EMAIL NEWSLETTER
THANKSGIVING 2003
Dear VSA Member,
Welcome to the first email newsletter of the Victorian
Society in America, designed to keep you up to date with news from the Society
and beyond. These newsletters will
appear periodically as time permits, usually around holidays, to supplement the
paper publications of the Society.
As the holiday season approaches, members are reminded of the Society’s associate program with online retailer Amazon. Any purchases made within 24 hours after clicking on the link to Amazon on our website, will result in revenue for the Society. You must visit our website first at www.victoriansociety.org and use the link to Amazon on our home page.
Members are also reminded that a gift membership of the Society may be the perfect holiday present for your Victorian friends. Simply contact us with the appropriate payment details for a new member, and we mail a welcome package, including a gift card in your name, to any new member in time for the holidays. Membership rates: Individual $45; Household $55, Student $30, Institutional $40.
The VSA and the Summer
Schools Alumni Association present a Study Tour of British Columbia. This exclusive 10-day tour visits some
of the most historic and scenic places in Canada. John Adams provides expert commentary
along the way, including evening lectures, readings, and onboard
videos.
If you anyone outside the Society who would be interested in receiving the printed brochure, please let us know, or visit the website to download the color brochure (pdf file).
The VSA website at www.victoriansociety.org has recently been updated, and will continue to be updated regularly with news and features; so please pay a visit. Pages recently updated include our HOME page, the NEWS page, the CALENDAR, VSA Events, RESOURCES, & CHAPTERS.
The 18 Chapters of the
Society now have their
own pages on the
main VSA website, where you can find not only contact details but listings of
their upcoming events and activities.
Please visit the Chapters webpages to see what is
happening in your Chapter, and across the country in other
areas.
Currently updated webpages are those for the chapters in
DC Metro,
Falls Church,
& Heartland.
Chapter Officers are reminded to send electronic texts of their events to info@victoriansociety.org for posting.
The Journal of the
Gilded Age and Progressive Era invites manuscripts from members of the VSA
on any aspect of Victorian society and culture in the United States between
roughly 1870 and 1920.
Published by the Society
for Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, this is the only journal
specifically devoted to an obviously relevant area for Victorian
studies.
To submit manuscripts,
please contact the editor, as follows:
Professor Alan Lessoff, Department of History, Illinois State University, Campus Box 4420, Normal, IL 61790-4420, or email: ahlesso@ilstu.edu - website: www.jgape.org.
At the VSA Fall Board Meeting, the forming chapter of
Greater Chicago was formally accepted as the eighteenth chapter of the
society. The chapter's petition was presented by their Treasurer and
long-standing national member, Robert Furhoff.
Membership inquiries for the Greater Chicago Chapter should be addressed to the Membership Chair at hrhlaurie1894@msn.com.
Close to 100 members of
The Victorian Society in America visited Buffalo and
Niagara-on-the-Lake.
Click
here for the tour
itinerary.
50 members of The
Victorian Society in America visited Detroit as it once was, still is, and
will be again. The Motoring Study
Tour took in a great number of historic buildings, private houses, and adaptive
use sites including the former Parke-Davis Pharmaceutical office building, now
an Omni Hotel, which was the headquarters.
The tour met with unanimous
praise and great thanks goes to members Cheryl Huff and Maria Wood of Detroit
for organizing the events, functions and making tour arrangements, and to all
the many home owners and institutions who made us welcome.
To view the tour itinerary, click
here.
VSA
PUBLICATIONS
Following the sad loss of our newsletter editor, Bill
Fischelis, earlier this year, the newsletter will appear twice annually for the
time being. Its release will be staggered with the magazine, Nineteenth
Century, so that publications are received
quarterly.
To supplement the Society's paper publications, it is
proposed to keep Society news and events up to date on the website, and to issue
periodic newsletters in email format. This way, members will receive
current news more often.
The latest issue of 19th Century magazine has been printed and will be mailed next week.
DONALD H. BERGMANN HONORED WITH GERMAN AMERICAN HERITAGE
SOCIETY AWARD
Noted VSA national
member and President of the St. Louis Chapter to be honored.
St. Louis - On Wednesday,
September 17 the GAHS Board of Directors selected member Donald H. Bergmann as
the 2003 recipient of the Carl Schurz Heritage Award.
The annual award is
presented to an individual recognized for their dedication to the preservation
of the history and heritage of our German forebears. Bergmann has been a leading
proponent of studying and preserving German heritage in the St, Louis area, most
recently with the restoration and rededication of landmarks such as the
larger-than-life Alexander Von Humboldt bronze statue in Tower Grove
Park.
The award was presented October 24 at the 2003 "Taste of Germany" Fund Raiser Dinner.
NEW HISTORIC PRESERVATION FUND HONORS MARGOT GAYLE ON HER
95TH BIRTHDAY
Establishment
of the Margot Gayle Fund for Preservation of Victorian Heritage was announced by
the Metropolitan Chapter of the Victorian Society in America at its annual
meeting on May 29.
Created to commemorate Margot Gayle's 95th birthday on May 14, 2003, the fund honors the eminent preservationist around whose table the Victorian Society in America was founded in 1966. She is also the founder of the Friends of Cast Iron Architecture and is credited with raising public awareness nationwide of the significance of iron-fronted buildings of the Victorian era. Her preservation efforts extend from the 1960s when she successfully campaigned to save the Jefferson Market Courthouse in Greenwich Village to a drive in the 1990s to restore the Yorkville sidewalk clock on Third Avenue near 85th Street.
See article by Hilda Regier at : http://www.preserve.org/vsametro/magotgayle.htm
The dates have been
announced for the 2004 Summer Schools. Go to
VSA
Summer Schools for full
details.
AND FINALLY…
Your staff of one at the e-newsletter was alarmed recently to read the headline “Dominos Pizza to open first Victorian store”. Before too many images of wallpaper and aspidistra could be conjured up among the pepperoni, one soon learned that the Victorian in question merely referred adjectivally to the Australian state of that name, the only territory down under where the fast food outlet was not represented. Full story here:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/11/11/1068329558620.html
In another case of mistaken identity, it was overheard at
the Fall meeting in Detroit that the sudden influx of hotel guests was owing to
a convention of that august organization, Victoria’s Secret.
Guests bearing the late Queen’s image on their totebags
soon rendered any correction unnecessary.
John
Cooper
Business Manager
The
Victorian Society in America