Last year we shared a collection of menus from Vassar Thanksgivings past. This year we’re moving beyond the food to offer an account of how Vassar students spent the full holiday nearly 140 years ago, from dawn to dark. The piece appeared in the January 1873 issue of the Vassar Miscellany.

Main Building, late 19th century

Thanksgiving Day dawned clear and bright upon us. That is to say, although we can not assert this for a fact, not having made any personal observations in the matter, it is safe to suppose that a perfect dawn must have preceded the perfect day which followed. The air blew fresh from the far-away mountain-tops, with a dash of snow and a tingle of ice in it that was particularly exhilarating. The sun did his very best beaming, the sky intensified its blue, and the clouds piled up their fleeciness. If we had not such an extreme dislike to anything which savors of originality, we might have been led to exclaim, “O, what is so rare as a day in November!” As it was, we bit our lips, and kept the sentiment in its proper place.

Main Dining Room, 1878

The half-past eight arrangement for breakfast was highly satisfactory to all parties. To tell the truth, the arrangement seemed much more satisfactory than the breakfast. But that was to be expected: for students are proverbial grumblers; and the occasional remarks overheard about “spreading things out” and a “consistent evenness” must have been the product of thoughtlessness or—the north side of the dining-hall. However that may have been, it was indisputably proved that “a short horse is soon curried.” Prayers after breakfast brought back “ye olden time,” and reminded us that Thanksgiving Day was not appointed for the sole purpose of eating turkey. Some, of us had difficulty in realizing this fact, and it required a great deal of logic to convince us; but in time we all assented to it.

Student Studying, ca. 1896

As soon as practicable we joined the company of anxious and scribbling Juniors in the library, who were poring over Shakespeare and Lamb and Froude in a last desperate struggle with those eternal essays. Burying ourself in a corner, we proceeded to pound our head against a wall of books, hoping that such a performance would send ideas showering upon the paper. Judging from analogy and experience, we concluded that every other girl was doing about the same thing. As fast as a respectable number of ideas were thus knocked out, one after another departed, wearing that particular smile of relief which is especially exasperating to the captive ones.

Thanksgiving Menu, 1872

For two hours or more before dinner the grounds were pervaded by people “getting up an appetite.” This was preparatory to “getting up a toilet,” and both objects were accomplished with a wonderful degree of success. To describe the former would be unkind; to describe the latter would be impossible. Behold us, then, O imaginative reader, seated in the dining-hall at half past three, each with her “own particular,” her best gown, best behavior, best smile, and best appetite. The dinner was gotten up in the very best style of our steward, and was as like the one of last year as anything well could be. Those brave individuals who began with the “intention of partaking of every dish, gave up in despair before half accomplishing their purpose. It was, indeed, rumored that one plucky damsel had achieved the glorious work, but she has not since been heard from. The question of time was clearly not involved in the solution of this problem, for whatever in that line cannot be accomplished in three hours, is so infinitesimal that it may practically be disregarded.

We draw a veil over the hour that followed. Enough to say, that at its expiration we seated ourselves in chapel to listen to readings by the President. His kindness in reading to us was only exceeded by the excellence of his elocution. The selections were from the “Merchant of Venice,” and included nearly all the favorite scenes.

President John H. Raymond and Lady Principal Harriet W. Terry

Miss Terry received in the parlors till nine o’clock, when we mustered our forces tor a fresh attack in the dining-hall. All things considered, the victory which we achieved was marvelous. We accomplished all that could reasonably have been expected of us.

The spirits of just men made perfect, held undisputed sway over the house that night. Our ancestors from time out of mind passed in solemn procession before our astonished vision. Ghosts of long-forgotten friends with mournful visages, shook the finger of reproach at us. Hollow-eyed children, imps of darkness, weird and fantastic forms, floated around our pillows, and the air was full of heavy oppression. Night was eternal; the sun had set forever; the firmament was a blank; existence was just becoming utterly unbearable, when a vigorous shake from our room-mate recalled our wandering wits.

