Taming Electricity: A Purdue Student’s Career in Electromagnetic Compatibility

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Electricity, or the flow of electric charge, is arguably the most important invention behind the spectacular advancement in technology witnessed over the last century. It has truly revolutionized our lives on planet Earth, and the way we explore other worlds in the universe. Today, as we sit in our comfortable climate-controlled buildings talking to people on the other side of the globe, we take electricity for granted. We also tend to overlook the hard work of countless engineers and scientists for harnessing the power of electricity. Donald Heirman is one such electrical engineer who worked on some fundamental problems in electrical circuits.

The EMC “can of worms”

One interesting problem faced by engineers early on was the relationship between electricity and magnetism: they are intertwined, each is a by-product of the other. When an electrical circuit is powered up, it produces a magnetic field. This can create “disturbance” in a nearby (or even in the same) circuit, and cause performance degradation. If this seems too technical, recall experiencing cross-talk on a 90’s landline telephone, or static noise-lines on a TV. The phenomenon is known as Electromagnetic Interference (EMI), and becomes of greater concern as electronic devices shrink in size. Lots of electrical components are in close proximity of each other, and hence prone to electromagnetic interference.

Mr. Heirman working in a “noise-free” environment c.1979

“Taming” electricity is hard work but vital for the smooth functioning of our modern lives. That is exactly what Donald Heirman dealt with during his career at AT&T spanning more than three decades. Having graduated with BS (1962) and MS (1963) degrees in EE from Purdue, Mr. Heirman joined AT&T Bell Labs as a young electrical engineer. Over the years, he worked on some of the most important and exciting projects at AT&T including the development of an Open Area Test Site facility, and a Transverse Electromagnetic (TEM) cell for the Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) analysis of devices. His work focused on electromagnetic interference testing and compliance, and stretched to a range of systems including computer processors, early telephone systems, antennae, road vehicles, and medical devices. Mr. Heirman was also the founding manager of Lucent Technologies (Bell Labs) Global Product Compliance Laboratory. In this role, he was in charge of the company’s major EMC and regulatory test facility, and its participation in national and international EMC standardization committees.

Mr. Heirman started his EMC career at a time when there were few legal limits on EM emissions from electronic devices (the FCC did not have EMC standards for electronic devices until 1979). His passion led him to join (and later lead) international efforts towards EMC standardization. He continues to work with all major national and international standards organizations including ANSI, IEEE and IEC. His many contributions to global electro-technical standardization in the field of EMC have been acknowledged in the form of some of the highest awards in the area.

Click to see the Bicycle Water Race c.1961

Mr. Heirman’s papers (http://collections.lib.purdue.edu/heirman/) provide a fascinating peek into the life and career of an EMC engineer. In addition, the papers offer an unparalleled insight into the history and evolution of EMC standards. The collection also includes some of Mr. Heirman’s amateur videos showcasing life at Purdue University during the early 1960’s. These videos are a rare glimpse of some of the events (sports at Purdue, the Purdue grand prix, ground breaking of the Purdue Airport, and the 1961 visit of President Eisenhower), and traditions (pie throwing, Iron Key, bicycle water race) at Purdue University. The video clip on the right shows just one such tradition (now forgotten): the bicycle water race.

Mr. Heirman currently runs a training and consulting business by the name of Don HEIRMAN Consultants. He continues to be a key player and educator in the field of EMC. His papers are part of the Donald N. Heirman Collection in the Virginia Kelly Karnes Archives and Special Collections Research Center at Purdue Libraries. The collection is open for research.

Space Exploration For All: The Eugene A. Cernan Papers

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The Barron Hilton Flight and Space Exploration Archives within Purdue Archives and Special Collections contains collections from many distinguished astronauts. Neil Armstrong, David Leestma, Jerry Ross, and Janice Voss have all left their mark on Purdue and humankind. Yet the Eugene A. Cernan papers cast a long shadow of their own. Comprised of 74 boxes organized into 11 series, the collection houses materials which span Cernan’s entire life, from his birth certificate to a letter written to his fellow Boilermakers just last year. It’s enough to keep anyone busy. I would know—I helped to organize it for almost a year.

