a fox in a Disney animated film), and comics are no exception. In addition to Classic Illustrated issues, the English folk hero also appears in Martin Powell and Stan Timmons’ Robin Hood, published by Eternity Comics in 1989. The series’ first issue, which was recently donated to Falvey, sports a cover illustration by painter N. C. Wyeth. (More information about the original painting is provided in the Brandywine River Museum of Art’s N. C. Wyeth Catalogue Raisonné.) Other popular culture materials at Falvey’s Distinctive Collections that depict Robin Hood’s adventures include dime novels like the Aldine Robin Hood Library and The Story of Robin Hood (1889), both of which are available to read on the Villanova Digital Library.

All the comics shown in this article, and several more issues of Classics Illustrated and other titles, are available to see in Falvey’s Rare Book Room during walk-in hours (Wednesdays 9:30-11:30 AM and Thursdays 2-4 PM) or by appointment. Make sure to check the library’s blog for more articles on our growing collections of comic books, dime novels, and other popular literature.

Falvey Library’s Distinctive Collections and Digital Engagement (DCDE) department recently received a generous donation of dime novels and other popular culture materials, including comic books drawn from the collections of John Randolph “Randy” Cox. Randy was a highly regarded scholar and collector, with expertise in numerous areas of pulp literature, including Nick Carter and Sherlock Holmes. He was also an early supporter of the Edward T. LeBlanc Dime Novel Bibliography project, a comprehensive online database of dime novels, story papers, reprint libraries, and related materials hosted by Falvey Library. Among the titles recently donated from Randy’s collections are several comic books published by Marvel Comics in the 1960s and 1970s. These materials demonstrate the value of collecting original copies of comic books in special collections.

Some Brief History

Under the banners of Timely Comics and Atlas Comics, Marvel Comics published stories in various genres from the 1930s to the 1950s, a period known as a Golden Age of comic books. It was during this period that a handful of now-classic characters, such as Captain America and Namor the Sub-Mariner, were introduced to readers. However, it was not until the Silver Age of the 1960s and 1970s that Marvel would become synonymous with the superhero genre. This was largely owing to the humanizing of superheroes: While characters published by DC Comics (Marvel’s main competition, then and now) like Superman and Wonder Woman were akin to gods, Marvel characters experienced more grounded, personal problems alongside their grandiose, world-saving pursuits. For example, Spider-Man struggled to make rent and stressed about his coursework. Some of the creators responsible for ushering in this era of storytelling (most of whom created the Captain America comics pictured above) were Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Sal Buscema, Don Heck, Jim Steranko, Gene Colan, John Romita Sr., Art Simek, Sam Rosen, and Stan Lee.

Creators such as these often worked in highly specialized roles, which were necessitated by the fast-paced nature of the comics industry, as well as the complexity of developing graphic storytelling. American comics typically involve a writer who develops the plot; a penciller who designs the panel layouts and draws the initial sketches; an inker who finalizes the penciller’s work by tracing it in black ink; a colorist who adds color to each page; a letterer who inserts speech bubbles and designs fonts and logos; and an editor who oversees and double-checks the whole process. There can be much variation to this process, but it has remained relatively consistent throughout the decades, even while several steps are now accomplished digitally in most cases. What made Marvel’s procedures unique during the Silver Age, however, was the emergence of the “Marvel method” of creating comic books, in which the penciller arguably played a more central role than the writer in developing narratives. Following the Marvel method, a writer would come up with rough outlines for a story, without providing detailed dialogue or many details about where individual scenes were set. This would allow the penciller to make major decisions regarding setting, pace, and other aspects of the story, making the penciller’s role similar to that of a film director. The writer would then write the narration and dialogue around the penciller’s drawings. Most comics creators have not been using the Marvel method since the turn of the century. Nonetheless, there are still some who prefer it, such as popular penciller Greg Capullo, who, though he works at DC Comics and Image Comics, began his career at Marvel in the late 1980s.

