The Public Domain Review

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Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost (1901)

Monday 10 December 2012 at 17:37

Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost, directed by Walter R. Booth, is the oldest known film adaptation of Charles Dickens’ 1843 novel A Christmas Carol – featuring the miserly Ebeneezer Scrooge confronted by Marley’s ghost and given by visions of Christmas Past, Present and Future. The film, “although somewhat flat and stage-bound to modern eyes,” according to Michael Brooke of BFI Screenonline, “was an ambitious undertaking at the time,” as, “not only did it attempt to tell an 80 page story in five minutes, but it featured impressive trick effects, superimposing Marley’s face over the door knocker and the scenes from his youth over a black curtain in Scrooge’s bedroom.” It was presented in ‘Twelve Tableaux’ or scenes and is thought to contain the first ever use of intertitles in a film. (Wikipedia) Download from Internet Archive Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/10/scrooge-or-marleys-ghost-1901/


Illustrations from a Chapbook on Robinson Crusoe (ca.1800)

Friday 7 December 2012 at 18:23

Illustrations from a chapbook entitled The Surprising Life and most Strange Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of the City of York, Mariner (ca.1800) as featured in John Ashton’s Chap-books of the Eighteenth Century (1882). (All images taken from the Chap-books of the eighteenth century, with facsimiles, notes, and introduction by John Ashton (1882) housed at the Internet Archive, donated by University of Pittsburgh Library System). Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/07/illustrations-from-a-chapbook-on-robinson-crusoe-ca-1800/


Prison diary of Michael Dougherty (1908)

Thursday 6 December 2012 at 18:28

Prison diary of Michael Dougherty, late Co. B, 13th., Pa., cavalry. While confined in Pemberton, Barrett’s, Libby, Andersonville and other southern prisons. Sole survivor of 127 of his regiment captured the same time, 122 dying in Andersonville, by C. A. Dougherty; 1908; Bristol, Pennsylvania. The diary of Michael Dougherty, a young Irish soldier in the American Civil War, kept while imprisoned in various Confederate prison camps. As Dougherty notes, in 1863 “At 5 p.m. we were overpowered, cut off from the division and 127 of our regiment, among whom was your humble servant, were compelled to surrender.” For the next 23 months moving from camp to camp Dougherty kept his secret diary noting down his experiences of daily life. Of the 127 Union soldiers taken prisoner with him, he was the sole survivor, with nearly all of them perishing at the hands of commander Captain Wirz in the notorious Andersonville, Georgia prison. Dougherty’s descriptions of the appalling conditions at Andersonville are amongst the most harrowing in the book. The book is housed at the Internet Archive, contributed by the Library of Congress. Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand [...]

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/06/prison-diary-of-michael-dougherty-1908/


Omar Rabbi Elozor by Cantor Meyer Kanewsky and his choir (1919)

Wednesday 5 December 2012 at 18:44

“Omar Rabbi Elozor” (In English: “Said Rabbi Eliezar”), performed by Cantor Meyer Kanewsky and his choir in 1919 for Edison Records. The lyrics are based on the last passage of Tractate Berakhot, from the Talmud, with a few repeats. The first line roughly translates as: “Said Rabbi Elazar, quoting Rabbi Chaninah, Scholars increase the levels of peace in the world”. Wikimedia Commons link Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/05/omar-rabbi-elozor-by-cantor-meyer-kanewsky-and-his-choir-1919/


Illustrations of Snowflakes (1863)

Tuesday 4 December 2012 at 17:19

The illustrative plates from Snowflakes: a Chapter from the Book of Nature (1863), a collection of poems, extracts, anecdotes and reflections on the theme of snow and the snowflake. According to the preface of the book, apart from the first few geometrical figures at the top of the first plate, which show the primary geo- metrical forms under which the snow-vapor crystalizes, all the other forms shown are “representations of individual crystals, actually observed and sketched with the aid of the microscope”. See the full book, including various poems and extracts from literature related to snow, here in our Texts collection. For some more snowflake related content have a look at Keith C. Heidorn’s article on Wilson Bentley, “The Snowflake Man of Vermont”. (All images taken from the book Snowflakes: a chapter from the Book of Nature (1863) which is housed at the Internet Archive, contributed by the California Digital Library). Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/04/illustrations-of-snowflakes-1863/


