The Dill Pickle Club Records: a jump in the proverbial DeLorean back to the 1920s and 30s

Arrest Notifications, various selections

drawing, untitled

Membership list, Dill Pickle Club

 The Newberry Library's manuscript collection hosts a wide variety of materials from the Dill Pickle Club. Included in this post are a few of those images. The collection includes around 30 different arrest notifications, the kind of slips that would have been handed by the arresting officer to the person being arrested. All of the notifications are pertaining to arrests of two different men: Daniel Finucane and John A. Jones. The charges are for 4 or 5 different crimes, indicated by their code in the index of Illinois laws. John A. Jones could either be the formal name or a relative of the manager of the club during the 20s and 30s, referred to in other documents as Jack Jones. Once I can find the necessary resources required to decipher what exactly those charges are for, I believe these arrest notifications will be greatly significant in my project at large. There were only 4 different arresting officers, and the arrests often happened on several consecutive days. Without any other context, it would appear that the members of the Dill Pickle Club were being genuinely harassed by the Chicago Police Department. I also plan on pursuing the membership list, shown to the right, as a means of tracking down other information about those involved in events at the Dill Pickle Club. Because so much was happening there, in terms of gay activism, leftist activism, communist activities, intellectual discussions, and a myriad of other events that would all be discussed in the adjacent Washington Square Park (then referred to as Bughouse Square), there is a plethora of stories hiding behind those names. I think this will really help paint an accurate picture of what the major point of gay population was like in the early 20th century. As an additional bonus, I threw in a doodle that I found that was labeled as "untitled drawing" with an unknown author. The paper appeared to have been folded several times and was well-worn. It is part of a large number of drawings, sketches, and political cartoons done by members of the Dill Pickle Club that show the culture and atmosphere among its members.

All images are credited to the Newberry Library's Special Collections.

Race Relations and Why This Week Was Really Hard

So we looked at race relations and racism in post-Civil War America at the beginning of this week, reading DuBose's The Souls of Black Folk. I've read a bit of DuBose before, but never anything quite this lengthy. I found it a lot easier to get through than I was anticipating, and it was really powerful. As a social justice warrior (I refuse to accept this term as a pejorative, name-calling strategy against millennial activists as it has frequently been used as of late) I've been highly invested in racial issues over the past few years, beginning with the Treyvon Martin case and reaching its summit with the Ferguson riots and the Michael Brown case. I attended Black Lives Matter protests when I lived in DC. I read book after book. I took a class specifically geared toward social justice issues for my J-term when I returned to campus so I could have a forum in which to talk about these issues. I watch and read and listen to around 5 different news programs/publications a day. I'm invested. These classes, today and yesterday (Monday and Tuesday) have been really, really, insurmountably difficult. I adore the way that Marcy teaches about race and history. I love that she asks us questions, makes us clarify our language so that we're being careful about what we're saying. I learned things I didn't know before. Today's class was awful. The lecture was great, don't get me wrong, but looking at 50+ pictures of lynchings was difficult (and that's an understatement--I sat in class crying, watching every slide go past that said "unidentified black man," or that showed a crowd of hundreds of white people watching the "spectacle" of a goddamn human being being murdered for no reason, and I felt my heart sink more and more) and while it was important, it wore me out emotionally. I'm not complaining--this was a very significant and moving lecture, and I'm glad I saw it--I'm just expressing the immense emotional toll something like this took on me. I think that when I get involved in race-related activism, I feel a little silly, like it's not my place to interfere or like people will think it's strange for a white girl to be so invested in the issues. It can be intimidating at times. However, I think it's really important to remember, especially when moved like this, that the only way things will ever change is if the party that is oppressing the oppressed makes a change. Like it or not, I was born into the party that is doing the oppressing. I cannot change the fact that I am white. I cannot change where or how I grew up. But I can help. I can check my white privilege and try and understand the other side, and by looking at these pictures it threw me right into the other side emotionally. The important step to remember that is especially poignant after today's lecture on the color line is that I need to find a way to accept that there is a line, but that the line doesn't need to be there, and that through open discourse and activism we can all find our own individual ways to reach across the lines and hold hands. (Apologies for the vomit-worthy cheesiness of the last sentiment. Unavoidable cliche.)

