This fall term the OMA hosted the students of Professor Daniel López-Cevallos’ ethnic studies course ES 351 “Ethnic Minorities in Oregon” for a session on the collections and histories available for them to use as part of their class projects. At the end of the term, the students returned to the archives to give poster presentations about their research. The students’ topics of study included: the IRCO Asian Family Center, Chinese Disinterment in Oregon, Mexican Immigration in Oregon, the Oregon – and OSU – Japanese Exclusion and Executive Order 9066, the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, and Chinese Miners in Oregon.

Read the whole post here. 

The Friday before Thanksgiving we hosted historian Peter Kopp for a Collections at the Center talk, which gave him an opportunity to talk about his new book (Hoptopia) and research process, and gave us an excuse to show fabulous archival documents.

All sorts of people were in the audience, from archivists to local hop farmers, brewers and even the famous hopmeister Dr. Alfred Haunold himself.

Read and see more on the Brewstorian Blog!

That time when Peter Kopp gave a talk OSU – and Al Haunold helped him out.

Had a wonderful time hosting Peter Kopp to promote his new book on hop history, Hoptopia. 

“If President Johnson had to kill – shoot, burn to death – ten Vietnamese women and children every morning before breakfast, the war would soon end.” -Linus Pauling, 1967

By early 1965, convinced that the United States government was the primary obstacle to initiating a cease-fire and subsequent negotiations in Vietnam, Linus Pauling increasingly began to go on the offensive against the war.

Read the entire post on the Pauling Blog. 

This is part 5 of 7 on Pauling and the Vietnam War.

George W. Ball and President Lyndon Johnson, ca. 1965. Image credit: George W. Ball Papers, Princeton University.

Almost as soon as he had received it, Linus Pauling sent a copy of Ho Chi Minh’s letter of November 17, 1965 to U.S. President Lyndon Johnson. While the letter contained some “strongly worded” rhetoric about the United States, Pauling wrote, these were to be expected from the leader of a small country that was undergoing significant aerial bombardment from a world power.

In Pauling’s view, the more loaded statements made in the letter were relatively unimportant. Rather, Pauling highlighted Ho Chi Minh’s aspirations for peace as the crux of his response, pointing out that his four-point prescription for resolution was not described as a prerequisite for the initiation of negotiations. Indeed, Pauling took pains to note (perhaps with some measure of concern) that Minh had not called for negotiations as a means to achieve a peaceful resolution at all. Nonetheless, he believed that the Vietnamese leader’s hopes for peace in his country could prevail if the United States initiated negotiations for strategic withdrawal and cease-fire.

Read Part 4 of 7 in the series Pauling and the Vietnam War on the Pauling Blog.

“Occupying Margins” A Panel Discussion on Gender and The OMA at the Oregon Migrations Symposium.

“This panel aims to spotlight the lived experiences of non-binary/genderqueer/gender non-conforming folx who live beyond the gender binary.” As part of Trans Awareness Week on OSU’s campus, SOL and the Pride Center hosted an event entitled “Occupying Margins: A Panel Discussion on Gender” in which three OSU students—Tara, Malik, and Vickie—spoke about their personal experiences with gender, as well larger impressions of the topic.

• Read more on the OMA blog. 

The OMA was delighted to give a presentation on one of its current projects, the Latinos en Oregón oral history project, at the Oregon Migrations Symposium on November 17, 2016, at the University of Oregon in Eugene. It was a full day of amazing presentations with a kick off event occurring the evening before featuring a number of public history projects. The OMA’s presentation “Latinos en Oregón: Stories of Migration and Settlement in Madras, Oregon” is available online, so be sure to check it out!

• Read more about the symposium on the blog. 

“The continuation of the savagery of the Vietnam War is unworthy of the dignity of man.” -Linus Pauling, 1965

In 1964, Linus Pauling’s colleague in anti-Vietnam War activism, Corliss Lamont, sent a copy of his 1962 open letter against Vietnam to President Lyndon Johnson. Pauling added his support to Lamont’s action, expressing his agreement with Lamont’s plea that the new President change course and disengage from a policy of military escalation had already “deteriorated almost beyond belief.”

President Johnson did not change course.

Read Part 3 of 7 in an examination of Linus Pauling’s activism against the Vietnam War.

Thanks to Gillian Bergmann, OHBA student extraordinaire, for a suite of posts related to Peter Kopp’s new book Hoptopia: A World of Agriculture and Beer in Oregon’s Willamette Valley.

Corliss Lamont

“As individuals who believe that the only security for America lies in world peace, we wish to ask you why at present the United States is sending its Army, Navy and Air Force to bring death and bloodshed to South Vietnam, a small Asian country approximately 10,000 miles from our Pacific Coast.”

-“An Open Letter to President John F. Kennedy Against U.S. Military Intervention in South Vietnam,” April 11, 1962.

In spring 1962, Linus Pauling was in communication with Corliss Lamont, a philosopher and the director of the American Civil Liberties Union, who was organizing an open letter to President Kennedy (which Pauling ultimately signed) opposing military action in Vietnam. Lamont had written to Pauling share the details of his own correspondence with McGeorge Bundy, the U.S. National Security Advisor. Bundy was highly critical of Lamont’s open letter and had provided documents intended to both enlighten Lamont and dissuade him from taking a strong stance against the U.S. position.

Read the whole post on The Pauling Blog. 

[Ed Note: This is part 2 of 7 in our series focusing on Linus Pauling’s activism against the Vietnam War. This is also the 600th post to be released on the Pauling Blog. We thank you for your continued readership.]

Last week the Oregon State Queer Archives hosted its first ever crafting event as part of OSU’s Queer History Month celebrations. We supplied attendees with copies of archival materials, including images from the Pride Center records, old event flyers, After 8 materials, and of course, glitter! One of the main goals of this event was to use archival materials as a way to imagine queer futures, particularly as they pertain to OSU and the surrounding community. Some absolutely fabulous art was created, and many of the artists generously donated their pieces to OSQA.

A flickr set of Glitter in the Archives!

Read the whole crafting event post.