What exactly is in all those boxes? Some items are simply cool to behold, like the mapbook of the lunar surface[1] and one of Cernan’s spacesuit gloves, worn during Apollo 17 and still covered in grey-like moon dust. If you’re looking for the kinds of technical minutia that will help you build your own lunar module, you might be disappointed. Sure, there are reports for several Apollo missions, as well as a transcript of Cernan’s log from Gemini 9. The real value of Cernan’s collection is how it brings NASA’s iconic programs back to Earth. It brings space exploration closer to us, without all that expensive rocket fuel, by provoking questions about who an astronaut like Eugene Cernan really was.

Gene Cernan, front row and center, was a member of Purdue Fijis while a student at Purdue

Astronauts were not born in their spacesuits, so how did they grow to fit one so nicely? Cernan played sports throughout his youth and engaged actively in the communities at Proviso East High School in Maywood, Illinois and at Purdue University. Between athletics, the Naval ROTC, joining the Purdue chapter of Phi Gamma Delta, and editing two yearbooks, Cernan must have hardly had a moment to himself throughout his education. He even majored in Electrical Engineering, whose students today only have time to sleep while their code compiles. Cernan later got a Masters in Aerospace Engineering from the US Naval Postgraduate School while also serving in the Navy. Cernan’s ascent, it seems, started long before he climbed aboard a rocket, or even joined NASA. It took drive and effort and recognition, but also choice. I’m no scientist, but launching into space appears to involve momentum.

Cernan was a pilot in the United State Navy before joining NASA

Eugene Cernan is human, but when did he become superhuman? Newspaper records abound in the collection and honed in on every last detail of Cernan, his family, his colleagues in spacesuits, and the missions he participated in. As much as it mattered to the nation what exactly his missions would accomplish, it mattered how Cernan trained and what he ate for breakfast. It mattered how his wife, Barbara Cernan, felt about her husband’s chances. It mattered whether his daughter, Tracy Cernan, was worried or excited about her father’s mission. It definitely mattered when Cernan broadcast expletives to the entire nation because ‘Snoopy,’ the lunar module, rolled unexpectedly above the moon during Apollo 10. And it mattered not only that Cernan and his colleagues landed safely after each mission, but also how they subsequently engaged with the nation through interviews and tours. The Space Race was won beyond Earth’s atmosphere by a relative few, but it’s impossible to imagine everyday Americans as mere spectators. NASA’s space exploration programs were cultural as well as scientific or political endeavors, and culture only takes on meaning when it is shared among people.

What (conceptual) space in terrestrial American society do astronauts play? Astronauts were and are icons, and the Cernan collection shows it. Telegram after telegram, letter after letter from celebrities, politicians, and business leaders. No fewer than seven sitting presidents corresponded with Cernan to varying degrees. Photos join the correspondence and show Cernan meeting some of those presidents, playing in charity golf tournaments with Bob Hope and Jimmy Demaret, showing NASA facilities to Barbara Eden, taking part in international tours, carrying the Olympic torch, and waving with Neil Armstrong at Ross-Ade’s fifty yard line at a Purdue football game. Astronauts have long been seen as a representation of the best of humanity. They helped the nation better understand its own potential. The Eugene Cernan papers shows this process was personal, not ethereal.

Earth rise. NASA image, from the Eugene Cernan papers

How do astronauts make meaning of their experiences? A central piece of the Cernan papers records the research and writing process of Cernan’s autobiography, The Last Man on the Moon. Cernan didn’t write the book based on memory alone, but rather reconstructed and reflected upon his experiences using hundreds of personal records which Purdue now houses. For feedback, he called upon the vast array of friends and acquaintances gathered over a lifetime of accomplishment. Their support was later joined by scores of fan letters. In crafting his reflections, Cernan grounded his individual experiences firmly in the broader machinations of society, situating himself as a person who became an astronaut who became a celebrity.

Smarter researchers than me will find the answers to these questions flowing incorporeally through the many pages and artifacts of Cernan’s collection. Which brings us to the heart of the matter: not what the collection offers, but why it exists at all.

During a visit to Purdue’s main campus last year, Cernan observed what’s become of his papers when the Cernan and Armstrong collections were opened for research.[2] I imagine (and I stress the word ‘imagine’ here) that when just about everyone else in the room is clamoring to speak to you, it’s difficult form a cogent thought let alone have a moment of genuine reflection. But the revered Purdue alumnus did reflect, and he had a lot to say. One thing in particular stuck with me: the Cernan papers are here within Purdue Archives and Special Collections to be viewed. This collection could have ended up in the Smithsonian. But it didn’t. Instead Cernan’s papers made their final touch down about a thousand feet from Harry’s Chocolate Shop.

