Collections

The Rudolph papers include scripts, articles and clippings, publicity and press materials, books, photographs, artifacts/realia, audio and moving image materials, posters, awards, and branded crew garments and caps from many of Alan Rudolph's projects. Photographer Joyce Rudolph is represented by hundreds of professional and personal slides and photographs, including many candid on-set shots.

The collection consists of professional and personal correspondence, assorted clippings, film festival awards and memorabilia, and scripts and production documents related to Alan Rudolph's filmmaking career, spanning his early work in Riot (1969), through 2002's The Secret Lives of Dentists. Also included are a plethora of documents from various unproduced projects. In the Artifacts and Graphics series are a small selection of props from Rudolph's films, most notably The Moderns, along with an assortment of film cast and crew branded gear, including caps, shirts, and jackets, movie posters, and a representation of some of the numerous awards won by the Rudolphs.

A small sub-series of material devoted to friend and mentor, Robert Altman, consists of articles and reviews, assorted programs, and, most notably, photographs taken by Joyce Rudolph.

Joyce Rudolph is represented by hundreds of her professional and sought-after on-set photographs, company stills, and candid shots, all taken during the filming of projects by Alan Rudolph and a wide variety of other notable filmmakers.

A series of Audio and Moving Image material consists of several VHS tapes, several movie video disks as well as two soundtracks. The Artwork series contains an assortment of drawings and paintings, most likely created by Alan Rudolph, along with two large acrylic paintings used as props in The Moderns.

The Delmar Lepper Civilian Conservation Corps photograph albums consist of two volumes containing 59 photographs, 15 postcards, and two letters documenting the daily life and experiences of a young man in the Civilian Conservation Corps in California and Idaho.

The Delmar Lepper Civilian Conservation Corps photograph albums consist of two volumes containing 59 photographs, 15 postcards, and two letters documenting the daily life and experiences of a young man in the Civilian Conservation Corps in California and Idaho.

Volume one (14 x 21 cm) has leather covers with a stereotypical design of a Native American man wearing a war bonnet and the words "Snap Shots/Co. 544/ Delmar Lepper" stamped on the front cover. This album contains approximately 40 snapshots and 15 half tone color postcards. Images of note include a picture of a bear being fed by a man outside of a car and postcards featuring Californian scenery. One of the postcards was sent to Lepper’s brother Albert in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Volume two (19.5 x 26.5 cm) has red pressed paper covers with a hawk and the word "Photographs" stamped on the front in silver. The album contains 19 snapshots as well as two letters written by Lepper in 1935 addressed to his brother Albert. One letter discusses Lepper's recommitment to the C.C.C. and his anxiety about doing so while the other letter describes a trip to a ship in the Pacific Ocean as well as his weight gain. The photographs appear to have been previously moved around in the album as many are loose.

The Matthias papers are a small, miscellaneous collection of letters and documents relating to Robert Matthias (a.k.a. Robert Matthews), the leader of the Kingdom of Matthias cult. They touch upon the lives and circumstances of Matthias; his wife, Margaret Matthias; cult follower Benjamin Folger; and Matthias’ legal counsel, Henry Western and N. Nye Hall.

The Matthias papers include seven miscellaneous items: three letters from Robert Matthias’ wife, Margaret, to his legal counsel, Henry Western; two letters to Robert Matthias while he was living in Sing Sing, New York; and two legal documents. A full description of each item is located in the Detailed Box and Folder Listing.

This journal describing a train trip through the South and a winter spent in Florida was compiled by R. W. Benson from letters written to her daughter.

This journal describing a train trip through the South and a winter spent in Florida was compiled by R. W. Benson from letters written to her daughter, Miss Clara Benson of Wellesley, Mass. Mrs. Benson might have copied her letters before sending them, but it seems more likely that she borrowed the letters at a later date in order to create a book recording her winter "dropped into a world of orange trees." Mrs. Benson also pasted in the postcards she sent to her daughter, as well as some wildflowers she had enclosed in one letter.

Seven of the cards are picture postcards of places Mrs. Benson visited. She took pains to place herself within the context of the scene depicted: "We circumnavigated the citadel. We walked where you see a man walking," she noted on the front of the postcard of the Tampa Bay Hotel. On two cards illustrating scenes from Havana, R. W. Benson made intriguing allusions to living in or taking an extended visit to Cuba in 1867. Two of the actual letters to Clara are included as well. There is a gap from January 27, the last copied letter, to April 8, the date of the next, and final letter, indicating that this journal does not represent the complete correspondence. Two calling cards, an envelope of pressed wildflowers, and a New Year's greeting are laid in the volume.

Mrs. Benson's letters do not progress in a linear fashion, but often return to and retell the same stories in quite different ways. Some events obviously upset her. When two ladies dawdled in the dressing-room on the train, she was in an "awful flurry" to dress herself and Lydia before the train reached Tampa. She also mulled over losing her pocket-book at the Hotel minutes before departing for Thonotosassa. More pleasant recollections were also repeated in her letters. She was enraptured by the young William Draper, "the 'saving grace' in our 'Old Folk's Concert,'" often mentioning his willingness to help and his broad shoulders.