Snowflakes: A chapter from the book of nature (1863)

Tuesday 4 December 2012 at 12:58

Snowflakes: a chapter from the book of nature; 1863; American tract society, Boston. A collection of poems, extracts, anecdotes and reflections on the theme of snow and the snowflake (most often in a religious direction). Interspersed amongst the texts are a series of beautiful plates showing the shapes and structure of the ice-crystal – you can see these also in a post in our Images collection. For some more snowflake related content have a look at Keith C. Heidorn’s article on Wilson Bentley, “The Snowflake Man of Vermont” The book is housed at the Internet Archive, contributed by the California Digital Library. Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/12/04/snowflakes-a-chapter-from-the-book-of-nature-1863/


Plates from a History of the Carriby Islands (1666)

Friday 30 November 2012 at 14:35

The 9 illustrative plates from The History of the Caribby-Islands: viz. Barbados, St Christophers, St Vincents, Martinico, Dominico, Barbouthos, Monserrat, Mevis, Antego, &c. in all XXVIII (1666), by Charles de Rochefort and translated by John Davies. (All images taken from The History of the Caribby-Islands housed at the Biodiversity Heritage Library, contributed by the John Carter Brown Library) Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/11/30/plates-from-a-history-of-the-carriby-islands-1666/


Henry Morton Stanley and the Pygmies of “Darkest Africa”

Thursday 29 November 2012 at 19:46

After returning from his disastrous mission to central Africa to rescue a German colonial governor, the explorer Henry Morton Stanley was eager to distract from accusations of brutality with his ‘discovery’ of African pygmies. Brian Murray explores how after Stanley’s trip the African pygmy, in the form of stereotype and allegory, made its way into late Victorian society. On 28 October 1888 the Welsh-American explorer Henry Morton Stanley was entrenched deep in the unexplored Ituri rainforest of the Congo. He had been hacking his way back and forth through the jungle for months in his attempt to relieve the colonial governor Emin Pasha, whose province in the southern Sudan was under siege by a coalition of Sudanese and Arab insurgents under the command of the messianic cleric Muhammad Ahmad. Famished and exhausted, Stanley sent his East-African porters out to pillage what they could from native farms. On this occasion they brought back an unusual prize: a “couple of pygmies”. These “pygmies” were most likely one of several diminutive ethnic groups (including the Aka, Twa, Mbuti and Efé) that still inhabit the forests in the upper Congo Basin. But for Stanley these Africans did not merely represent intriguing ethnographic specimens; they [...]

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/11/29/henry-morton-stanley-and-the-pygmies-of-darkest-africa/


Scientific Amusements (1890)

Monday 26 November 2012 at 20:37

Scientific Amusements, translated from the French of Gaston Tissandier. By Henry Frith ; fully illustrated; 1890; Ward, Lock & co., in London, New York. Harry Houdini’s copy of Scientific Amusements left by his estate to the Library of Congress in 1927. From the Preface: Young people of both sexes, and persons of all ages who have leisure and a taste for that which is ingenious as well as instructive and amusing, may be commended to this remarkably interesting collection of experiments, nearly all of which can be readily performed by an unskilled person who will carefully follow out the directions given. It is surprising how near we are to the most fundamental principles of science when we perform some of the simplest operations. The book is housed at the Internet Archive, donated by Cornell University Library. Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/11/26/scientific-amusements-1890/


One World or None (1946)

Friday 23 November 2012 at 19:20

A film from the Prelinger Archives showing the horrors of atomic warfare. Made only one year after the end of the Second World War, it is thought to be the first “atomic scare movie”, a genre which would flourish in the U.S. throughout the next decade. Download from Internet Archive Note this film is in the public domain in the US, but may not be in other jurisdictions. Please check its status in your jurisdiction before re-using. Sign up to get our free fortnightly newsletter which shall deliver direct to your inbox the latest brand new article and a digest of the most recent collection items. Simply add your details to the form below and click the link you receive via email to confirm your subscription!

Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2012/11/23/one-world-or-none-1946/