Archive for the “Research ideas” Category

In Chapter 7, the men go hunting for wild turkeys, which Ruth later cooks in a scrumptious feast.  In honor of the turkey feast day coming up this month (Thanksgiving), this post spotlights some of the resources on wild turkeys we have here at Alden.

A sampling of our books about wild turkeys:

• Clancy, Gary.  Wild Turkey.   Minnetonka, MN: Cowles Creative Publishing, 1996.  (link to this book in ALICE)
• Williams, Lovett E., Jr.  Wild Turkey Country.  Minoqua, WI: Willow Creek Press, 1991. (link to this book in ALICE)
• Lewis, James C.  The World of the Wild Turkey.  Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1973.  (link to this book in ALICE)
• Platt, Carolyn V.  Creatures of Change: An Album of Ohio Animals.  Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1998. (link to this book in ALICE)

And here are some articles.  (Some of these include recipes!)

• Grivetti, Louis E., Jan L. Corlett, and Cassius T. Lockett.   ”Food in American History, Part 2: Turkey.” Nutrition Today 36.2 (2001): 88. (link to article at journal website)
• Miles, Jonathan. “Roast Wild Turkey.” Field & Stream Dec. 2008: 47.(link to article in Academic Search Complete)
• Mariani, John. “Turkey goes wild.” Sports Afield Nov. 1998: 40. (link to article in Academic Search Complete)
• LeBrun, Fred. “Game fare.” New York State Conservationist 53.2 (1998): 10. (link to this article in Academic Search Complete)
• Michael, Romano. “The Chef.” New York Times 29 Oct. 1997: 5. (link to this article at New York Times website)

Throughout Cion,  the character Orpah is on a quest to find a ghost orchid.  Here are some articles that will help you learn more about ghost orchids and where they actually can be found.  (Hint: it’s nowhere near Athens County.)

• Ebersole, Renee.  “A Blooming Ghost.”  Audobon.  Nov./Dec. 2007: 22. (link to this article at the magazine website)
• McClintock, Jack.  “Fakahatchee Ghosts.”  Smithsonian.  Aug. 2003: 24-7. (link to this article in Academic Search Complete)

In chapter 8, Toloki and Orpah go hunting for wild mushrooms, including morels.  Since it’s the time of year for mushroom hunting, here are some articles from Academic Search Complete about morels.  Here is an article about a man who hunts wild mushrooms professionally for New York restaurants.  This is one about hunting morels and what to do with them when you find them.  This one gives hunting tips, a recipe, and some websites to try.

In case you’re interested in something more scholarly, here is one about how morels came back in British Columbia following a devastating forest fire.   And our last one is about where and when morels grow each year.

In chapter 6, we learn that after Abednego got to Tabler Town, he started to grow pawpaws.  Academic Search Complete has some articles that tell us more about this native Ohio fruit.  This one is a good introduction and even has pictures.  Here’s another good one that talks about how to grow the trees.  And here’s one about how pawpaws are becoming more popular for the commercial market.

Next Tuesday, February 10th, at noon in Alden room 251, we will present our workshop on doing research on Cion, which set a new record for workshop attendance last quarter. This time it promises to be even better, as librarian Marne Grinolds walks you through some of the best places to start when doing research on Cion. Not only can you learn more about the history behind this fascinating book, but you also might learn some tips and tricks that can help you in researching other historical novels. See you on Tuesday!

So where is Abyssinia anyway?  The World Book Encyclopedia can tell us!  And once you know that, if you’re interested in learning more, doing a keyword search in ALICE, the library catalog, for Abyssinia will bring up a range of interesting travelogues written by people who visited the country in vastly different time periods.

Anyone doing research relating to The Ridges and its early history as a mental hospital should take a look at Katherine Ziff’s 2004 dissertation entitled Asylum and Community: Connections Between the Athens Lunatic Asylum and the Village of Athens 1867-1893. Here’s the abstract (summary) that she wrote for her thesis:

The locus of care for mental illness in the United States has traditionally been described as either community based or centralized, asylum based. Most asylum case studies have focused on the inner workings of the institutions. None have studied in asylum in the context of its surrounding community.