Delight in the natural world fills her letters, from more traditional observations of the lovely view of the lake to curious descriptions of how the oranges looked "quite social in the nice top-sail breeze" one day and "sullen and belligerent" in the "glimmering sun" of a still day. She described twilight, "which as usual in southern climes is short," as "a mere wave of the hand." When writing about a walk among "frequent cypresses with their mourning moss trailing," she stopped her narrative of the walk to reflect that while "on the other trees the long trailing moss swaying in the wind seems quite a cheerful decoration, on the cypress it seems like mourning."

R. W. Benson also discussed the temperature in great detail, no doubt reveling in the balmy weather she was experiencing. She often mentioned what layers of underwear she had either removed or put on: "I prophesied we would soon discard all underwear, but when I had taken a sponge bath I found I wanted some underclothes, after all."

The Sumner H. Cater collection contains materials related to a University of Illinois student's employment as a stereoview salesman during the summer of 1913.

The Sumner H. Cater collection contains materials related to a University of Illinois student's employment as a stereoview salesman during the summer of 1913.

The collection includes the original salesman case used by Sumner H. Cater which contains 1 stereoviewer, 24 sample stereographs (3 by Keystone View Company and 21 by Underwood & Underwood), and 3 explanation cards that help demonstrate how stereographs work. Photographic content includes 4 foreign views showing "Picking lemons" at an orchard in Sicily, "The Japanese hillside trenches," "A hospitable home in old Ireland," and "Concrete Arches" at the Panama Canal; 4 domestic views showing "A mountain of petrified water" and "'Old Faithful' geyser in action at Yellowstone National Park, the "Famous trotting ostrich 'Oliver W.'" in Jacksonville, Florida, and "Feeding the Chickens" on a New Jersey farm; and 16 views from the Underwood & Underwood "Holy Land" series mainly showing scenes from Jerusalem.

• “Keystone World Tours” by J. Paul Goode, Keystone View Company, Portland, Oregon (1 item)
• “A Pilgrimage Through Palestine,” Keystone View Company, Meadville, Pennsylvania, 1907 (1 item)
• “The Stereoscope, The Stereograph, Sun-Painting” Sun-Sculpture” by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Keystone View Company, Meadville, Pennsylvania, 1910 (1 item)
• “The Underwood Travel System,” Underwood & Underwood, New York, 1913 (1 item)
• “Manual of Instruction,” Underwood & Underwood, New York, 1908 (1 item)
• “Old Mother Earth’s Babies,” Keystone View Company, New York 1907 (1 item)
• “Key to 72 Travel-Tour of the World Through Stereoscope” by J. Paul Goode, Keystone View Company, Meadville, Pennsylvania (1 item)
• “Keystone Cabinets and cases,” Keystone View Company, Meadville, Pennsylvania, 1905 (1 item)
• Underwood & Underwood stereoview listings (2 items)
• Two editions of "The Underwood Travel System Newsletter" listing totals from completed sales by various salesmen as well as best practices regarding sales strategies, announcements, and new photographic subjects in stock (2 items)
• Two editions of "U.T.S. [Underwood Travel System] Selling Aids" (2 items)
• Unused envelopes addressed to Keystone View Company and Prof. Ira O. Baker (5 items)
• Contract between Sumner H. Cater and Keystone View Company agreeing to terms of employment between June 10th and September 10th 1913 (1 item)
• Unused "Salesman's Weekly Report to Keystone View Company" template forms (3 items)
• Letter from Keystone View Company to Sumner H. Cater dated April 2nd 1913 notifying Cater that a duplicate of his contract with Keystone is attached, insisting that Keystone will assist him in making the “largest amount possible from your vacation work,” and urging him to study the products on offer (1 item)
• Letter from Keystone View Company to Sumner H. Cater dated April 19th 1913 notifying Cater that Keystone had received his "Letter of Credit" and that they were sending stereographs his way, with Panama Canal views emphasized as products he should try especially hard to sell during his pending window of employment (1 item)
• Letters from Keystone View Company to Sumner H. Cater (originally addressed to Princeton, Illinois, but remarked for general delivery in Garrison, Iowa) dated June 16th and 17th 1913 notifying Cater that records indicate they have not yet heard from him despite his window of employment having officially begun while also positing to Cater that this summer will prove to be the "best season that Keystone college men have ever known," before listing off names of other salesmen alongside how many hours they have worked and how many orders they have successfully procured (2 items)
• Letter from Underwood & Underwood to Sumner H. Cater dated June 14th 1913 and addressed to Benton, Iowa, notifying Cater that the Benton area has been reserved for himself and "Mr. Hey" and encouraging him to work thoroughly in such a large area (1 item)
• Letter from Underwood & Underwood to Sumner H. Cater dated June 16th 1913 and addressed to Garrison, Iowa, notifying Cater that they have sent him an outfit and a "Canvass and Delivery Instruction" booklet (1 item)
• Letter from the treasurer of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Y.M.C.A. to Sumner H. Cater indicating that while he made a subscription payment of $2.00 the previous fall there was still a remaining unpaid balance of $1.50 (1 item)