On Oct. 26, genealogists and historians, as well as representatives from historical organizations, lineage societies and genealogical societies, visited the Indiana State Library to attend the biennial Genealogy and Local History Fair!
This year’s theme was “At the Crossroads of America: Westward Migration and Family History” where we looked at migration routes across the United States and how and where people traveled after they arrived in America.
Our speakers were professional genealogists and lecturers Annette Burke Lyttle and Eleanor Brinsko. Burke Lyttle presented “The National Road: America’s First Federal Highway” examining the route that took settlers from Maryland to Illinois and helped open up the Midwest. The National Road, known as Washington Street in Indianapolis, traces through the heart of downtown just two blocks from the library, so this topic was of particular local interest. Burke Lyttle also presented “How Advertising Brought Our Ancestors to the Midwest,” which looked at the many forms of marketing that were used to attract new settlers both from the East and from Europe.
Brinsko presented “Westward Ho: Migration Methods of the United States” exploring how people moved across the country and how the travel methods available to them influenced where they chose to go. Regardless of the time period, travel across the United States was often difficult and dangerous, and it was impressive to learn about the things our ancestors faced as they sought a place to live.
The Genealogy and Local History Fair will return on Oct. 24, 2026. We hope to see you there!
This blog post is by Jamie Dunn, Genealogy Division supervisor.
In honor of the Indiana State Library’s 200th anniversary, the Indiana State Library Bicentennial Committee, in conjunction with the Indiana State Library Foundation, will support one Indiana State Library Bicentennial Research Fellowship for 2025.
Emerging or established researchers and historians who are prepared to conduct and publish new research and scholarship with a focus on Indiana history, or a specific collection housed at the Indiana State Library, are encouraged to apply. The fellowship provides a $1,000 stipend to support in-person research for five consecutive work days at the Indiana State Library in downtown Indianapolis.
Applicants must be emerging or established historians, researchers, authors, post-docs or graduate students with proven writing skills, a demonstrated passion for Indiana history and the ability to perform in-person research at the Indiana State Library for five consecutive days, Monday through Friday, between Jan. 6-Dec. 19, 2025. Applicants can be based anywhere in the U.S., but the committee particularly encourages Indiana residents outside of Marion County to apply.
Those interested should submit a completed Indiana State Library Bicentennial Application along with a one-page research statement or proposal, a resume or CV with a maximum of three pages, one letter of recommendation and up to three writing samples. The application should be submitted via email. Writing samples may be submitted as PDF or Word files and should be no longer than 20 pages each.
The application deadline is Tuesday, Nov. 26. The Fellowship will be awarded by Tuesday, Dec. 31.
Asher and Adams are noteworthy mapmakers for their contribution to 19th century county and city mapping. They are known for their detailed state atlases of New York in 1869, 1870 and 1871. Some Asher and Adams maps were published in New York City, and others were published in Indianapolis. Sometimes, they publish as Asher, Adams and Higgins.
The Indiana State Library wishes to share an 1867 map of Indianapolis, published by Asher and Adams in Indianapolis, and printed in Buffalo, New York. It has now been made available online. The map is large and detailed. Railroads are drawn with detail and clearly name the depots. There is an extensive business directory in the margins.
If you’re an Indianapolis map enthusiast, you’re likely familiar with the 1866 Warner map of Marion County, published by Titus. However, you may not have seen the Asher and Adams map; at least not the Indiana State Library’s copy. Why wouldn’t you have seen this map before? It’s rare and it’s massive. It was dissected, and when unfolded its large size makes it difficult to handle. It was also horribly dirty. It had been on “preservation status” in our catalog, essentially hiding it from the online public access catalog.
This is where Seth Irwin comes in. Irwin has been the Indiana State Library’s conservator since 2019. He, and his rotating crew of interns, with a grant-funded conservator, have worked wonders with the map collection. You may have seen their blogs about some other map treatments here and here. Sadly, he is leaving his position here at the Indiana State Library. He has made a huge impact on the future of the State Library’s Indiana map collection. His knowledge and tenacity made him an incredible friend to the map collection. I am deeply grateful for the time he spent time with us.
Here are some photos from his most recent treatment of the Asher and Adams Indianapolis map:
Washing of the map.
Dirty silk – once used to protect the map – removed.
Born on May 26, 1805, in Petersburg, Virginia, Angelina Maria Lorain – or Lorraine – was raised as a Methodist and instilled with ideas of abolitionism. After marrying James Collins – and taking his name – in 1830, the couple moved to Paoli, Indiana, where they lived for a few years before settling in New Albany in Floyd County.
