Adventures in Acquisitions

Roland Baughman
Director of Special Collections

In each issue of Columbia Library Columns, some of the more nota¬
ble current additions to the collections will be discussed. Such addi¬
tions fall into distinct categories, and it will be by categories that
they will be described. The present article deals with gifts of single
items that have come in recent months—items that are unique in
every sense; unique in themselves, and unique in the fact that their
deposit in the Columbia Libraries is the result of a combination of
rare circumstances. Their acquisition carries the special responsi¬
bility that goes with the custodianship of treasures that belong not to
any single individual or institution, but form part of the whole
range of cultural resources of the entire intellectual world.

MORE than forty years ago, on January 19, 1909, Columbia
University held a celebration of the looth anniversary of
the birth of Edgar Allan Poe. For the occasion a select exhibition
was placed on display, consisting of notable Poe editions and
manuscripts, many of which had been borrowed for the occasion
from friends of Columbia.

Among the borrowed items were three priceless relics of Poe's
fevered life—a rare daguerreotype portrait showing the author in
one of his last poses; a letter in Poe's careful script to one of his
several publishers, John Reuben Thompson, editor of The South¬
ern Literary Messenger; and an original manuscript of "Annabel
Lee," one of three copies in Poe's handwriting now known to
exist. All of these mementoes had once belonged to Thompson;
upon his death they had passed first to his sister, Mrs. Quarles,
and then to his second cousin, Isaac Michael Dyckman. They had
been lent for the exhibition by Mr. Dyckman's widow.

Within recent weeks these three precious relics were once again
brought to Columbia—this time to remain as a permanent part of
the resources which are preserved in the Columbia Libraries.
They had been bequeathed to the University by the daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Dyckman, the late Mrs. Alexander McMillan Welch
—a true friend of Columbia, and a generous donor to the Libraries.