Today, as part of The Day We Fight Back, a national demonstration against mass surveillance, the American Library Association is urging library supporters to ask their representatives in Congress to support the USA FREEDOM Act (S.1599 and H.R.3361).
ALA is making this effort because of the library community’s long standing commitment to privacy, starting with the protection of patron library records. Grassroots support from ALA has meant a lot to the reform attempts since passage of the USA PATRIOT Act in 2001. Now with public knowledge about the extensive surveillance of telephone records and other revelations, there is an opportunity get some real reforms to the surveillance system. That is why we need our library voices to express the need for ending mass surveillance, bring due process to the FISA court process and rationality to the collection and retention of data about millions of people.
The FREEDOM Act, introduced by Senator Pat Leahy (D-Vermont) and Representative Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin), seeks to end bulk collection of Americans’ communications information and introduce transparency and oversight for National Security Agency investigations. As ALA explains:
This bicameral piece of legislation is intended to end bulk collection of telephone metadata, prevent bulk collection of Internet metadata, and permit companies to report publicly on the number of FISA orders and National Security Letters they have received and complied with, and the number of users (or accounts) whose information was sought under those orders and letters.
The bill would also require the government itself to make additional disclosures about the intelligence surveillance it conducts. It would also establish a process for declassifying significant opinions issued by the FISA court and create an Office of the Special Advocate charged with arguing for privacy at the FISA Court.
Please ask both your U.S. representative and senators to co-sponsor this important legislation. If your any of your legislators have already co-sponsored, please thank them for bringing more transparency and oversight to these spying programs.
Good luck to the Lady Royals in their game this afternoon against Juniata! If they win, it will be the team’s 11th win for the season — and the 800th win of Coach Mike Strong’s career, which would make him the first coach in NCAA Division III women’s basketball history to reach that milestone.
Strong became head coach for the Lady Royals in 1979. Here’s a photo of Coach Strong with his team from the 1980 Windhover yearbook:
Now that we’ve all had our turkey, it’s nose to the grindstone as we head into dead week and final exams. The Library will be open extended hours, beginning tomorrow night, for late night studying. Here’s our schedule for the next two weeks:
Happy Thanksgiving to all, from your friends at the Weinberg Memorial Library! We’ll be on reduced hours for the holiday:
Wednesday, November 27: 8:00am – 4:30pm
Thursday, November 28: CLOSED
Friday, November 29: CLOSED
Saturday, November 30: CLOSED
Sunday, December 1: 12:00pm – 11:30pm
In honor of our many veterans: This Honor Roll booklet from January 1945 lists 1,835 University of Scranton students and alumni who had served in the armed forces.
Find photographs, documents, news clippings, and more about the many veterans in the University community in our digital collections.
For the past few months, we’ve been working on a giant digital collections project. Earlier this year, in preparation for the University’s 125th anniversary, we digitized 97 oversized scrapbooks, filled with newspaper clippings about the University, that were hiding in our basement.
There’s an immense variety of materials inside the books – some are dedicated to academics, others to athletics and alumni – and they date from as early as the 1890s to as recent as the 1980s. Some of the scrapbooks were in good shape, while others were falling apart:
What we’re working on now is processing and cataloging the digitized images, to make them easy to browse and search. While we’re only about a quarter of the way done, you can take a look at our progress by searching and browsing 9,000+ articles from the 20 scrapbooks currently available in our new University of Scranton Clippings Collection.
Note: Items in this collection are restricted to on-campus users only, but off-campus users will still be able to search and browse records for the articles.
We’ll be adding articles from the rest of the scrapbooks throughout the year, so check back often! You can also send questions or comments to us at digitalcollections@scranton.edu.
We encourage all our University community members to submit “Your Scranton Story” in celebration of the University’s 125 years. At the end of the year, we’ll be capturing the Scranton Stories in our web archives, preserving your memories for the 150th anniversary and beyond.
The University of Scranton begins its 125th Anniversary celebration this month with a special mass on August 12. We know all true Royals take pride in the long history of the University of Scranton — but just in case your memory is a bit fuzzy, here’s a quick pictorial primer on the story behind our 1888 cornerstone, featuring materials from the University Archives and Digital Collections.
The University of Scranton was founded in 1888 by Most Reverend William G. O’Hara, D.D., the first Bishop of Scranton, as the College of St. Thomas of Aquin.
The Catholics of Northeastern Pennsylvania responded with enthusiasm. Four packed trains brought attendees from Wilkes-Barre and Carbondale, who joined the people of Scranton in an “immense throng” on Wyoming Avenue. At 2:30pm, community organizations and societies gathered at the corner of Franklin and Lackawanna Avenues and paraded to the Cathedral, carrying banners and (in some cases) bringing along a band. The Scranton Republican noted that “the parade was not a large one, but it made an excellent approach.”
