Library Fellow Kira Parrish-Penny '24 Catalogs Eight Memories from Rauner Library

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June 19, 2025
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A Rare and Transformative Privilege

Over the past five years, Rauner Special Collections Library has been a refuge, an escape, and a constant source of wonder. Those who love this place know the magic of its collections—how flipping through a diary or paging through old files makes history feel real and alive. This nearness has power. It reveals the layers that connect us—past to present, person to person. 

This has moved me profoundly. And I’ve seen it move others. 

To know a place this deeply, this thoroughly, is a powerful, sometimes uncomfortable intimacy. This experience is only possible thanks to the Rauner Special Collections Library staff, who know it as a rare and transformative privilege. 

A Catalog of Small Spaces at Rauner Library

card reads table 5 in the reading room

My favorite table, despite Peter Carini’s gentle campaign to get me to branch out. 

During my Historical Accountability Fellowship in spring 2023, I spent most of my time at Table 5. I sat in that east-side chair facing the front doors, immersed in the quiet hum of archival research. There, I sifted through files, student publications, photographs, and correspondence. 

By then, Dartmouth had been shaping me for over two years. And in those ten weeks at Table 5, I began to understand how it had shaped generations of students before me. After extended stints in the archives, I realized that my research was transforming my perception of the school: buildings and spaces I once passed without a second thought now made me think of events that took place forty or fifty years ago. For the first time, I recognized that every corner of campus was layered with history, invisible to most. 

Six years ago, my mom and I found ourselves at Table 5 after a campus tour guide recommended we stop by Rauner to check out “something cool.” I was a junior in high school and a prospective student. I was intrigued. 

For a few hours, my mom and I flipped through Maxfield Parrish’s papers and a Robert Frost notebook. I decided I would attempt to transcribe parts of Frost’s illegible scrawl. When Jay Satterfield noticed what I was doing, he popped out of his office to offer me a book of official Frost transcriptions to compare.  

All I could think was: This is awesome. Dartmouth students do this every day? 

At the time, I never imagined I’d end up graduating from Dartmouth—let alone spending my first year after graduation working at Rauner. At that point, all I knew was that I had decided that my “Why Dartmouth” admissions essay would be about Rauner Special Collections.  

Cheers to serendipity. 

card reads the book elevator near my desk

I won’t miss its noise—especially the metallic groans on the way up—but I will miss the daily delight of seeing a sign that reads: 

 “NO PASSENGERS. BOOKS ONLY.” 

card reads level 1 stack 6 far west side

This is the cooking section of the Dartmouth History collection, which I sifted through for Rauner’s 2025 spring exhibit, From Plate to Print: Cookbooks and the Evolution of the Domestic Sphere. 

Here, I discovered strange and wonderful gems, like A Kick in the Kitchen (the Hanover High Girls’ Soccer State Champs’ community cookbook) and Gridiron Cookery (a mid-century compilation of recipes from the wives of famous football coaches). 

Ask me about American Cookery (1796), the first cookbook written by an American. Or check out Kemeny’s recipe for Hungarian Pork Goulash! 

card reads the front doors

…wouldn’t have made much of an impression on me, if not for a mishap. 

On a closing shift, I unknowingly left the front doors unlocked. A few hours later, my phone pinged - a Slack message from Jay, the head of Rauner Library: had the building been properly secured? 

Turns out, some students had made their way inside and triggered the alarm.

Thankfully, no harm was done—except to my pride. I was given a remedial door-locking lesson, and walked away with a story that still makes my mom laugh. 

card reads the big metal case on the east side of level 2

This case is home to around 4,000 formerly-unprocessed Dartmouth posters. Near the end of my fellowship, I began sorting through them: removing duplicates, writing descriptions, and making them accessible for future researchers. 

Lessons learned: 

  1. In 1974, you could see Bruce Springsteen in concert at Dartmouth for $4.50. 
     
  2. MS Paint took the early 2000s by storm—and poster design suffered for it. 
     
  3. I now silently judge posters in Collis and Novack when I notice the lack of year in the event date. I think: Fifty years from now, some poor archivist is going to have to label this one “undated.” 
card reads #transcription-help slack channel (a digital space)

A community of Dartmouth Libraries transcription pros that helped decipher countless transcription stumpers in Lady Jane Franklin’s mid-nineteenth century scrawl. Thank you! 

card reads Jack-o-lanterns in the Rauner Reading Ream

Earlier this year, I indexed every article from the 1910–1923 editions of Dartmouth’s satirical magazine, The Jack-o-Lantern. I sorted them into themes: “jokes about weather,” “sexist jokes,” “political jokes”—you get the idea. 

Satire turned out to be a bizarre window into the zeitgeist. So many jokes about divorce, flappers, Prohibition, and—somehow—World War I.

card reads the cork board of letters from past lathem fellows, at my desk

Pinned to this board are words of encouragement and advice that I read and reread all year. Soon, I’ll write my own for Sophie, the incoming ‘25-’26 Lathem Special Collections Fellow. I will tell her that Rauner is the ideal place to nurse her deep passions and pursue her casual curiosities. I will tell her to make sure she knows how to lock the front doors (kidding!). I’ll remind her, just as the previous fellows reminded me, that this year goes by fast. 

***

To my kind, patient, lovely colleagues at Rauner: you create that magic. You make an impact on every visitor—my mom and I can vouch for that. How lucky I am to be a part of a community that loves this place; that has felt its magic and wants others to feel it, too.

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