Historian Anya Jabour thinks that autograph albums were particularly important to women during moments of transition in their lives, such as following commencement from school or in the weeks leading up to a marriage, allowing \u201cyoung women’s friendships with each other to survive separation and even death.\u201d [3]<\/a> Mary\u2019s album includes an undated \u201cQuarterly Bill\u201d (report card) from Bradford Academy, an institution in Bradford, Massachusetts, which operated as a women\u2019s college between 1836 and 1931. Most of the entries are written by friends from Lowell, suggesting that perhaps Mary\u2019s signature album was a way for her to stay connected with friends from home while she was attending Bradford.<\/p>\n The content of the entries in Mary\u2019s album reflects this purpose. Though many a joy around thee smile<\/p>\n And many a faithful friend you meet<\/p>\n Whose love may cheer[e] life\u2019s dreary way<\/p>\n And turn the bitter cup to sweet<\/p>\n Let memory sometimes bear thee back<\/p>\n To other days almost forgot<\/p>\n And where you think of other friends<\/p>\n Who love thee well Forget, me not!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Other entries, expressed in common language of Christian \u201cvirtue\u201d suggest how these women conceived of, and dealt with such separations. An 1834 entry from Eliza Brooks of Lowell, MA, potentially the wife or sister of the aforementioned Oliver Brooks includes a poem, copied from an unknown source, that imagines a world where \u201cvirtue round us ever shed\/The influence of her gentle light.\u201d The poem\u2019s author then goes on to admit that such a world will never be possible, nor desirable, for if the world was always virtuous:<\/p>\n We then might never thoughtful turn<\/p>\n Our minds to nobler scenes above,<\/p>\n Nor let within our bosoms burn,<\/p>\n Aught purer than an earthly love.<\/p>\n But Dearest<\/span> Friends<\/span> [author\u2019s emphasis] are from us riven,<\/p>\n And pleasures gayest hours are brief;<\/p>\n And hope by stern misfortune driven,<\/p>\n Will wither like the Autumn leafe.<\/p>\n Then may we seek an endless Friend<\/p>\n Whose smiles are never shaded,<\/p>\n And hope for life that never shall end<\/p>\n Nor fade, as earthly scenes have faded<\/p>\n And calmly on life pathway move<\/p>\n To those Blest<\/span> Mansions <\/span>far above.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Eliza Brooks underlined \u201cDearest Friends,\u201d in the fourth line, suggesting that this sentiment refers to Mary specifically. The \u201cendless Friend\u201d in this poem is assumed to be God. This poem is then one of several entries in Mary\u2019s album recommending religion and investment in virtue, charity, and humility as ways to transcend the reality of being separated from friends, and the pain that comes with that separation. Other entries refer to virtue, Godliness, and eternal blessings outside of the context of friendship, suggesting a shared common experience and concern with upholding Christian values.<\/p>\n Presumably, Mary read these entries. This considered, her album becomes a dialogue between friends and herself, a place to receive and reflect on shared sentiments regarding friendship, separation, Christian virtue, and happiness.<\/p>\n But is this a journal? So far, I have been unintentionally vague about what I mean by a journal or diary, assuming (until now) that the term didn\u2019t really need a definition. In my first entry<\/a>, I described diaries as \u201csomething extremely personal, a continuous letter to self.\u201d Mary\u2019s signature album differs from previous diaries I\u2019ve discussed in that she did not write in it, and other people did; it is not \u201ca letter to self,\u201d but a series of entries written to Mary by others. But it is personal, in the same way that a scrapbook or a signed yearbook is personal. The entries she collects from friends are a physical manifestation of existing friendships and interests.<\/p>\n Furthermore, this album differs from, let\u2019s say, a collection of letters, in that it is contained in an album, and Mary\u2019s presence is discernible through materials she\u2019s intentionally inserted into it, including her map and a typed, published entry intended \u201cFor an Album\u201d that has been removed from a primer or magazine and carefully glued to her album\u2019s opening pages. Though Mary was not this album\u2019s scribe, she was its owner and curator. Her album then, though not a journal, serves many of the same purposes, reminding us that diaries, in the traditional sense, are not the only self-curated historical documents that were used to record and reflect on the intimate details of a person\u2019s life.<\/p>\n Rebecca D\u2019Angelo is a senior undergraduate student in History and Anthropology. In her blog series For Private Eyes Only<\/strong> she studies diaries available in Archives and Special Collections at the Dodd Research Center to explore the history of journal writing and reasons why we write journals.<\/em><\/p>\n [1] Anya Jabour, \u201cAlbums of Affection: Female Friendship and Coming of Age in Antebellum Virginia,\u201d The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography<\/i> 107 (1999): 128.<\/p>\n [2] Lisa Ricker, \u201cPerforming Memory, Performing Identity: Jennie Drew\u2019s autograph Album, Mnemonic Activity, and the Invention of Feminine Subjectivity\u201d (Proquest,\u00a0UMI Dissertation Publishing, 2011).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [3] Ibid<\/i>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" They say you are who your friends are. To anyone reading Mary Clark\u2019s 1835 signature album, this statement is almost literally true. Presumably a resident of Lowell, Massachusetts in the 1830s, we know very little about Mary\u2019s life, except what … Continue reading ![\"mapClark\"](\"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/files\/2013\/11\/mapClark-300x225.jpg\")
<\/a>The entries in Mary Clark\u2019s signature album are not chronological. They are scattered throughout the album, separated by empty pages; all date between 1834 and 1838. Though Mary does not seem to have written in her own album, her book includes items that appear to have been created or collected by her, including a carefully drawn map of Eurasia (pictured). Female friends wrote most of the entries, though her album includes an entry from an \u201cOliver Brooks,\u201d presumably a male friend.<\/p>\n![\"messinger\"](\"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/files\/2013\/11\/messinger-225x300.jpg\")
<\/a>An 1836 entry from an \u201cS.J. Messinger\u201d of Lowell (pictured) includes the following handwritten poem borrowed from a Scottish author:<\/p>\n\n
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