 

Relevance to Special Collections

Partly due to the success of superhero film franchises like the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), comic-book superheroes have seen a resurgence in popular culture during the past decade. Stories that have now become a mainstay in the popular imagination, like the MCU’s Infinity Saga, can be traced back to comics published in the late twentieth century. For example, “the tesseract,” a cosmic weapon/energy source used by the villain Red Skull in the film Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), and later by Loki in The Avengers (2012), makes an early appearance in an issue held by Falvey’s Distinctive Collections, under the name of “the cosmic cube”:

This newfound popularity of Marvel characters has meant that older comics, such as the ones in Falvey’s Distinctive Collections, are easy to find and rarely out of print. Even when they are out of print, there is always the option of accessing a digital copy. However, most recent editions of twentieth-century comics display several differences from the original copies. These differences demonstrate the value of collecting original copies of these comics in heritage institutions.

 

When large companies like Marvel reprint their earlier titles, they usually recolor the drawings. The above images show the differences between several panels in the copies of Captain America Vol 1 #110 and Conan the Barbarian Vol 1 #1 held at Falvey and their modern reprints (you may click on all images in this article to enlarge them). While some may argue that the modern edition is superior due to its cleaner lines and brighter colors, it does not teach us much about comic-book authorship or readership in the Silver Age. From an artistic point of view, it could be argued that the relatively muted colors and imprecise inks of the original printing are better suited to the art style. Moreover, the signature “dots,” which marked the cheap mechanical printing processes of the time, lend a realistic texture to many parts of the page. On the contrary, the flat recoloring makes figures and environments stand out in a way that was not originally intended. Artists and editors designed these comics with specific printing technologies in mind. If a researcher is to study these titles, they will get a clearer understanding of the comics in their moment of creation if they examine original copies.

Another aspect that is omitted when older comics are reprinted (except in facsimile editions of key issues) is the section of letters, or “fan mail,” at the end of each issue. These sections, which still exist though not as frequently as they used to, often have pun-based titles and publish selected letters from readers, as well as responses from Marvel’s editorial staff. They shed light on the reactions and attitudes of these comics’ first readers. One notable characteristic is that Marvel did not seem to shy away from publishing fan letters that were critical of the company or the topics explored in superhero comics. For instance, the following fan letter, published in Captain America Vol 1 #126 (the plot of which addresses issues of racial inequality), is actively resistant to the types of nationalistic attitudes that a character like Captain American might risk inadvertently endorsing:

A similarly valuable paratextual segment in Marvel comics of this era is “Stan’s Soapbox,” where writer and editor Stan Lee would discuss a wide variety of topics in his characteristically jovial style. (Lee, whom many will recognize as an elderly man who made brief appearances in most Marvel films until his passing in 2018, was as much a showman as a comics creator–so much so, in fact, that when artist Jack Kirby left Marvel Comics, he created a satiric parody of Lee for DC Comics called Funky Flashman.) The following two entries of “Stan’s Soapbox,” published in consecutive issues of Captain America, show the editorial staff’s active engagement with readers’ opinions:

Some entries in “Stan’s Soapbox” would also offer glimpses into the process of creating comics, including the Marvel method. Other entries announced events that would become key moments in comics history, such as Jack Kirby leaving Marvel.

Another element that almost never makes its way into modern reprints is the impressive and sometimes bizarre variety of advertisements that accompanied these superhero stories. Some addressed (or, unfortunately, sometimes took advantage of) the anxieties and insecurities of readers, such as the advertisement below about reading proficiency. Others promoted interesting and strange products, such as a book that teaches readers to throw their voices like a ventriloquist.

And, of course, some advertisements would announce the publication of new Marvel series, such as the 1970 series featuring Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, the first comic book  published in the United States to feature this famous character.

Collectively, these advertisements and other paratextual segments mentioned above help us understand the interests, attitudes, and even spending habits of readers during the late twentieth century. (For similar information on early-twentieth century consumers, see a 1916 store catalog recently made available on the Villanova Digital Library.) They can serve as invaluable resources for research; and, this research can only reach its full potential if researchers have access to original copies of these comic books, rather than being limited to modern reprints.

