Roscoe W. Segar was a Portland, Oregon commercial artist specializing in theater advertisements. The collection contains advertising proposals, work, and publications, radio advertisement copy, manuscripts, tearsheets, scrapbooks, photographs, selections of Segar’s student work, and collected theatre and motion picture memorabilia.
Coll 247
Edwin Willard Deming (1860-1942) was an American sculptor, illustrator and writer who lived among Native American tribes when he was young and then dedicated his career to artistically recording and portraying them accurately and with dignity. The collection consists of his correspondence, drawings, sketches, and paintings, as well as anthropological and linguistic material, notes and other documentation of tribes he visited or lived with.
Ax 595
Carrie K. Sweetser (1863-1952) was a watercolorist, a life-long diarist, and her botanist husband’s (UO Botany professor, Albert Raddin Sweetser) devoted travel companion. The collection contains watercolor paintings of botany subjects, including wildflowers and fungi.
Coll 237
Stop by the SCUA hallway today to see some great examples from our collection of original artwork for editorial cartoons. These are poster-sized work, inked onto card stock, from the days when all the drawing, lettering and inking was done by hand.
Many of the visitors to this exhibit come away shaking their heads, because it can seem as if nothing much has changed over the years. In 1932, Quincy Scott (1882-1965) was worried about Oregon voters who weren’t paying attention to the measures on the ballot. In “The Price of Freedom is Eternal Vigilance,” the background to the conversation shown here has a scene from the Revolutionary War, “1776: We fight for the right to govern ourselves. 1932: We govern ourselves.” Scott was the editorial cartoonist for The Oregonian from 1931-1949.
We also hold work by Homer Davenport (1867-1912) of Silverton, Oregon, who became the most highly paid political cartoonist of his time. Davenport started at the Portland Mercury, moved to the San Francisco Examiner, and then was hired by William Randolph Hearst for the New York Journal. Davenport’s attacks on the McKinley campaign and their ties to big business. These cartoons enraged his critics so much that they attempted to pass an anti-cartoon bill through the New York legislature in 1897, but Davenport’s public supporters defeated the legislation.
Compare these cartoons to those you see in today’s newspapers, and you’ll see one huge difference: the amount of text. The visual literacy expectations for the public were much lower, so everything was labeled to make sure the meaning was clear. Here you can see that the Ancient Mariner embodies “Depression Complex” and his deadly weapon is “Voting Without Thinking.” (The dead albatross is “Actual Progress Toward Recovery by the Hoover Administration.”) The title of the cartoon is “The Ancient Marine Made a Mistake.”
The University of Oregon’s art museum first opened its doors to the public on June 10, 1933; it was renovated and reopened in 2005 as the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art (MOA). The collection contains records that document the functions, activities, and people of the museum.
Call number: UA 120
Ruth Mountaingrove is a photographer, writer and artist who moved to Oregon in 1971, settling in communes and eventually co-founding Rootworks, a lesbian community in Southern Oregon. The collection consists of 21 VHS videotapes of Mountaingrove relating the story of her life by talking, dancing, and singing.
Call number: Coll 265
In Oregon, artists and crafts people worked on Work Projects Administration (WPA) projects for schools, universities, hospitals, and the Forest Service. This collection includes photographs of paintings and murals that were installed in Oregon public schools, University of Oregon and Doernbecher Memorial Hospital for Children, Portland, Oregon. Of interest to the researcher is the collection of photographs of woodwork, art, and paintings for Timberline Lodge, Mt. Hood, Oregon.
Call number: Coll 238
Guide to the Work Projects Administration Oregon Federal Art Project Collection
Collection comprises literary manuscripts and book illustrations by American artist Clare Newberry, including 242 original drawings, sketches and illustrations; three book dummies; and scrapbooks from childhood and early school days.
Call number: Ax 681
Wallace Smith (1888-1937) was a newspaperman, novelist, and artist. The papers include Smith’s manuscripts and published pieces, minor correspondence, drawings and illustrations, photographs, and miscellaneous documents.
Call number: Ax 269
Guide to the Wallace Smith Papers
Nils Hogner (1893-1970) was was a muralist and book illustrator, specializing in the illustration of nature books. The collection contains correspondence, original illustrations, manuscripts by Hogner and Dorothy Childs Hogner and others.
Call number: Ax 717
Libraries Home