Chicago Tribune editorial ‘Astronauts are only human’. From the Eugene A. Cernan papers

Captain Cernan donated to people: to thinkers, to doers, to Boilermakers. Everything from the dusty glove to his boyhood scrapbook is here to help us better understand Cernan’s life and by extension humanity’s first (and last—er, most recent) steps on the moon. If this collection makes anything clear, it’s that those steps were a shared experience on individual and deeply touching levels.

You’ll see it in the fan mail from a young woman pursuing a career in space exploration.

In Cernan’s letter to his mother, written before he knew whether he’d make it back to Earth.

In the newspaper photo showing a young Tracy Cernan pretending to radio her spacewalking father.

In Cernan’s scribbled personal notes, organizing his thoughts before drafting The Last Man on the Moon.

“In the Apollo 17 crew’s dinner menu right after splashdown. “Mare Imbrium Papaya,” for the record, sounds delicious.”

And in the photographed eyes of a young man applying for the NROTC in 1952, not yet aware of the adventures ahead of him.

The Eugene A. Cernan papers promise no more or less than any archival collection: to provide a slice of insight into the shared experiences that shape human lives. But it’s the promise that’s special—the promise of personal enlightenment through the embrace of our collective past. Eugene Cernan has opened the record of his past with this notion in mind, and it’s closer than you might think.

Editor’s Note: Essayist Brian Alberts is a graduate student within the Purdue University Department of History. He served as a graduate research assistant within Archives and Special Collections and was part of the team that processed the Eugene A. Cernan papers.

Reflections on Boiler Pride…

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Editor’s Note: Writer Mary Sego is an archival assistant and processing specialist within Archives and Special Collections.

As a Purdue alum and thirty-one year Purdue employee, I always reflect upon Purdue as a new semester begins. I remember back as this Hoosier farm girl took her first steps onto a large campus with hopes and dreams waiting to be fulfilled. I followed in the footsteps of 4 older siblings, and 1 younger followed me. This meant 48 move-in trips for my parents and 16 continuous years of having at least one student on campus, sometimes two or three. I am now seeing the hopes and dreams being realized for the next generation, as now two younger relatives have chosen Purdue for their college educations.

Working in the Virginia Kelly Karnes Archives and Special Collections Research Center has been an incredible opportunity. I have had the honor and pleasure to have processed 123 collections, including the Neil A. Armstrong papers, along with nearly 700 faculty and alumni folders. I have seen alumni, researchers, faculty and staff, along with the general public come into the Archives, and beam with pride and fascination. I have gone through boxes of unprocessed collections packed by donors that love their alma mater, and only want the best for the generations of Boilermakers that follow in their footsteps. Many feel it is their obligation to give back to the University and their fellow Boilermakers, because they feel Purdue gave so much to them.

Mark Brown on STS-28, August 1989

Many of the alumni astronauts have given their collections to Purdue, in hopes that those that follow can learn from the many, many treasures found in their collections. Indeed, several have taken Purdue memorabilia into space with them, and shared their Purdue pride among the stars. They are truly loyal and dedicated alumni!

Orville Redenbacher, 1928 grad in his Purdue Band uniform

Other faculty, staff and alumni have also given their papers and collections to Purdue. The names Amelia Earhart, George Ade, John T. McCutcheon, Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, and Orville Redenbacher are known to the world. Former Purdue presidents, and many other faculty, staff and alums also have their papers in Archives and Special Collections. Their contributions, and therefore their collections, are treated with equal care and respect as any other.

Ralph S. Johnson, circa 1935

Some of the alumni and faculty may not be as well known, but are important none the less. One such person is Ralph S. Johnson who worked his way through Purdue as a Memorial Union food service worker. He graduated from Purdue in 1930 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical and Mechanical Engineering and went on to become the chief pilot for United Airlines in 1935. During the early years of WWII, he was responsible for developing and testing a myriad of programs aimed toward air safety. He was awarded a Purdue honorary Doctorate of Engineering in 2008.

