One reason the Permanent Record project has been so interesting is that I was lucky enough to have found report cards from a school that was extremely well documented. The book whose cover you see above was written in 1910 by one of the school's founders, and it explains a lot about the school's founding and early workings. The whole book is available online, as is one of the school's early annual reports. Even better, a 16-minute silent film about the school was shot in 1911 (if you have a few minutes, it's definitely worth watching). All of these resources helped me understand and interpret the information on the report cards.
The history of the school is the subject of today's Permanent Record article on Slate. Along the way, we'll take a look at a few students and their descendants, and we'll also see what the school building is like today. The article is available here.
Special Event: This Saturday, Sept. 24, I'll be hosting a small Permanent Record gathering in Brooklyn, New York. Attendees will include some of the family members I've interviewed, some researchers who've assisted me during the project, some people from Slate, and so on. We have room for a few more people, and it occurred to me that it might be interesting to have some readers on hand. If you'd like to attend, get in touch and I'll give you the details.
Hi, I've only just finished entry two over at Slate but its a fascinating story and really enjoyed your writing. Great Job.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to read the rest first but will try to pop by and read the posts here afterwards. Keep up the good work!