Monthly Archives: December 2017

I meant to post this yesterday but I was unexpectedly overtaken by a long nap. It’s Edgar Odell Lovett’s Christmas message from 1945, his last year as president of the Rice Institute and the year that saw the end of … Continue reading →

From a Brown College scrapbook: I don’t think that’s really Santa. Bonus: This isn’t a Rice magazine but the very idea of it makes it too weird to pass up. Extra Bonus: The library is closed until after New Year’s … Continue reading →

We got a surprise donation this morning from Russ Pitman ’58, a copy of philosophy Professor Radoslav Tsanoff’s book on ethics: It isn’t surprising that Russ gave something to the Woodson. He’s given many things over the years and has … Continue reading →

They look like they could not possibly be having more fun: I especially love the old style lights on the tree. We went back to the big bulbs ourselves this year. Bonus:

Purely by accident, since last Christmas I’ve come across two nice holiday cards sent out by the Rice school of architecture. The first one is undated but seems from context to be from the mid to late 1940s:   The … Continue reading →

There turned out to be a fantastic cache of interesting material in the Faculty Club papers and I’ll be returning to it often as we go through the new year. Back in the day it really operated as a club … Continue reading →

This letter accompanied the donation of Faculty Club records to the Woodson in 1998. I’ve talked about the donor, Edward Hake Phillips, before, here. The second paragraph is mind boggling: Bonus: Light up the world with kindness. Extra Bonus: Meanwhile … Continue reading →

I found this grainy, faded image of the original Commons in a scrapbook I hadn’t opened in several years. Somehow I had overlooked this rare image–note that the wooden paneling hadn’t yet been installed: The original surface seems to have … Continue reading →

I’ve spent over two decades thinking about the history of race relations at Rice, first for my dissertation, then for the book that followed, and even now out of simple curiosity. One of the oddities in this story is that … Continue reading →

I’ve gotten quite interested in what the original layout of the basement of Fondren would have been, interested enough in fact to do some research. For a moment this afternoon I thought I had it when I found this: A … Continue reading →