Rennsalaer Polytechnic college paper digitized

[George Thompson]

In a losing battle against multitudes of emails mostly from liberal and
environmental groups advising me that the sky is falling, (which I do
indeed believe, but I can't keep up with reading them all), I have started
giving my email horde a weekly enema, deleting without reading.  This is
one that got at least a glance.

>From a recent post to a NYS History blog.  For those interested -- if any
one.

GAT

The staff of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Archives has digitized
more than a century of *The Polytechnic *student
newspaper<http://digitool.rpi.edu:8881/R/DMI1X68AXFVBB5G7GBMA6VC2PD144B63GX9E7I28C6DL7ALDII-04671?func=collections&collection_id=1132>
. *The Poly* archive is available online through the Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute Digital
Collections<http://digitool.rpi.edu:8881/R/DMI1X68AXFVBB5G7GBMA6VC2PD144B63GX9E7I28C6DL7ALDII-04604?RN=957814084&pds_handle=GUEST>,
and can be searched by date or keyword.

The archive offers a window into the way Rensselaer students saw themselves
and their Institute through history.

The earliest editions of *The
Poly*<http://digitool.rpi.edu:8881/R/MEKDMBAQNKE4V4PHS6K59HA8PAIVNRJKLU5ST834PNT18HIA1G-02941?func=collections-result&collection_id=1626>
include
challenging math problems, news from other universities in the Northeast
including Harvard, Yale, and Cornell, short fiction, poems, alumni news,
athletic scores, and social news. The advertisements offer the finest
apothecaries, boot makers, tailors, and hatters.

A 1924 edition<http://digitool.rpi.edu:1801/webclient/DeliveryManager?application=DIGITOOL-3&owner=resourcediscovery&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&pid=131735>
describes
festivities for the Institute's centennial, which included a keynote speech
from then-Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, five years before he took
office as the 31st president of the United States. (Click the link and then
click the "Continue" button in the lower right corner to proceed to the
issue.)

The Dec. 13, 1967,
edition<http://digitool.rpi.edu:1801/webclient/DeliveryManager?application=DIGITOOL-3&owner=resourcediscovery&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&pid=100485>
offers
a review of a concert The Doors played on campus as part of Frosh Fling
Weekend: "Instead of setting the house on fire, Jim (Morrison) failed to
even break the ice. He seemed disgusted with the whole scene at the end and
showed how he felt when he cried, 'If this is Troy, I'm with the Greeks.' "

Throughout the years, stories in *The Poly* touch on historical moments and
reveal the way they impacted campus life. Editions published during World
War II indicate that degree programs were condensed to allow students to
complete them before being called up to war. Those editions also share news
of alumni fighting overseas.

The lead story of the Sept. 15, 1942,
edition<http://digitool.rpi.edu:1801/webclient/DeliveryManager?application=DIGITOOL-3&owner=resourcediscovery&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&pid=167245>
reveals
another ripple effect of World War II on the Institute: "Rensselaer Breaks
Long Standing Tradition; Opens Registration to Women for First Time," the
front page headline announces.

The story quotes Institute secretary-treasurer (and future president)
Livingston W. Houston as saying that it was necessary to admit women "due
to the need to train women scientists and technicians to replace men called
to war."

Would-be female applicants waited anxiously as administrators considered
whether to admit them. "As RPI administrators were making their decision on
the women student question, three women applicants waited outside the door
for an answer," *The Poly* story continues.

Today, nearly 30 percent of all undergraduate and graduate students at
Rensselaer are female.

Issues of *The Poly* from 1885 to 1976 can be searched online by anyone. An
earlier iteration of *The Poly* that only lasted for one semester, the fall
of 1869, is also available in the archives. Because some syndicated content
is still protected by copyright, issues of *The Poly* from 1977 to 2001 can
only be accessed on campus or with a current Rensselaer login.

The staff of the Institute Archives is now working to add to the archive
recent issues of *The Poly* - dating from 2002 to today - that were
produced digitally.

The digitization is part of an ongoing effort to both preserve and make
accessible the newspaper archives. In 2001, the fragile newspapers were
preserved on microfilm. Then the 41 reels of microfilm were scanned by
Hudson Microimaging using optical character recognition so the entire
archives can be viewed, and all the text searched, online.

In a post on the RPI History Revealed
blog<http://archives.rpi.edu/blog/2014/01/31/the-poly-digitally-revealed/>,
archivist Tammy Gobert writes that in total about 2,800 issues and more
than 41,000 individual pages were digitized in this process.

- See more at:
http://newyorkhistoryblog.org/2014/03/09/rensselaer-polytechnic-institute-newspaper-archive-goes-online/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NewYorkHistory+%28New+York+History%29#sthash.gvNAK17t.dpuf

--
George A. Thompson
The Guy Who Still Looks Stuff Up in Books.
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998..

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