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If you’ve enjoyed pondering the Puzzle Poems submitted by Villanova alumnus T. A. Daly to Golden Days for Boys and Girls weekly story paper, you won’t want to miss the latest episode of Spare Change Library podcast.

Puzzle Poems and Solutions 

This episode explores a very personal ‘Villa Nova’ connection to reader-submitted puzzle poems from Golden Days for Boys and Girls (c. 1880-1907). It features interviews with Rebecca Oviedo (Distinctive Collections Archivist) and Demian Katz (Director of Library Technology at Villanova) as well as readings from Golden Days story papers, hosted by yours truly–Dr. Meg Piorko (Distinctive Collections Librarian).

Can’t get enough poetry? Falvey has got you covered!

Check out the spring exhibit: “Poetic License: Seven Curators’ Poetry Selections from Distinctive Collections” located on the first floor of Falvey Library.

Happy Friday! As promised, here are the solutions to last week’s puzzle poems, published in Golden Days for Boys and Girls story papers (c. 1880-1907)

Puzzle Poems submitted by “Villa Nova” featured in Golden Days

Puzzledom Solutions

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 38, August 20, 1887.

No. 7 solution (Wide-spread.)

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 41, September 10, 1887.

No. 9 solution (The demon of despair.)

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 45, October 8, 1887.

No. 5 solution (Care-worn.)

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 23, May 7, 1887.

No. 9 solution (Ruined castle.)

Need more Distinctive Collections poetry content?

Check out the exhibit “Poetic License: Seven Curators Poetry Selections from Distinctive Collections” located on the first floor of Falvey Library

Tune into my inaugural episode hosting the Spare Change Library podcast to learn more about the puzzle poems featured in Golden Days for Boys and Girls story papers

Puzzle Poems from Golden Days for Boys and Girls

This popular children’s story paper (published from 1880 to 1907) featured a weekly section titled “Puzzledom.” The editor solicited puzzles and published solutions submitted by readers. Finding the solution to puzzle poems typically involves rhyming riddles, in which words have more than one meaning, clues that hint at a keyword or phrase, and anagrams that require rearranging the letters of a given word or phrase.

Example Puzzle Poem and Solution

Puzzle No. 5 A Transposition.

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 36, August 6, 1887.

Answer: Talent, latent.

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 37, August 13, 1887.

Try your hand at solving these Villa Nova (T. A. Daly) puzzle poems

Answers will appear in next week’s blog post!

Puzzle No. 7 Charade.

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 37, August 13, 1887.

Puzzle No. 9 Anagram.

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 40, September 3, 1887.

Puzzle No. 5 Charade.  

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 44, October 1, 1887.

Puzzle No. 9 Double-Word Enigma.  

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 22, April 30, 1887.

Golden Days poem featured in HBO series Boardwalk Empire

Golden Days for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 25, May 21, 1887.

The first episode of the final season (e1s5) of Boardwalk Empire opens with the main character having a flashback to himself as a boy in 1880’s Atlantic City. The scene opens and closes with a voiceover of the poem “Be Honest and True” by George Birdseye read aloud from Golden Days for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 25, May 21, 1887. This episode of Boardwalk Empire illustrates the incredible popularity and influence of Golden Days story papers during the late 19^th century.

“Villa Nova” poetry featured in Golden Days

Golden Days for Boys and Girls was a weekly children story paper published from March 6, 1880 through May 11, 1907. The paper was produced in Philadelphia by James Elverson (originally intended as a companion to his adult story paper: Saturday Night—also available in our Digital Library) but circulated widely from coast to coast.

Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 1, December 4, 1886.

Thomas Augustine (T. A.) Daly

Daly was a student at Villanova from 1880 to 1887. Daly went on to have a prolific career publishing many books of his dialectic poetry. But before he was a renowned author, he submitted original “puzzle poems” to Golden Days for Boys and Girls under the pseudonym Villa Nova. Today, Villanova holds issues of Golden Days from 1887 containing Daly’s puzzle poems, as well as his personal notebooks where he crafted the cryptic poetry.

Notebook, Thomas A. Daly’s Villanova Notebook v. 2, 1886-1887.

For more on Daly’s Villanova legacy and Irish American dialectic poetry, check out Distinctive Collections Archivist Rebecca Oviedo’s digital exhibit: Rediscovering T. A. Daly: Immigrant Voices in Poetry

Puzzle Poems

Puzzle poems combine logic puzzles with poetic language, requiring an aptitude for English and mathematics to both create and solve the riddle. Types of puzzle poems featured in Golden Days include numericals, charades, anagrams, enigmas, and forms (such as pentagon, square, diamond, inverted pyramid, etc.) Finding the solution to puzzle poems typically involve rhyming riddles where words have more than one meaning, clues that hint at the answer, and rearranging letters of a given word or phrase.

Puzzledom section. Golden Days : for Boys and Girls, v. VIII, no. 1, December 4, 1886.