Image Analysis Assignment

This image was somewhat difficult to decipher initially. After a lot of index-less searching through a large leather-bound anthology of issues of Punch, I found it. The image, titled "Rhodes Colossus Striding from Capetown to Cairo," depicts a massive man standing with one foot on either side (north and south) of the African continent, looking quite noble, wearing clothes typical of what would find on an explorer of the era, with a rifle strapped across his chest. Without knowing specifically who the Rhodes in question is, it can be inferred by reading the adjacent poem that he is either a successful British explorer helping colonize Africa, or is a representation of the colonization of Africa by Britain as a whole. The poem glorifies the imperialist efforts of the British government. It makes a point of describing Rhodes as "Brobdingnagian Bagman, big Dreamer of Dreams, A titan of tact and shrewd trader--shrewd trader! A diplomat full of finesse and sharp schemes, With a touch of the pious Crusader--Crusader! A 'Dealer' with despots, a 'Squarer' of Kings, A jumper of mountain, lake, wilderness, wady, and manager 'cute of such troublesome things as Lobengula or the Mahdi--the Mahdi." The indigenous people are referred to as "wild would-be Scuttlers" in one line, "sullen Boers," in the next, and "plack potentates." The sing-song, jovial tone in which the poem is written depicts the casualness with which imperialism and exploitation of an entire continent of people was approached by the bulk of the British people. Rhodes is depicted as civilizing the black people, doing it with ease, bringing them culture and religion and work to do, showing how "easy" it is to colonize a place and marginalize all its peoples. The last stanza emphasizes the fortitude of the British people taking on their "noble" cause of civilizing the "dark continent" despite the lowered price of South African shares, referring to themselves as "trade martyrs." The patriotism in the last 4 lines makes it clear that the Colossus in question is more a metaphor for Britain than an actual person, explaining that "Scuttlers will have their work cut out to shunt this stalwart, far-striding Colossus--Colossus." Upon first reading of the poem, I interpreted it as a baseline applause for British imperialism in Africa, but when delving into it further, it appears that it could potentially be a satirical poke at the people who work for these "bosses" (or "diplomats" or "Titans," as the poem describes them) that represent Britain's best interest when actually on the ground. The lines "We brave Britons are still to the front--Provided we've someone to boss us--to boss us" present a bit of irony--these people who Britain marginalizes, oppresses, and enslaves are being bossed around by people who are being bossed around themselves. This dichotomy between poorly-treated British workers and actual enslaved people is made fun of by the poem which seems to emphasize how absurd it is to complain about it at all when you in fact are not the one who is being enslaved. The introduction of almost Swift-ian language like "brobdingnagian" supports the ironic nature of the poem. Punch is full of political cartoons and satiric commentary, perhaps being one of the first publications that did for the public what The Onion now does for us. It is interesting to contemplate whether or not one would make the satire about such an empire that the colonization business was in the British economy at this time.