Also found in the Purdue Archives are the papers of Charles A. Ellis, educator, structural engineer, and mathematician who joined the Purdue faculty in 1934. Ellis was an expert in bridge design, co-designing the Montreal Harbor Bridge and almost single-handedly designing the structure of the famed Golden Gate Bridge.

Pamphlet from the Purdue University School of Medicine collection

Few realize that the founder of Arnett Clinic in Lafayette, Dr. Arett C. Arnett, graduated from the Purdue University Medical School. In May, 1906, one hundred and twenty-two students received their diplomas from Purdue University and successfully passed the examination of the State Board of Medical Registration.

In the spring of 1907, Purdue graduated sixty-eight men and four women. In that class was Arett C. Arnett who helped establish a Lafayette clinic in 1922, later known as Arnett Clinic. One can find memorabilia from this class in the Purdue University School of Medicine collection.

Another collection, the John Y. D. Tse papers, comprise a compilation of ten poems and memoirs written by Tse as reflections upon forty years as a management professor, founder of the Krannert Graduate School of Business, entrepreneur, and benefactor to Purdue University. Within the volume are also photographs, reprints of letters written to Dr. Tse by colleagues, an address written by Tse for the 25th anniversary of the Krannert School of Management, and reprints of newspaper clippings and articles about and by Dr. Tse

Many wonderful scrapbooks have been donated to the Purdue Archives, all containing numerous personal items and anecdotes. One example is the Simeon V. B. Miller scrapbook (1900-1906), which contains memorabilia from Simeon Van Buren Miller’s college career at Purdue University. Involved in the train wreck of 1903, Miller compiled numerous newspaper clippings from the wreck. Simeon Miller followed in the footsteps of his father and two brothers as a member of Phi Delta Theta, and therefore his scrapbook contains a concentration of ephemera from the fraternity. He was president of the Class of 1905 during his sophomore year, and so the scrapbook also contains items from his tenure as class president. Other miscellaneous items, such as fee statements, dance cards, items from the athletic association and athletic events, score cards and fee statements, newspaper clippings on the tank scrap, and numerous other programs are also included. One can certainly learn a great deal about a person and Purdue from a single scrapbook!

This is just a small sampling of the items that can be found in the Virginia Kelly Karnes Archive and Special Collections. We are here to help you and welcome a visit! You can learn more about Purdue and those that have walked the campus. Feel free to just stop by and say hello!

Our wish for you this semester is to reach for the stars, explore and enjoy your time at Purdue! We hope one day you will consider donating your papers to the Purdue Archives, and helping your fellow Boilermakers for generations to come!

Clipping from the Jerry L. Ross papers

Space Age Philosophy: Wonder in the Archives

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When we think of philosophy, if we think about it at all, it is very unlikely that we associate philosophy with archival research. Maybe we think of the problems of freedom, or personal identity, abstract metaphysical issues, or ethics. But philosophy and the archives seem an odd couple.

As a graduate student in philosophy and literature, I suffered from the same prejudice when I arrived in the Barron Hilton Archives for Flight and Space Exploration. Although the Flight Archives are unique for their emphasis on science and engineering, and of course for the incredible historical significance of items housed in collections such as the Neil A. Armstrong Papers and the Eugene A. Cernan Papers, I didn’t see the philosophic potential of the archives at first.

Michel Foucault, photo courtesy of Wikipedia

For much of Anglo-American philosophy, the archives are a foreign place. The most well-known use of the archives in philosophy is probably by Michel Foucault (1926-1984), a French thinker famous for his genealogical arguments based on extensive archival research. His writings on madness and the modern prison system are hallmarks of structuralist and postmodern philosophy.

Foucault himself is often studied as a “Continental” philosopher, a representative of postmodernism in the 20th century, but his particular method of archival research is rarely discussed, and never taught as a methodology available to students of philosophy. Given philosophy’s centuries old love-affair with science, we should all be pleased to learn that the archives are a place rich with materials teeming with philosophic potential.

In this post, I want to focus on one collection in particular that displays the potential for philosophical investigation. The Archives for Flight and Space Exploration houses tremendous philosophical resources when we begin to appreciate archival spaces as a place where philosophy can thrive.