However, the world of comic-book collecting can be difficult to navigate for those not already familiar with it. Moreover, key issues (i.e., issues that include the first appearance of a major character or a particularly famous moment in a widely beloved story) can be too expensive for most individuals to afford. In an especially extreme case, a copy of Action Comics #1–the first appearance of superman and the birth of the superhero genre as we know it today–sold for $3.18 million last year. However, this case is not reflective of the prices of most older comic books, which are indeed affordable for many heritage institutions. By collecting original copies of comic books, heritage institutions can make these texts accessible to researchers and fans alike. Furthermore, these comics are recent enough to have copyright restrictions, which is why they have not been digitized for the Villanova Digital Library. In most cases, only modern reprints have been made available digitally by Marvel and other major companies. This is yet another reason for heritage institutions to collect physical copies.

The series referenced in this article are part of the growing number of comic books in Falvey’s Distinctive Collections. Be on the lookout for additional blog articles that highlight these comics, their value of research, and their connections to other historical materials at Falvey and beyond. In the meantime, if you are interested in a primer on how to study and appreciate comic books, then make sure to check out Falvey’s copy of Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art (1993).

A new exhibit, Korean War: American Forces in Korea, is now available to view in the Prince Family Veterans Resource Center on the ground floor of Vasey Hall. The exhibit focuses on the Korean War, which was fought in 1950-1953 between North Korea, supported by China and the Soviet Union, and South Korea, supported by the United States. Following three years of conflict, the two sides agreed to an Armistice, resulting in a Demilitarized Zone along the 38th parallel north, which divides the Korean peninsula to this day. Korean War: American Forces in Korea was curated by Director of Distinctive Collections and Digital Engagement Michael Foight and Distinctive Collections Coordinator Christoforos Sassaris. It includes a range of materials covering the war, from 1950s comic books to a letter signed by President Harry S. Truman.

The first case, pictured above, includes two US military publications that shed light on the experiences of US troops stationed in Korea. The Hour Glass was a newspaper that chronicled the activities of the 7th Infantry Division; it provided US troops with information about Korean history, culture, and language. The Stethoscope served as a newsletter for the 7th Division’s 7th Medical Battalion; it includes illustrations drawn by members of the Battalion.

The exhibit also commemorates Villanova alumnus Lt. Robert Munday, who was killed in action while serving as an officer in the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War. In the first exhibit case, you may view a letter of condolence following Munday’s death signed by President Harry S. Truman, as well as an article on Munday published in a 1951 issue of the Lynx, a literary magazine published by Villanova College from 1948 to 1983. A plaque dedicated to the memory of Munday is found outside of John Barry Hall on the Villanova campus. Moreover, an entry on Munday is found on Honoring the Fallen: An Interactive Memorial Map, a Geographic Information System (GIS) map showing the locations where numerous Villanova veterans died in service. Another Villanova alumnus who died in Korea while serving in the Marine Corps is William Gaul, who is likewise commemorated with an entry on the GIS mapping project. A similar resource is the oral history project The Voices of Villanova’s Veterans, which includes interviews with numerous Villanovans who served in the armed forces.

The second exhibit case, pictured above, includes representations of the Korean War in the popular culture of the 1950s, including an issue of Collier’s magazine and four comic books depicting fictional scenes from the war. The page of Collier’s displayed in the exhibit showcases illustrations of US troops in Korea by artist Howard Brodie (1915-2010), who had previously become known for his sketches of World War II combat. These drawings demonstrate the heavy toll that continuous fighting took on US troops. The comics not only seek to engender sympathy toward troops, but also reflect several widespread attitudes, including McCarthyism, that would persist after the Armistice of 1953. These comics were all published shortly before the creation of the Comics Code Authority, which censored comics for decades, so Korean War-era comics were free to draw on the conventions of horror and similar genres in their depiction of wartime suffering.

Interestingly, one of the comic-book stories on display (“That’s What I Call Shooting,” found in Soldier Comics no. 11) emphasizes the importance of mapping technologies in war. For more information on this subject, read this article on Art of War: Illustrated and Military Maps of the Twentieth Century, an exhibit that was viewable in both Falvey Library and the Prince Family Veterans Resource Center during fall 2022.

You can see the full Korean War: American Forces in Korea exhibit during the spring 2023 semester at the Prince Family Veterans Resource Center in Vasey Hall!