Golden Days for Boys and Girls solicited reader submissions of puzzle poems with the following call in each weekly issue:

Puzzledom

Original contributions solicited from all. Puzzles containing obsolete words will be received. Write contributions on one side of the paper, and apart from all communications. Address “Puzzle Editor,” Golden Days, Philadelphia, PA.

Stay tuned!

The Falvey Distinctive Collections and Digital Engagement staff will be producing a Spare Change podcast episode on Golden Days puzzle poems to complement the spring exhibit “Poetic License”, coming to Falvey Library next month. Solutions to a selection of Daly’s puzzle poems will be featured in next week’s blog post.

This week’s blog post highlights one of the newly digitized Distinctive Collections materials published in 1927, which now makes it public domain. For more on Public Domain Day 2023 see last week’s post.

The Chronical of the Northern Baptist Caravan

This daily devotional was published by The Northern Baptist Convention Board of Missionary Cooperation in 1927. Each section represents a single day, meant to be read aloud as a family for the duration of one month.

The Land of Adventure: a virtual journey

This imagined caravan journey through the “Land of Adventure” includes a variety of virtual modes of transportation such as car, boat, camel, and even elephant. Baptist missionary destination highlights from the “Land of Adventure” include: The Castled Walls of Carcassonne, Shanghai China, Burma, El Salvador, and New York City.

A Book Sewn Shut

The introduction gives explicit instructions for its intended use, “Each day’s discoveries will be disclosed by cutting the corners of one page of the book.”

These books were sold with the pages sewn together. The cutting of the thread each day in order to discover the daily devotional was an important aspect of the spiritual reading practices of this particular text. The material evidence of the holes where the book was previously sewn shut appear in the top and bottom corners of each page.

Newly Digitized Public Domain Materials from 1927 in the Digital Library

In addition to the Northern Baptist Caravan, here is a list of some of the materials in the Distinctive Collections that are now available in our Digital Library:

150th anniversary of the battle of Germantown, October 1st to 4th, 1927 : programme

Neddie Burd’s Reading letter: an epic of the early Berks Bar / by J. Bennett Nolan

Anthony Comstock, Roundsman of the Lord

Irish medieval monasteries on the continent : a dissertation / by Joseph Paul Fuhrmann, O.S.B.

Mysteries of the missing / By Edward H. Smith  

Public Domain Day 2023

Happy New Year! January 1 is Public Domain Day in the United States. On the first day of the year 2023, US copyrights expire for works produced in the year 1927 and these materials enter the public domain. In celebration of Public Domain Day, here is a list of some of the materials in the Distinctive Collections that are now available in our Digital Library.

The Chronicle of the Northern Baptist Caravan

The wonder smith and his son : a tale from the golden childhood of the world

Coaster captain : a tale of the Boston waterfront by James B. Connolly

Diamond Dick’s red trailer : or, A hairbreadth escape by W. B. Lawson

Pirates of the Prairies by Kilpatrick Mason (Texas Pat)

Famous Media from 1927

The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes the final set of 12 Sherlock Holmes short stories by British author Arthur Conan Doyle

To the Lighthouse a philosophical novel by Virginia Woolf set in early 20th century Scotland

Metropolis a German expressionist sci-fi film direct by Fritz Lang and written by Thea von Harbou, based on his novels by the same name

Music by the jazz studio group Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven from the Okeh Records recording session

Meg Piorko’s Weekly Pick: Christmas: Its Origin and Associations,…

Christmas: Its Origin and Associations; Bringing in the Yule Log.

For the month of December the blog will be featuring holiday themed materials from Falvey’s Distinctive Collections.

Christmas: Its Origin and Associations, Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries is written by W. F. Dawson and first published in 1902. The long title describes the contents spanning 1900 years of Christmas traditions from all over the world. The chronological chapters are illustrated by reprints of pen and pencil drawings of holiday festivities and traditions, spanning the Origin and Associations of Christmas to Modern Christmases at Home and Abroad.

Christmas in Provence

Calabrian Shepherds Playing in Rome at Christmas.

“At home, at sea, in many distant lands, This Kingly Feast without a rival stands !”

Royal Party Dining in State. Christmas to the End of the Wars of the Roses.

Home for Dawson meant turn of the century England, and his history of Christmas is indeed centered around royal traditions of the English crown. Politics frequently influenced the national holiday traditions of England. One such example is the practice of decorating the Christmas Tree. First popularized in England by Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria, who brought this tradition from his homeland of Germany as a way to incorporate his own culture of celebrating Christmas.

How is Christmas celebrated around the world today?

Take a glimpse into the diverse cultural practices of the Christmas season from countries around the globe: https://www.whychristmas.com/cultures/

“Christmas Eve” in Bright Flowers: Choice Stories for Little People

For the month of December the blog will be featuring holiday themed materials from Falvey’s Distinctive Collections.