Neighborhood Walk Assignment Write-Up

For the neighborhood walk assignment, I was assigned to explore Bronzeville with my co-fellow Teddy. I’ve lived in the suburbs for 15 years the most experience I had with Bronzeville was in driving past it on my way into the city, and even then I only knew that was what it was because of the large banner-like sign proclaiming it which is visible from the road. It’s not an area that is ripe for suburban tourists either, which was kind of a relief when we got the assignment because not only had I never been there but I had never really heard anything about it from anyone I knew. We started our walking tour completely by accident at the Illinois Institute of Technology campus. We passed by a huge stone building labeled “Machinery Hall” and Teddy suggested we go in and find someone to talk to. It was a good pairing, because had I been on my own I never would have thought to go into the building, let alone talk to someone inside. I’m by no means a shy person, but being raised and spending your angst-filled, easily embarrassed teen years in the suburbs means constantly doing everything you can not to look like a tourist, even when you’re in a place you’ve never been before. That paired with my dependence on technology made this assignment really jarring for me—I kept taking out my phone to look for directions and then remembering that it was prohibited. It’s novel to spend an extended period of time (even though it was just a few short hours, it’s a few hours more than either of us would usually go without our phones) with my phone in my purse, right there if I need it. Inside Machinery Hall we spoke to a maintenance man named Maurice, who was more than willing to help us with our project. He was funny, warm, and eagerly reflected on his 30+ years of working at IIT and told us about growing up in the projects of Bronzeville, which used to be full of jazz and night clubs. He never explicitly said anything to us about the racial demographic of the neighborhood, which is pretty significant to the area as we later discovered, but did mention a few times that the neighborhood was “changing.” Maurice gave us the address of his church so we could go somewhere if we had more questions, and we left. Afterward, we stopped into admissions because I knew the father of my best friend from elementary school worked there, and although I hadn’t talked to the girl in years, her father was more than happy to talk to us. He’s been working there for 13 years and had never walked around Bronzeville or taken a tour. In fact, he couldn’t really tell us anything about the history of the area, other than the history of the school specifically. He told us that it was funny how “people around here and in the suburbs spend so much of their time not thinking about these areas that are so close to them that they’ve never even been to.” He gave us directions to get to a sculpture that turned out to be a sculpture from the prior week’s scavenger hunt that my group hadn’t made it to. We took the bus over, which was the first time we saw more of the neighborhood than just what was on the IIT campus. Compared to our own area, there were significantly more minorities than there usually are, and that was just on the bus. It was mostly black people, some Hispanics, and a few Asian people. We walked for quite a bit after getting off the bus and stopped at a church—the front doors were locked, but we heard Gospel music from the back so we thought maybe people were there. That door was locked too, but on our way out an older white woman, whom I can describe only as gruff, yelled after us to see what we wanted.  We told her we were doing a school project about the neighborhood and asked if we could come in and talk to some people. She replied that they’re only open on Sundays, and upon further questioning about whether or not we could talk to a pastor, she repeated this, and then essentially asked us to leave. I’m already kind of skeptical about church-based experiences, but nobody I’ve ever encountered in a church setting has asked me to leave before or told me the church was closed—I don’t know much about churches but I had always assumed they were all open all the time so people could come and go as they pleased. We continued walking, past a lot of big hospitals that looked relatively new and fancy, quite a few more churches—mostly Methodist, Baptist, and Episcopalian, although we did pass one Catholic church—and a couple developments of really nice looking condos and apartments. These luxury condos and apartments were peppered by massive, older looking buildings that appeared to be housing, but it was hard to tell from a distance. We found the sculpture we were looking for, the Tribute to the Great Northern Migration, but there were no plaques, no inscriptions, nothing explaining its significance or the year in which it was erected. After looking at it for a moment and commenting on how we had seen so few people, we decided to head back over in the direction we had just come from, to see if we could find somewhere where there were more people. We got off the bus in what I can only guess is downtown Bronzeville, where there were a ton of people, in cars and on foot. Teddy and I were the only white people we saw in this part of the area. We saw the victory monument, looked at the “walk of fame,” and tried to get into the visitor center which ended up being closed. As we walked back to the subway, we found a small historical obelisk shaped sculpture explaining the history of the area in greater detail than anything we had seen anywhere else did, spotted a landmark plaque on the outside of an ACE Hardware denoting its former life as an extremely popular jazz club, and saw the Chicago Police Department headquarters. This was nothing like the more residential or campus parts of the area we had seen—it was mostly businesses, in somewhat decrepit conditions, several fast food restaurants, and a few stretches of blocks that made me feel a little unsafe (mostly just because of the amount of people on the street trying to sell things or pass out flyers or ask for money). It’s not often that I get to be a minority somewhere, which is something that by far white people take for granted. I honestly loved this experience. Certain aspects of it were frustrating, sure, but I’m always excited to go somewhere new, and this was no different especially considering that it’s somewhere I probably never would have visited otherwise. I hope I never stop having experiences like this, and that I never stop learning from them. 

The first post.

It occurred to me that I haven't posted yet, so here we go. The first week here has been absolutely incredible. It feels like it's been longer than that, so fingers crossed that this whole semester will go by this slowly. I'm still blown away by the idea that I've got my own little corner of the Newberry with my name on it. I got to look at two volumes of first edition Jonathan Swift this week. And a bunch of really, really old maps. I'm geeking out super hard. On the topic of research, I've officially changed my topic. The original idea was looking at women who forged their own way from non-Western to Western parts of the world and why, and the societal implications of those relocations. It was going to be a pretty cool topic, but on the one hand it was really hard to explain to people and on the other it started to lose its luster about a day after I got here. We went on a historical walk of our neighborhood earlier this week with a fellowship alum who now works at the Chicago History Museum. The walk itself was amazing and fed my inner architecture nerd, but it was revolutionary because we were pointed toward a few different landmarks from queer-rights activism. Chicago was (and in some ways still is) a hotbed for queer activism. So my new research topic is queer rights activism in Chicago and a.) why it is so much less reported on than the activism happening in New York or San Francisco and b.) the impact it had on contemporary queer activism. I'm really, really, beyond psyched to research this and my advisor and professors are all on board. It's going to be a good couple of months. My significant other came up for the second time yesterday and we went on a long bike ride down Lake Shore. We stopped at a pier down by Oak Street Beach, and while the waves crashed up onto our feet we turned and looked at the city and I felt home. Off to Bronzeville in the morning for a homework assignment!


--Caroline