However blessed the man who invented Thanksgiving may be, the demented individual who got out a patent on the day after, should have been forced to leave the country.

You can read this account in its original form on pages 124-126 of the Vassar Miscellany, January 1873.

Posted on behalf of the Office of Communications

Einstein at the tiller, 1936,
inscribed to Otto Nathan

For the past ten years, they’ve been a major pride point of the Special Collections at the Vassar Libraries: a collection of letters, manuscripts and photographs relating to Albert Einstein, notably including 130 letters exchanged between Einstein and his friend Otto Nathan, executor of the great scientist’s estate and a member of the college’s economics faculty in the early 1940s.  Researchers from around the world have traveled to campus to study the collection.  But now, thanks to a grant from Vassar alumna Dr. Georgette Bennett in honor of her husband, Dr. Leonard Polonsky, Vassar’s Einstein papers are being digitized, and will become available to a much wider audience.

“My husband and I are deeply committed to the democratization of knowledge through digitization of rare documents.  Digitization of Vassar’s Einstein papers dovetails with our digitization of his collection at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.  We’re delighted to make Vassar’s valuable materials accessible to a worldwide audience,” said Dr. Bennett, a graduate of Vassar’s Class of 1967.  The generosity of Dr. Bennett and Dr. Polonsky builds in turn on the original gift of the papers, more properly known as the Morris and Adele Bergreen Albert Einstein Collection, from Adele Gabel Bergreen of the Class of 1944.  “To receive this grant was extraordinary,” said Sabrina Pape, Director of the Vassar Libraries.  “We are so grateful to Dr. Bennett and Dr. Polonsky for allowing us to bring the collection to a worldwide community.”

While the Bergreen Einstein Collection includes other materials, Ronald Patkus, head of the Libraries’ Special Collections, said the grant from Dr. Bennett and Dr. Polonsky has allowed the digitization project to concentrate specifically on the papers and manuscripts.  “The bulk of it is letters between Einstein and Otto Nathan about Einstein’s social and political concerns, especially those relating to Jewish-American organizations and individuals,” he said, adding that they shed light on “Einstein the humanitarian, which is a nice complement to the scientific Einstein.”

Einstein and Otto Nathan
© Philippe Halsman Studio

Read more online about the Morris and Adele Bergreen Albert Einstein Collection at Vassar College

According to Joanna DiPasquale, Digital Projects Librarian, the process itself involves placing the papers on flat-bed scanners and using high-resolution special equipment that “zooms down to photograph these incredibly fragile materials in a non-invasive way.”

“As an undergraduate institution, Vassar has many unique needs, “ DiPasquale said.  “It’s my job to design a system to meet those needs.”  The result in this instance is a new viewer that will enable a person looking at scanned Einstein materials to see the original German transcription side by side with its English translation – and there will be a full-text searchable database, in both English and German.  Through a consortium that provides third-party backup storage of electronic documents, the digitization will also ensure the future integrity of the files by archiving them.

Einstein to Otto Nathan,
September 5, 1939

In addition, Vassar is partnering with such institutions as the California Institute of Technology, which has top experts at reading and translating Einstein’s papers, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, which is the official repository of the Albert Einstein Archives and home to the world’s largest collection of Einstein materials.  “The result of the Vassar effort will be a standalone project that targets undergraduates,” said DiPasquale, “but it will also contribute to a larger digital collection of Einstein materials that will include both Vassar and Hebrew University materials.”

The digitization work has begun in earnest, with open online access to the documents expected to begin in early 2014.  But as Pape stressed, that marks just the beginning of the effects of Dr. Bennett and Dr. Polonsky’s generosity, which also will include stipends for Vassar faculty members to explore ways of incorporating materials from the Bergreen Einstein Collection into their teaching.  Faculty from such diverse disciplines as History, German Studies, Philosophy, Earth Science and Physics already have expressed interest.

“Opening up the collection for greater use across the curriculum is completely in keeping with our intent, and in keeping with a Vassar education,” said Dr. Bennett.  “We are happy to make this possible.”