Tuesday, March 14, 2006, 7 p.m.
Lownes Room
John Hay Library
“The Reluctant Spiritualist: A Life of Maggie Fox”
Nancy Rubin Stuart, MAT ’67
Award-winning author Nancy Rubin Stuart MAT ’67 will give a talk and slide presentation on her latest book, “The Reluctant Spiritualist: A Life of Maggie Fox.” This work depicts the true-life tale of the beautiful Victorian teenager caught in a family web of greed and deception. Maggie Fox later rose to celebrity status as one of the founders of American spiritualism. Her alleged ability to communicate with spirits in America’s first séances of 1848-1850 astounded the press, made her and her sisters the darlings of Broadway, inspired thousands of child imitators, and fascinated the most prominent men and women of her era – among them, Horace Greeley, James Fenimore Cooper, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mary Todd Lincoln, William Lloyd Garrison, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and William James. In 2005 the Washington Post considered Ms. Stuart’s book “fascinating” and the Boston Globe called it “ a richly sympathetic portrait of a fascinating and tragic woman.” For additional information about the book and the author, see: http://www.thereluctantspiritualist.com/
Some related materials from the Brown University Library Special Collections will be exhibited in the Lownes Room. Ms. Rubin Stuart will be available for questions and a book signing at the conclusion of her talk.
For further information contact hay@brown.edu

Thursday, March 2, 2006, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m.
Lownes Room
John Hay Library
Exhibit, Panel Presentation, and Reception
The Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women and the Sarah Doyle Center, in association with the Friends of the Library, will celebrate an exhibit showcasing some of the Rhode Island and Pembroke women’s documents in the Christine Dunlap Farnum Archives. Listen to the Voices of Sophia, the new choir of Providence’s Sophia Academy. Hear an historian, an archivist, a student, an alumni and a donor of records talk about the importance of remembering what women have done.

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Tuesday, March 28, 2006 5:30 p.m.
Lownes Room
John Hay Library
Lydia Maria Child was once America’s bestselling author and its first feminist. In 1833, she declared war against slavery with her daring publication, An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans. Today she is largely forgotten. A special exhibit and lecture at Brown University works to reinstate her to her rightful place in American letters and human rights. The lecture by local historian and bibliophile, Ray Rickman will be held during a public reception on Tuesday, March 28, 2006 at 5:30 pm at the John Hay Library, 20 Prospect Street, Providence. The event is free and open to the public.
Books were central to the life and identity of Child. As an etiquette maven for children, as a novelist, an historian, a religious writer and, an outspoken champion of human rights, her books framed and outlined her beliefs and character. The exhibit will utilize more that 75 books, letters, and photos from the private collection of Ray Rickman to reflect Child as the first woman in America to commit her life to equality. Robb Dimmick, known for his work on the Langston Hughes, Abraham Lincoln and Black Lavender exhibits at the Hay, will serve as guest curator.
Not limiting herself to African American justice, she campaigned against the dispossession and genocide of Native Americans, championed equal rights for women, promoted literature for children, and was the first domestic advice diva.
Mr. Rickman, will discuss Mrs. Child’s influence on other prominent women, including Harriett Beecher Stowe, Julia Ward Howe, and the late Rosalind Wiggins, and talk briefly about how and why he built his Lydia Maria Child collection. The exhibit runs from February 28 through March 31st.

“The Other Lincoln/Douglass Debate”
Philip Gould, Professor of English
Director of the American Seminar at Brown
Brown University
Thursday, February 9, 2006 7 – 8 p.m.
Lownes Room
John Hay Library
This talk will examine the relation between Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass over troubling racial and political issues that arose during the Civil War, particularly treatment of black troops, colonization, and of course emancipation. It looks at Lincoln through the eyes of Douglass and African American leaders (and culture). It also considers the potential effect Douglass might have contributed to Lincoln’s views on race and on African Americans.
This lecture and the accompanying exhibit, “Broken Chains: Abraham Lincoln and the Legacy of Emancipation in the African American Experience , 1820-1920 “, are part of a series of special events held in conjunction with the traveling exhibition “Forever Free: Abraham Lincoln’s Journey to Emancipation” sponsored by the Providence Public Library. The traveling exhibit has been organized by the Huntington Library and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History in cooperation with the Public Programs Office of the American Library Association. The exhibition at the Providence Public Library will run through February 10, 2006 and has been made possible by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Tours of the Lincoln Rooms will be available before the lecture from 6-7 p.m.
For more information contact Holly_Snyder@brown.edu