Over the last few months we’ve acquired a number of things of local regional interest in Special Collections. Of particular interest is the third volume of Daniel Reiff’s biography of his father Harry Reiff. Dr. Harry Reiff taught at St. Lawrence University from 1928 to 1966. Dr Reiff was a noted scholar of international relations, and his book The United States and the Treaty Law of the Sea (University of Minnesota Press 1959) was a widely cited landmark book in the field. Daniel Reiff’s biography also gives much attention to what made Harry Reiff so important to the St. Lawrence University community—from starting the Model UN Security Council to the numerous lecture series and scholarships in his name. This is an important and welcome addition to our holdings related to the history of St. Lawrence (and there is also a copy in the open stack if you’d like to check it out!)
Along with this new book, there is a profile of Harry Reiff, Owen D Young, and Frank Piskor, in a Scarlet and Brown Story presented by Paul Doty and Paul Haggett, which was recorded in October of 2021.
Several titles that bespeak regional issues and history have also been added to the collection. A new piece in our Adirondack Collection is a surveyor’s day book dated 1865 kept by E.A. Merritt and Henry Thompson. Titled Field Notes of Piercefield, the notes are descriptions of Great Tract no 2 Township no. 6 which includes Jock Pond, Wolf Pond, Blue Mountain, and Long Pond. This is a fascinating description of the lay of the Adirondacks in the mid-nineteenth century. In our Rare Book Collection two recent titles of note are a new volume of poems by Adirondack poets Linda Blaskey and Jim Bourey, Seasons of Harvest. A book that is ostensibly about aging, it is structured as “free-standing poems of vividly described and deeply felt acceptance.” Also new in Rare Books is a graphic novel titled A Most Costly Journey: Stories of Migrant Farm Workers in Vermont edited by Mark Bennett, Andy Kolovos, and Teresa Marcs. The book speaks to the experiences of a community who are a part of rural New York and Vermont, but a community that does not often hear their stories told, or in this case, see their stories drawn. North Country Public Radio profiled the book in March of 2023. Finally, two new pieces in The North Country Boats and Boating Collection—an authentic 1915 Rushton Catalog in Fine Condition, and a letter dated July 29th 1902 on Angler’s Association of the St. Lawrence River. The catalog is the last produced by the Rushton Company before its demise, and the letter is addressed to one George E. Vaukener of Ogdensburg, and is an invitation to join, that details the advantages of association membership.