Special Collections and Archives receives grant from the GRAMMY Foundation

In 2008, a set of about a dozen recordings made around 1950 by Ione Love Thielke was found by the Idaho Songs Project in a private collection in Blackfoot, Idaho. 

The recordings were homemade using a portable acetate disk recorder of the type that became available after World War II. The Project arranged for the Blackfoot Collection to be donated to Special Collections at the Albertsons Library, Boise State University, where the materials could be archived professionally in a carefully controlled environment.

Research showed that Ione Love Thielke was a colorful, talented rural musician who took regional poetry and set it to music, singing and accompanying herself with a tiple. She was the wife of an Idaho/Oregon logger who performed her music throughout Idaho, Oregon and Washington and occasionally beyond. Thielke was well connected with the Idaho literary community of the time.

Subsequently, the Idaho Songs Project located the descendants of Ione Love Thielke and facilitated the donation of several more boxes of her recordings to the Albertsons Library. A preliminary physical inventory indicates the collection contains dozens more homemade acetate recordings that Thielke made of herself and other Idaho musicians and poets, as well as many reel to reel tapes made from about 1948 to 1951 in Boise, Cascade and Pocatello Idaho and Salem, Oregon. 

The titles also indicate the collection includes numerous radio broadcast of programs hosted by Thielke from 1947-1951 in Boise and Pocatello, with interviews of and performances by numerous Idaho musicians and poets.

Special Collections and Archives received an $11,747 grant from The GRAMMY Foundation to digitize the Thielke recordings and make them available online.

The project will be completed by December 2014.

Ione Thielke collection: http://nwda.orbiscascade.org/ark:/80444/xv47659/

GRAMMY Foundation: http://www.grammy.org/grammy-foundation

Cheryl Oestreicher, PhD
Head, Special Collections and Archives/Assistant Professor

Who is KP2?

Albertsons Library will be hosting the Campus Read Kick-Off event on April 22nd from 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM. We will display this year’s book, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, and announce next year’s Campus Read selection.

Join us on the 1st floor of the Library, across from the Circulation Desk. We will have cake, past Campus Read books to check out, and a presentation of the new book. Come find out about KP2 and get a jump start on the campus wide common reading experience for 2014-2015.

Mary Aagard,
Access Services

Check Out the Special Collections and Archives Exhibits

The next time you pass through the library be sure to take a look at our exhibits on the 2nd floor celebrating the lives of two fascinating Idaho leaders: Pete Cenarrusa and Bethine Church.

 

Learn about Pete and Bethine’s life and accomplishments through their letters, photographs, books, memorabilia, and other rare materials from their archival collections.

Bethine Church, widow of Idaho Senator Frank Church, was born into a politically active family and remained a prominent figure in Idaho politics throughout her life. In partnership with her husband, she earned the nickname of “Idaho’s third senator.”

Pete Cenarrusa's fifty-two years of service as legislator and Secretary of State makes him one of the longest-serving public officials in the United States. Throughout his life Pete Cenarrusa was dedicated to promoting the Basque cause and helping Basque communities and immigrants.

Bethine and Pete both passed away in 2013. Their collections are available for research here in the library.

For more information just stop by and see us or go to: http://library.boisestate.edu/special/

Gwyn Hervochon,
Archivist/Librarian