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John Miller, director of archives at UA, leaving post after 36 years
By David Giffels
Beacon Journal columnist
Published on Sunday, Dec 23, 2007
The pages are loose and yellow, nestled in a distressed leather cover. I have to put on white cotton gloves to touch them, and even then I don't want to, fearful of damaging them, which, after 164 years, would make me the scourge of archivists the world over.
Not to mention ruining Christmas.
Lying open on the table at the University of Akron Archives, stiff pages flat against a tired spine, is one of the very first copies of the most famous Christmas book ever printed. It's an 1843 copy of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, possibly a first edition, although ongoing archival scrutiny suggests it might be slightly later. But still.
The frontispiece has held its color after all these years, a fanciful illustration of Mr. Fezziwig's Ball.
The facing title page introduces a book that would, almost instantly, put Dickens into a rare echelon of literary celebrity.
A Christmas Carol:
In Prose.
Being
A Ghost Story At Christmas
The first printing of 6,000 copies sold out immediately upon its release in December 1843. Dickens' story of Ebenezer
Scrooge, Bob Cratchit and the spirits of past, present and future would change the way Christmas stories are told, from refined stages to sitcoms. (Personal favorite: the 1984 Highway to Heaven version with a browbeaten mechanic by the name of ''Ratchett.'')
For all that, however, this copy, the pages of which I carefully turn with gloved fingers, is only the second most interesting A Christmas Carol in the UA collection. That's because the other copy, an 1846 edition resting on this same table, has a surprise in the opening pages:
''To Dudley Costello, this set of Christmas books, from his friend Charles Dickens, 24th May 1849.''
I place my fingertip on the page, one degree of white-cotton separation from Charles Dickens' pen.
Books an excuse
I came here to see these books. But that was kind of an excuse.
Mostly, I came to say goodbye to a friend, someone who has been a touchstone for me the past decade, and for countless other students, researchers and historians interested in Akron.
John Miller, the director of the archives since 1972, finished his last day at the university Friday, retiring after a generation spent gathering and cataloging some of the most interesting artifacts you never knew Akron had.
Here in the basement of the Polsky Building, he sits across the reading-room table as I look at the Dickens copies. Next to him is his successor, Victor Fleischer, who joined the archives in September.
Behind them, by chance, is another holiday artifact, a gold record, Firestone: Your Christmas Favorites, one of the many seasonal records issued by the tire company in its heyday. Hanging across the room is a black wool jacket with ''Polsky's'' in script across the back.
Items by the thousands
In the climate-controlled storerooms beyond are thousands of items — books, papers, memorabilia — related to the history of the university and the region. The archives are also home to the Herman Muehlstein rare-book collection, which includes these copies of A Christmas Carol.
Muehlstein was an entrepreneur who made his fortune in the scrap-rubber industry and devoted a considerable portion of it to collecting books. Although he lived in New York, his business connected him to Akron, and he chose UA as the best home for his collection.
His library of 257 books is impressive, with a 1466 copy of Cicero's De Officiis, set from the first printing press with movable type; Shakespeare folios from the 1630s; and a 1663 printing of the Bible in Algonquin, one of 14 known surviving copies. The strongest thread is American and British literature, including first editions of Mark Twain, Jack London and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
While Miller has served as caretaker of this and other collections, perhaps his most important accomplishment has been his ability to shepherd more recent history into the archives.
Although this institution might seem like a static repository, its holdings directly reflect the dynamic changes in Akron across the past 35 years. As the various pieces of the former rubber capital have broken up and moved away, Miller has gathered what was left behind and given it a proper home. The university has collections from Firestone, Goodrich and the United Rubber Workers, among others.
Good time for archives
''It was an unfortunate time for Akron, but at the time, archivally, it was important,'' Miller says.
Whenever an era has ended, the archives have been there to gather the pieces. When Beacon Journal publisher John S. Knight died in 1981, Miller took on his papers. After John Seiberling retired from Congress in 1986, he turned over a large collection. And so on.
Now, with Fleischer at the helm, ''we'll move from a collecting phase to an access phase,'' Miller says.
Fleischer, who began his career at Stan Hywet Hall before becoming director of the Youngstown State University archives, has a strong background in digital preservation, transferring fragile paper items into computer files where they can be widely viewed without fear of damage.
Miller intends to stay active in Progress through Preservation and the Lighter Than Air Society and, despite his retirement, expects to spend a fair share of his time back in the archives.
After all, some of his best friends are there — Dickens, Shakespeare, Seiberling and the rest.
David Giffels is a Beacon Journal columnist. He can be reached at 330-996-3572 or at dgiffels@thebeaconjournal.com.
The pages are loose and yellow, nestled in a distressed leather cover. I have to put on white cotton gloves to touch them, and even then I don't want to, fearful of damaging them, which, after 164 years, would make me the scourge of archivists the world over.
Get the full article here.
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