Month: December 2015

Posted on

Today is National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day

Gene Yearwood, Pearl Harbor veteran, with Marines at Pearl Harbor commemoration ceremonies, Naval Air Station, Atlanta, Georgia, December 7, 1988. AJCPov01-031CD, Atlanta Journal Constitution Photographic Archives. Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.
Gene Yearwood, Pearl Harbor veteran, with Marines at Pearl Harbor commemoration ceremonies, Naval Air Station, Atlanta, Georgia, December 7, 1988.
AJCPov01-031CD, Atlanta Journal Constitution Photographic Archives. Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.

Seventy-four years ago, on December 7, 1941, Japanese planes attacked the Pearl Harbor naval station on Oahu Island in Hawaii.  More than 2,400 Americans, mostly non-combatants, were killed. The next day, the United States entered World War II by declaring war on Japan.  On Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, all federal agencies and interested organizations are encouraged to fly the United States flag at half-staff in honor of those who died at Pearl Harbor.

The Digital Library of Georgia includes historic image, video, and oral history resources that feature first-hand information about the Pearl Harbor attack and the observation of Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

From our partners at the James G. Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center is an oral history interview with Denver D. Gray. Gray served as a lieutenant colonel in the 17th Air Base Group, U.S. Army Air Forces, at Hickam Field, Hawaii during World War II. During this interview, he describes watching a B-24 Liberator bomber burn during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. The interview is part of the Veterans History Project.

From the Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection is WSB-TV newsfilm footage of a December 7, 1964 interview with an unidentified military admiral who describes his experience living by Pearl Harbor. He makes several observations about the day of the attack and the reporting of the attack by radio. He also includes a story of his wife building an impromptu bomb shelter using mattresses.

We hope that these resources help draw attention to the sacrifices of veterans who served during World War II, and honor the memory of those lives lost during the tragedy of Pearl Harbor.

Share
Posted on

New online exhibit “Tragedy in the New South: The Murder of Mary Phagan and the Lynching of Leo Frank”

Leo Frank and his wife Lucille in the court room for his murder trial, Georgia, 1913. Local identification number: AJCP402-102e, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Photographic Archives. Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.
Leo Frank and his wife Lucille in the court room for his murder trial, Georgia, 1913.
Local identification number: AJCP402-102e, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Photographic Archives. Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.

The Digital Library of Georgia is pleased to announce a new online exhibition titled Tragedy in the New South: The Murder of Mary Phagan and the Lynching of Leo Frank that is now available through the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA).

The link to the exhibit is http://dp.la/exhibitions/exhibits/show/leo-frank.

On April 26, 1913, Confederate Memorial Day, thirteen-year-old Mary Phagan was murdered at the National Pencil Company in Atlanta, Georgia. Leo Frank, the Jewish, New York-raised superintendent of the National Pencil Company, was charged with the crime.

At the same time, Atlanta’s economy was transforming from rural and agrarian to urban and industrial. Resources for investing in new industry came from Northern states, as did most industrial leaders, like Leo Frank. Many of the workers in these new industrial facilities were children, like Mary Phagan.

Over the next two years, Leo Frank’s legal case became a national story with a highly publicized, controversial trial and lengthy appeal process that profoundly affected Jewish communities in Georgia and the South, and impacted the careers of lawyers, politicians, and publishers.

By the early twentieth century, Jewish communities had become well-established in most major Southern cities, continuing a path of migration that began during colonial times. The Leo Frank case and its aftermath revealed lingering regional hostilities from the Civil War and Reconstruction, intensified existing racial and cultural inequalities (particularly anti-Semitism), embodied socioeconomic problems (such as child labor), and exposed the brutality of lynching in the South.

This exhibit is a collaboration between DLG and DPLA staff. DPLA exhibitions cover major themes and events in American history and culture, and are widely used in education. Exhibits are comprised of items curated from collections made available by DPLA content partners. The incorporation of these shared materials ensures broader discoverability of these resources.

Tragedy in the New South: The Murder of Mary Phagan and the Lynching of Leo Frank makes use of photographs, newspaper articles, broadsides, illustrations, letters, and other unique items to illustrate key themes, which include the setting of Atlanta in 1913, the murder of Mary Phagan, Leo Frank’s legal battle, Frank’s lynching, regional and national reactions to the lynching, and the legacy of the Frank case.

We hope that you take the time to look through this new exhibition.

Share