Dramatic photo of Bruce McCandless’ untethered spacewalk courtesy of NASA

Philosopher Shaun Gallagher has recently accomplished a remarkable research program looking at the relationship of astronaut experiences of awe during spaceflight to similar accounts of spiritual or religious experiences. Collections like the Neil A. Armstrong Papers, the Eugene A. Cernan Papers, and the Jerry L. Ross Papers – all house in the Flight Archives – could be used to further research in the direction first indicated by Gallagher and his team. Early accounts and rare personal reports of historic events in the history of space flight open new interpretative doors to philosophers wishing to understand human cognition when it is pushed to its limits – both in the sense of the need to perform demanding technical labors, and in the struggle to makes sense of radically new and unprecedented experiences of space.

Armstrong in the X-15, circa 1960. NASA photo. Part of the Neil A. Armstrong Papers at Purdue Archives and Special Collections

Philosophers of mind and science will find much of value. In one of over 450 individual speeches contained in the Neil A. Armstrong Papers, Armstrong elaborates on the role of the X-15 as a “theoretical aircraft.” That is, the X-15 had, from Armstrong’s perspective, no practical purpose. It was designed and flown with only the idea that it could and would push the boundaries of what was humanly and technologically possible in the realm of high-speed, high-altitude flight. It was a plane built for theory, not practice. Of course, many groundbreaking advances in flight science and technology resulted from the X-15 project, though when the aircraft was conceived these advances were in no way predicted or even predicable! They were the result of chances and great risks taken by the men and women of NASA and the experimental test pilots who flew these challenging new jets.

Every stage of the X-15’s development is covered in the archives. From early documentation of its design, to the simulator training that prepared pilots for the X-15’s demanding environment at extreme altitudes, to the reports that document the pilot’s experience of sub-orbital flight in a flying machine that had no precedent in human history.

Armstrong strapped into a flight simulator during the X-15 program, circa 1960

The photo to the left, part of the Neil A. Armstrong Papers at Purdue’s Archives and Special Collections, gives a sense of the experimental nature of the X-15 flights. Here we see Armstrong in a simulator, hoping to be as prepared as possible to face relatively unknown flight conditions, and to test the predictive capabilities of science and engineering. Philosophers have pondered over the predictive powers of science since at least the 1600s, and here in the Flight Archives, we see how strong those powers are. Using available mathematical models, together with mountains of data gathered via weather balloons and other high-altitude aircraft, experimental pilots like Armstrong dared to fly under dangerous conditions with only the confidence that the numbers were correct – to a point – and that these pre-flight results were sound enough to risk life and limb to confirm in experience. Subsequent first hand analysis of in-flight experiences reveal the intricate feed-back loops of hypothesis formation, experimental confirmation or refutation, and hypothetical conjecture that lead to ground-breaking advancements in space age technologies that we now take for granted as commonplace.

Thus, not only are philosophers offered a previously unknown level of behind-the-scenes access to the historic US space program, they are also now able to observe the process by which scientists and engineers worked together across many disciplines in order to accomplish some of humanity’s greatest feats of technical know-how: like landing the first people on the moon and returning them safely to Earth.

Armstrong prepares experimental equipment on the lunar surface during his historic moonwalk in 1969, photo courtesy of the Flight Archives

Armstrong prepares experimental equipment on the lunar surface during his historic moonwalk in 1969. NASA photo. Neil A. Armstrong Papers at Purdue Archives and Special Collections

The confrontation between human beings, their environment, and the technologies that enable us to explore this environment and adapt to its most extreme conditions raise deep philosophical questions about the exploratory nature of humanity and our quest for knowledge. This quest has led us far from home, and continues to prod us toward unknown worlds.

These invaluable resources provide a glimpse at science in action at a time when new discoveries in physics and engineering were routinely put to the test in do-or-die circumstances. The huge volume of professional communications and scientific reports contained in the Neil A. Armstrong Papers would themselves keep philosophers occupied for years to come.

Since my time in the archives, and particularly my work processing the Neil A. Armstrong Papers, I have grown accustomed to the idea of the archives as a place for philosophy. Only a brief review of some of the collections housed at Purdue’s Virginia Kelly Karnes Archives and Special Collections would be enough to convince many skeptics that, indeed, philosophers could benefit from exposure to just a fraction of these materials.