The ceremony began at 3pm, as Bishop O’Hara and several priests, cross-bearers, and acolytes processed from the Cathedral to the cornerstone, accompanied by the Cathedral choir and an orchestra performing Mozart’s Gloria. Bishop O’Hara blessed the cornerstone, placed at the foundation of the planned College building. The granite stone (in a “much admired pink hue”) was inscribed with the College’s name and the date:
The cornerstone, as it appeared in the 1950s
Inside the cornerstone was placed a copper box, which held:
Seven silver coins, fresh from the U.S. Mint, including a rare 3-cent piece
That day’s issues of local newspapers (including the Scranton Times, the Scranton Republican, the Free Press, News, and the Catholic Record, along with the Catholic Standard of Philadelphia)
A record of the blessing, in Latin
Bishop O’Hara then gave a sermon, noting that “God gives His grace to all works that are given in his name.” He charged the attendees with the care and support of the College: “It is for you to put your shoulder to the wheel and to see this institution of learning rising up… [do] not think of educating your children according to the fashions of the world, but to train their minds and impress upon their hearts the great truths of religion and to point out to them the way in which they should walk.” The following day, local newspapers published the text of the sermon along with detailed reports of the event:
August 13, 1888 article about the cornerstone blessing (click for full view)
Bishop O’Hara’s plans came to fruition in 1892, when the construction of College Hall (later known as “Old Main”) was completed and St. Thomas College opened its doors. The three story brick building housed classrooms on the first and second floors, an auditorium/gymnasium on the third floor, and a chapel in the basement:
Old Main (center), ca. 1920s
The cornerstone remained at the base of Old Main for more than 70 years. During that time, St. Thomas College evolved into the University of Scranton (changing its name in 1938), and the campus center shifted from Wyoming Avenue to the property surrounding the Scranton Estate, which Worthington Scranton donated to the University in 1941.
Cornerstone of Old Main, as it appeared in the 1950s
In 1962, the University formalized this shift by moving the cornerstone from Wyoming Avenue to the new campus. The cornerstone was carefully removed from Old Main (which would be demolished in 1968):
Rev. Joseph A. Rock, S.J., overseeing the removal of the cornerstone in 1962
It was then transferred to the new campus, where a newly constructed classroom building — St. Thomas Hall — was about to be dedicated. The September 1962 issue of the Aquinas described the move:
The cornerstone was removed from St. Thomas College to perpetuate those things for which it stands. The intentions of the founding fathers and the service which its building has provided to higher education have all been carried with the stone to its new resting place beneath a new cornerstone in the walls of St. Thomas Hall.
No edifice is stronger than its foundation, and the foundation of St. Thomas Hall and the University is in the ‘Old Main’ building and St. Thomas College. This is symbolically represented by the old cornerstone providing a foundation for the new, as St. Thomas College provides a foundation for the present institution. Along with the stone, St. Thomas College has given its name to the largest building on the University campus, providing a continuity to the history of the school by linking its past with its present.
At the September 16, 1962 dedication of St. Thomas Hall, both the old and new cornerstones were blessed by Rt. Rev. Msgr. Joseph A. Madden, chancellor of the Diocese of Scranton. Msgr. Madden observed: “What we witnessed here today is but a step, though gigantic, towards fulfillment of a divine command… ‘Go, therefore and Teach!'”
Rt. Rev. Msgr. Madden blessing the new 1962 cornerstone in front of St. Thomas Hall
A special guest at the dedication was Dr. Martin T. O’Malley, who at the age of 12 had served as an altar boy at the 1888 dedication. He was the only person to be present at both the 1888 and 1962 events.
The contents of the 1888 cornerstone were removed before it was installed; the original silver coins and the copper box went into other storage for safe keeping. It’s a little unclear from the 1962 accounts of the dedication, but it seems that the original 1888 newspapers were placed into the 1962 cornerstone, along with:
A letter from Robert P. Moran ’25, the architect of St. Thomas Hall, addressed to the future architect of any building that replaced it
A letter from 1962 student body president Jacques P. Kueny
A letter from Atty. James A. Kelly, president of the Alumni Society
A letter from Dr. Frank J. O’Hara, director of alumni relations, to alumni of the future
Bulletins from the Graduate School, the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Evening College
The latest issues of the Alumni Bulletin
Promotional materials from a recent development campaign
A pictorial booklet
Copies of student publications
A list of student names for the 1961-1962 academic year
New issues of local newspapers from the day of the 1962 dedication
Three medals
New coins of each denomination
Both the 1888 and 1962 cornerstones were placed at the Linden Street entrance of the new building, which at the time was a very prominent location. Over the years, though, it proved to be a less than ideal spot in terms of cornerstone visibility, with bushes and eventually a tree hiding the stones from direct view:
St. Thomas Hall, ca. 1979St. Thomas Hall, 1982St. Thomas Hall, ca. 1990sSt. Thomas Hall, 2013
As part of the 125th Anniversary, the 1888 cornerstone has been dislodged from its 1962 placement and will be on display – location TBA – throughout the celebration. Keep an eye out for it, and be sure to take the opportunity to pay your respects to Bishop O’Hara and the University’s 125-year-old granite foundation.
The cornerstone on display at the August 12 anniversary Mass.
