Collections

My copy of French Essence finally arrived last week and I was so excited to get it.  What a gorgeous coffee table book.  Vicki included a chapter on collections and in it she reminds us that "one simple purchase can start a collection."  Reading and looking at the photographs of collections made me start thinking about some of my collections.  The first thought that came to mind is my collection of old primers that I've had for many years. These primers aren't just any old primers.  They're from a school in my hometown and are a part of civil rights history.

I'm from a town that didn't even exist until the late 1940's but in 1949 a very strong black woman by the name of Pearl Stephens donated some of her own land so that a school could be built for the black children living in the community.  Before that black children would have to gather in local churches for school lessons because they weren't allowed to attend the schools built for white children.  The primers in my collection are books from the early days of Pearl Stephens Elementary School and are very beautiful in their own way. Click on Pearl Stephens to read about the history of the school.  Finally, thanks to Pearl Stephens, the black community "had its first tax-supported school, furnished with secondhand books. . . ."

Maybe it's because I taught school at one point in my working life, but I think these books are a treasure.  
Obviously the books were used over and over by generations of children and as the original binding wore out, they were lovingly restored using whatever materials that might be available.  I love being able to open the cover of one of the books to find wallpaper with pricing information. 

Textbooks are now being replaced by Kindle-type readers so I guess all textbooks will become a thing of the past but for now I love the old worn out primers that carry with them a part of American history.