I know I will be incorporating archival resources into my own philosophical projects in the future – hopefully expanding work I’ve already conducted on the philosophy of mind. I invite my fellow philosophers to join me as we all search out new and exciting opportunities for the simple awe and wonder with which all true philosophy begins.

More information on the work of Shaun Gallagher can be found here: http://chdr.cah.ucf.edu/spaceandspirituality/

More information on the Neil A. Armstrong papers can be found here: https://apps.lib.purdue.edu/archon/index.php?p=collections/controlcard&id=149

Editor’s note: Essayist Donovan Irven is a doctoral candidate in the interdisciplinary program for Philosophy and Literature at Purdue University. He is also the graduate assistant for the Barron Hilton Flight And Space Exploration Archives within Purdue University Archives and Special Collections.

A Tragic Telegram and a Goofy Movie

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Last year, near the anniversary of Amelia Earhart’s disappearance, I started digging. It was a momentous occasion–Earhart is one of the more famous historical figures who spent time at Purdue and whose life is documented in our collections. I was searching our databases, looking for some materials from around the time of Earhart’s round-the-world flight. Often if I find something interesting, I will share it with our followers on Twitter. As I scanned the list of search results, I came across this:

earharttelegram2

I wasn’t prepared for it. The telegram, sent from George Putnam, Earhart’s husband, responding to his son, David Binney Putnam, was sent shortly after contact was lost with Earhart’s plane. It reads: “THANKS DEAR BOY IT HELPS THERES PLENTY OF HOPE YET LOVE DAD.”

When I read it, I felt a sense of dread sinking into me. Knowing that Amelia was not coming back–ever–made George’s hopes all the more tragic. But reading this note, with its short, desperate prose, and knowing that it was just a family thing in that moment, between father and son and an absent stepmother, gave the document a sacred quality. I shouldn’t be reading this. I wasn’t meant to read this. But why feel this way? It’s history. It’s public.

History is often interesting to read about from a distance. We can reflect on how day-to-day life has changed since a famous person’s time, such as Earhart’s heyday of the 1920s-30s. We can joke around about silly fashion and customs from the past. The past is removed from us; we don’t have access to it, so it feels foreign and alien and often quite backwards. We cannot understand why, for example, Purdue students used to race around Memorial Mall on tricycles while people threw buckets of water at them. It makes no sense.

But some things make too much sense. And its in those moments of discovery, when history recorded in writing or film becomes less distant. It comes closer to our own experience as people and becomes less alien. It’s someone we know. It’s how we feel now. For all its strangeness, the tricycle water-bucket race does appeal to a certain sense of goofy fun. The people in the film look like they’re having a good time–and why not? They’re racing around a circle or throwing buckets of water on people. It’s not just hilarious because it’s strange; it’s hilarious because it looks like it might be fun to do.

George’s letter to David about Amelia made sense. The hope still hanging over both of them, the hope that she might show up, somewhere, adrift in the sea, or stranded on an island–a little worse for wear, but still smiling–that hope made more sense than anything. If you’ve ever lost someone, you know about hope. And you might have also felt that same sense of sinking dread I did when you read the telegram, knowing she didn’t come back. That the hope was disappointed. And in that moment, Amelia Earhart wasn’t just a famous missing person. Not just a feminist role model. She was more than her ideals or legend. She was someone like you or me.

And we lost her.

This year marks the 78th anniversary of Earhart’s final flight. For me, that short telegram reveals so much of the power of history and the importance of preservation. History research does more than just generate academic knowledge and understanding–all of which is important, good, and necessary for our society. It is notes like George’s that tell us what history can be: a moment of human connection transcending time.

The telegram can be viewed online with other materials from the time of the initial search for Earhart’s plane. These materials are within the full George Putnam Palmer Collection of Amelia Earhart papers, as well as the Amelia Earhart at Purdue Collection, and can be viewed in Archives and Special Collections digital repository e-Archives.

Course Reflection: The Technology and Culture of Flight

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The following is a guest blog post by Katie Martin, who recently graduated from Purdue University with a Bachelor of Arts degrees in History and American Studies.

As a senior History student, I had taken plenty of history classes. However, I have never experienced a class quite like HIST 395: Air and Space: The Technology and Culture of Flight. This junior research seminar was taught by Professor Michael Smith in collaboration with Tracy Grimm, the Barron Hilton Archivist for Flight and Space Exploration at Purdue Libraries Archives and Special Collections. To facilitate discussion and use of archival materials, the class met in Swaim Instruction Center, right across the hall from the Archives and Special Collections.