This research explores the nature of the connections between asylum and community by way of a historical organizational case study of the Athens Lunatic Asylum from 1867 through 1893 as it relates to the Village of Athens, Ohio. Sources consulted include official documents (government reports and records, census data), personal documents (letters and manuscripts), and popular culture documents (newspapers, atlases, and photographs).

Between 1867 and 1893, the Asylum was connected with the Village of Athens in five areas: money economy, landscape, political and physical infrastructure, family, and social order. These connections were forged by the asylum’s need for goods and services and by the needs of the Athens community for jobs and cash. They were also sustained by community needs for recreation and entertainment, for humanitarian resources for those with mental illness, and at times for a means of social control. The political and physical infrastructure as well as the formal and informal networks that controlled the commitment process served to make possible the connections that met the needs of both asylum and community.

This research documents three aspects of asylum-community affairs receiving received attention from researchers. First, it identifies ways in which the Asylum functioned as customer and employer in the community. Second, it documents how the asylum grounds, as a permeable boundary between asylum and community, functioned as a community resource. Third, it shows how the Athens community used the state and local political infrastructure to advance its interests with regard to the Asylum; it also describes the ways in which the physical infrastructure connected Asylum and community.

This study describes an example of a community’s collaboration with an asylum at a time when care has been thought of as situated within the asylum. It suggests areas for constructing or renewing community connections for those with mental illness.

The full text of the dissertation is available for viewing or downloading. Be sure to consult the bibliography at the end for leads to many more sources.

Dr. Glen Jackson

Several months ago, Dr. Glen Jackson of Ohio University’s Chemistry Department made a presentation in Alden Library about a research project he had been involved in dealing with one of the ghost stories connected to The Ridges. Briefly, the story concerns a patient at the Athens Mental Health and Retardation Center who went missing in December 1978 and whose body was discovered in an unused part of The Ridges the next month. Quoting from Dr. Jackson’s article:

Although the floor was supposedly cleaned after removing her body, there now (December 2007) is present a very distinct white mark on the floor in the shape of a human body (Figs. 1 and 2). This ‘‘stain’’ has fueled numerous ghost stories and urban legends in the community, and has been featured in a TV documentary⁄drama (3).

The article, “Analysis of Suspected Trace Human Remains from an Indoor Concrete Surface,” describing this research and its conclusions has now been published in The Journal of Forensic Sciences. To learn about how Dr. Jackson went about this research and the conclusions he came to, you can read the article for yourself.

When the Abyssinian Queen was not being accused of making love potions, she was suspected of practicing voodoo (more properly spelled “vodou”).  Almost 150 years later, Obed Quigley, as one of his many money-making schemes, decides to practice something called “conjure.”  Both of these are real religious practices in the U.S. today, and we have books about both of them.

Here’s a list of some of our books about vodou:

• Secrets of Voodoo, by Milo Rigaud
• Divine Horsemen: Voodoo Gods of Haiti, by Maya Deren
• Vodou in Haitian Life and Culture: Invisible Powers, edited by Claudine Michel and Patrick Bellegarde-Smith
• Vodou: Visions and Voices of Haiti, by Phyllis Galembo  (This one is full of color pictures.)

We also have a book about conjure, a more Americanized practice that grew out of vodou: Conjure in African-American Society by Jeffrey E. Anderson.

In chapter 2 of Cion, we learn that The Owner was madly in love and filled with desire for the slave called the Abyssinian Queen, and that the other residents of the plantation suspected that she had used a love potion on him.  The idea of love potions has been in existence for thousands of years, and today they are studied more scientifically as aphrodisiacs.  We have two good books on the subject here at Alden.  Love Potions through the Ages tells the history of love potions from ancient times through the Middle Ages, complete with plenty of spells and recipes!  Aphrodisiacs– The Science and the Myth gives a more medically-centered view of what aphrodisiacs actually are and how they work on the brain.  You can find either of them by doing a title search on ALICE, the library catalog.