“Christmas Eve” is the first story in the children’s book Bright Flowers: Choice Stories for Little People, published in New York in 1889. This 19^th-century illustrated children book is formatted with a short story on the left page with a corresponding image adjacent to the text.

“Christmas Eve”

In the story “Christmas Eve”, three children (Alice, Clarence, and Grace) worry that Santa won’t be able to visit them on Christmas Eve because of the snow. The eldest of the children, Alice, assures her younger siblings that the snow will actually assist Santa’s sleigh pulled by reindeer in their travel. However, she cautions her siblings against being greedy children only concerned with receiving presents during the Christmas season.

The History of Santa Claus in America

American folklore around Santa Claus came out of New York in the 19^th-century, which is when and where this book was published. Washington Irving, the author of “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”, led a movement to create a Santa who was family-friendly and cheery in response to the carnivalesque Christmas celebrations that occurred during this time. This version of Santa Claus was inspired by the Dutch Sinterklaas. When adopted to an American tradition Santa Claus diverged from Sinterklaas by wearing a bright red fur coat rather than a bishop’s robe, is plump not thin, and drives a team of flying reindeer instead of traveling by flying horse.

Illustration of Santa Claus for “Christmas Eve”

“Christmas Eve” and the depiction of Santa in Bright Flowers is an attempt to circulate this new image of Christmas and Santa to American families. This and other 19^th-century popular literature books can be found in our Dime Novel and Popular Literature Collection, many of which are available in the Digital Library.

How will you be celebrating the Christmas season at Villanova?

Take a trip back in time to Villanova Christmases of yore and glimpse how Villanova alumni celebrated the holiday season with Santa Claus and friends in the Belle Air yearbooks, available in our Yearbooks Collection.

Belle Air Yearbook, Villanova Class of 2000

Meg Piorko’s Weekly Pick: Linguistic Stocks of American Indians, North of Mexico.

In honor of Native American Heritage month I will be highlighting materials in our Distinctive Collections relating to Indigenous peoples and experiences.

The Linguistic Stocks of American Indians, North of Mexico (1890) is a map of indigenous language groups of North America, published by John Wesley Powell (1834-1902). Powell was an American geologist and professor at Illinois Wesleyan University known for leading a three-month expedition along the Green and Colorado rivers, marking the first U.S. government supported passage through the Grand Canyon. Powell was named the first director of the Bureau of Ethnology at the Smithsonian for his work on linguistics and sociology.

Linguistic Stocks of American Indians, North of Mexico, 1890.

Capturing a moment in North American colonial history

This map illustrates various Native American languages and the regions in which they were spoken in the late-19^th century. In the coming years European colonists would continue to displace many of these indigenous groups westward in the name of imperialist expansion. A map produced in the early 20^th century depicting the same language groups would look very different.

This and other historic maps are part of our John F. Smith, III and Susan B. Smith Antique Map Collection. Click here to listen to John Smith describe this map in his own words.

What to learn more about the Smith Map Collection?

Check out the current Distinctive Collections and Digital Engagement exhibit titled, “Art of War: Illustrated and Military Maps of the Twentieth Century” located on the first floor of Falvey Memorial Library, co-curated by Rebecca Oviedo and Christoforos Sassaris.

Meg Piorko’s Weekly Pick: The Snow People by Marie Herbert

In honor of Native American heritage month I will be highlighting materials in our Distinctive Collections relating to Indigenous peoples and experiences.

The Snow People (1973) is a self-published, firsthand account of Marie Herbert’s experience living among the Inuit people for one year with her explorer husband, Wally Herbert, and their young child. Wally Herbert specialized in exploring lands considered the most remote and uncharted by Europeans.

Front cover, The Snow People

Wally’s goal in living among the indigenous people of northwest Greenland was to document their “vanishing culture”. Rather than record their lives via film or other technology-based documentary methods, the Herbert family attempted to assimilate with the Inuit people. Marie, Wally, and their ten-month old baby lived in a hut on a settlement located 90 miles north of a U.S. airbase, isolated by a frozen sea.

The Herbert’s did however take personal photos of their time with the Inuit.

In her book, Marie Herbert recounts the domestic experience of living as an Inuit woman. She learned skills such as how to collect ice for fresh water, skin a fox, make sealskin shoes and polar-bear pants, guide a sledge through hazardous rocks and ice, net migrating birds, make dog harnesses, and more! Marie’s daughter Kari learned to speak the local Inuit language before she could speak English.

What does Inuit language Inuktitut sound like? Click here for recordings of people speaking Inuktitut

Portraits of Inuit women and an Inuit man holding the Herbert’s baby

This and other arctic Distinctive Collections materials are part of the Jamie Wheeler Collection recently acquired by Falvey.

What to learn more about this new collection?

Check out the digital special collection exhibit, “That Fairytale of Ice”: Polar Exploration in Mind and Memory, curated by Distinctive Collections librarian Rebecca Oviedo.