Amelia Earhart and George Palmer Putnam

On the first day of class, we knew we were in for a different kind of history course. Professor Smith explained that by the end of the semester each student would complete a publishable 25-page paper using primary sources held in the Purdue collection. With Tracy’s great assistance, each student identified a topic and used class time to peruse Purdue’s physical and digital collections. I chose to focus my research on Amelia Earhart, specifically, how she and her publicist husband, George Palmer Putnam, worked together to craft her enduring public image.

I looked through several Amelia Earhart scrapbooks containing newspaper clippings relating to her lecture tours, her flights across the Atlantic, and her failed world flight attempt. I also read various correspondences between Earhart and people like Eleanor Roosevelt, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, and Edward C. Elliott, President of Purdue University during Earhart’s time on campus. I received permission to view the original materials. Holding the physical materials in my hands provided a deep understanding of my topic and strong connection to the past. I also utilized the digitized Amelia Earhart Collection in Purdue e-Archives, which consists of more than 3,500 scans of photographs, maps, documents, and artifacts.

Daily Mirror newspaper clipping, June 19, 1928

The research sessions were broken up by reading assignments and even field trips. During one memorable class period, we rode the Boilermaker Special to the Purdue Airport for a tour led by Dr. Thomas Carney, Professor of Aviation Technology. We also viewed and discussed the exhibit on display in the Archives at the time, Steps to the Moon: Selections from the Neil A. Armstrong Papers and the Eugene A. Cernan Papers. Most exciting of all, our class was invited to the opening of the Armstrong and Cernan papers on November 21. We heard Eugene Cernan and Carol Armstrong speak and even got the chance to shake their hands and discuss our experiences working with the collections.

The class picked up in intensity as we neared the end of the semester. In the final weeks, we were expected to submit a 5-page abstract to our classmates. One person per class presented their work for 30 minutes followed by a session of critique and discussion. Although this portion of the class was stressful, my fun and supportive classmates made the experience worthwhile. I completed my paper and am now in the process of publishing my work in a journal of popular culture. This class improved my research, writing, and presentation skills tremendously, provided opportunities to actively learn, and exposed me to persons and scholarship on an international scale. I won’t soon forget working with the Amelia Earhart Collection and my experiences in this class!

This class is being taught again in the Fall of 2015 as HIST 495: Flight and Space Exploration: Archival Research Seminar. Persons interested in the course are encouraged to speak with their advisor, Professor Michael Smith, or Tracy Grimm for more information.

Memoirs and Memories: Purdue University Archives and Special Collections

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Welcome!

Welcome to the new blog for the Virginia Kelly Karnes Archives and Special Collections Research Center. We are pleased to launch this blog to increase awareness of the Archives and Special Collections, our unique collections, user-centered services, and exciting new initiatives.

The Archives and Special Collections at Purdue are closely connected to the University’s land grant mission and support the University’s overarching goals of learning, discovery, and engagement. As a division of the Purdue Libraries, Archives and Special Collections contributes to the three main components of the Libraries strategic plan: learning, scholarly communication, and meeting global challenges.

We live in a time of great scrutiny over the costs of higher education and the need to demonstrate the value of all parts of a university in contributing towards its mission. Libraries, archives, and special collections are no different, although it can be challenging to put a monetary value on preservation of the cultural and historical record to advance research and learning. In this first blog post I’d like to provide a general overview of the ways the Archives and Special Collections division has aligned itself with the mission and goals of the Libraries.

Archives and Special Collections, located on the fourth floor of HSSE Library in Stewart Center.

Learning: Integration of Information Literacy

The faculty and staff who work in Archives and Special Collections actively contribute towards teaching and learning at Purdue. We collaborate with faculty in instructing students on how to conduct research using primary sources such as archives, manuscripts, and rare books. The archives reading room functions as an active laboratory space where students benefit from hands-on practice conducting research in a real-world research environment. Students who interact with our collections to analyze primary sources not only improve their problem-solving and critical thinking skills, they often make exciting discoveries that spark their research interests.

Each year, we host a growing number of students whose classes visit Archives and Special Collections, utilize the collections for class assignments and research papers, and, increasingly, publish their work in journals such as JPUR, the Journal of Purdue Undergraduate Research. Our philosophy is that the archives and special collections exist to be used by students, faculty and staff, and the public, and we encourage students to come back and pursue their own independent research projects outside of class. Amazingly, many of them do. Several of the students who have used the Archives and Special Collections holdings in their assignments have been so inspired by working with original primary sources that they have made the decision to pursue graduate degrees in library and information science, archival science, or museum studies.

Scholarly Communication: Increase Access To and Use of Scholarly Resources

As part of the Libraries strategic goal of scholarly communication, Archives and Special Collections increases access to and use of unique and distinctive collections. We actively acquire manuscripts and personal papers, university archives, and rare books that support teaching and research. The collections are built strategically, in alignment with Purdue’s disciplinary strengths and land grant mission. As such, the Archives and Special Collections has identified several areas of focus for the collections: the history of flight and space exploration; the history of women in Indiana and/or affiliated with Purdue; the history of psychoactive substances research; and Purdue University history. We are committed to making all of our collections as easy to locate and use as possible, and we do this in a variety of ways. First of all, when we acquire a collection we create an online accession record for it immediately, to allow researchers to find it as soon as possible. Secondly, we process the collection, taking steps to preserve items in the collection, arrange them, and create a finding aid or guide to the collection that enables researchers to see what is contained in the collection and if it is relevant to their research. The finding aid goes into our collections database, available online freely for anyone to find. Additionally, catalog records are created and contributed to WorldCat and the Libraries online catalog, to ensure a variety of routes for students and scholars to discover the collections.

Archives and Speical Collections holds numerous primary and secondary sources.

In addition to these traditional accessioning and processing steps, the collections are regularly brought to students and used in class assignments. Collections are rotated for exhibits, allowing visitors to benefit from viewing displays of these rare materials. Finally, collections are increasingly being digitized, as resources allow, to provide researchers worldwide the opportunity to use the unique special collections at Purdue to meet their research, teaching, or personal needs. This enables scholars to access our collections regardless of geographic location and without the constraints of time and expense of traveling to use the collections. We have created several online exhibits, experimented with crowd sourcing the identification of photographs, and enabled users to add keywords and tags to scanned items in e-Archives, our digital library. We are committed to free and open access to our collections, and to prioritizing digitization efforts to meet the areas of highest research demand.

Increasingly, we are finding ways to publish materials in Archives and Special Collections to expose the collections to a wider audience. In collaboration with the Purdue University Press, we have worked to have materials in the collections used more frequently in the Press’s publications, digitized and linked content to print and e-books published by the Press, and collaborated on creation of an app for the Spacewalker biography of Jerry Ross, that links to digitized videos, images, and related materials from Ross’s personal papers in the Archives and Special Collections.

Preservation of the cultural and historical record is a key aspect of the work we do in Archives and Special Collections, and we take that role seriously, particularly as the majority of new manuscripts, archives, and images are created digitally today. These “born digital” items are inherently at risk due to the rapid obsolescence of software and file formats. Without active stewardship, many of today’s digital files will be unreadable to future generations. Some of the initiatives the Archives and Special Collections staff have undertaken to preserve important digital collections include creation of digital preservation policies and practices for working with born digital manuscript collections and university records; web archiving of critical university web sites, particularly the webpages of academic units that contain university publications, reports, minutes, and related content that needs to be accessible in the future; active membership and contribution of digital collections to MetaArchive; and data curation, with archivists as active partners in appraising and preserving data sets in PURR, the University’s research data repository.

I hope you enjoy our blog, and that you find something in our future posts that will spark your curiosity, engage your interests, and encourage you to interact with us and our collections. Please visit our website for more information. If you have an idea for a future blog post, please feel free to contact us at spcoll@purdue.edu.

Memoirs & Memories

Tales From Purdue University Archives and Special Collections

Taming Electricity: A Purdue Student’s Career in Electromagnetic Compatibility

Space Exploration For All: The Eugene A. Cernan Papers

Reflections on Boiler Pride…

Space Age Philosophy: Wonder in the Archives

A Tragic Telegram and a Goofy Movie

Course Reflection: The Technology and Culture of Flight

Memoirs and Memories: Purdue University Archives and Special Collections