Painting titled “Mrs. A. Collins, aged thirty-six.”
In 1851, Angelina Collins, with the help of John R. Nunemacher, printer and book seller in New Albany, published her volume of table receipts – known today as recipes – titled “Mrs. Collins’ Table Receipts: Adapted to Western Housewifery.”
In the preface of the book, she explains “…my object has been to simplify the culinary art, and adapt it to every capacity and condition of life, and in preparing the receipts, I have endeavored to select and combine such ingredients as may be easily obtained in any section of our country, but especially have I desired to render them serviceable to the housekeepers of the West.” In other words, “Here’s what you can find at local markets and groceries in late 1840s southern Indiana.” Being on the Ohio River, many of the river towns would have access to a far greater variety of imported goods from the eastern coast, with grocers and merchants being among the first businesses to be established.
Collins ends her preface with “To the ladies of the West, I offer this little volume with full confidence that it will be properly appreciated and well received, and should it in any manner add to their comfort or convenience, I shall be fully compensated for the employment of my leisure home.” And her little volume must have added a large amount of comfort and convenience because in 1857, her cookbook was republished after somehow making its way to A. S. Barnes & Company in New York, where it experienced a name change to the title “The Great Western Cookbook, Or Table Receipts Adapted to Western Housewifery” with the same number of pages. By this time, 1850s southern and middle Indiana would have been well settled, but the upper part still remained as open territory for settlers. These types of publications, such as Mrs. Collins’ cookbook, were meant to encourage immigration to those areas and further west, by showing that there is an abundance of resources.
Here at the Indiana State Library, we have the original 1851 volume and have added it to our digital collections. You can view it here.
Cover of “Mrs. Collins’ Table Receipts: Adapted to Western Housewifery.”
The 1857 version is available online to be researched in Indiana University’s digital collection, “Service through Sponge Cake”. Here is a link to that version.
So, if you love trying our historic recipes, there are 140-plus pages for you to sample. Collins organized her book by topics, including fish, boiling, pickling, pies and fancy dishes to name a few. And of course, no cookbook would be complete with tidbits of information or advice. On page 15, “Observation – In preparing soups, always cut the pieces of meat you send in the tureen small enough to be eaten with introducing a knife and fork into the soup plate.”
Her recipes include corn pone, hominy, “Succotash a la Tecumseh,” mock turtle soup, “California soup,” Mrs. Collins’ batter cake and brain balls. Collins also includes a recipe for mangoes, or in today’s language, stuffed bell peppers. Also included is an interesting recipe for “Indiana sauce.”
Indiana sauce, as featured in “Mrs. Collins’ Table Receipts: Adapted to Western Housewifery.”
Although Angelina Maria Collins died on Sept. 28,1885 in Salem, Indiana, her cookbook is still being researched and used by historians.
Are you interested in historic cookbooks? If so, here are some digital collections of historic cookbooks available from libraries around the country:
On Nov. 13, the Rosetta Stone platform will be upgraded. Users who subscribe to Rosetta Stone via INSPIRE will notice a change in their account.
Once the migration is complete, users’ accounts and progress will be reset. EBSCO recommends that users note their current level and lesson. After the migration, users will be able to go back to their previous lessons manually. EBSCO has provided a reminder bookmark that can be printed out in order to help users keep track of their current lessons. The bookmark can be downloaded here. Click here for further instructions on how locate current levels and lessons.
There will be no other changes to users’ accounts. Users will enter their same credentials on the login screen. They will still have continuous access to Rosetta Stone’s content, new updated imagery and cultural stories. The program will look and feel identical to the existing site. The content and curriculum path will not change.
Indiana residents who use Rosetta Stone via INSPIRE will still have free full access – all five levels – to nine languages in Rosetta Stone: Chinese (Mandarin), Spanish (Spain), Spanish (Latin America), English (American), English (British), French, German, Italian and Russian. Additionally, Indiana residents can access 15 languages up to level three: Arabic, Dutch, Filipino (Tagalog), Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Irish, Japanese, Korean, Persian (Farsi), Polish, Portuguese, Swedish, Turkish and Vietnamese.
Rosetta Stone is available to all Indiana residents at no cost. Visit the INSPIRE website and click on the Rosetta Stone logo to sign up and get started.
This blog post was submitted by the communications director of the Indiana State Library.
As a regional coordinator with the Professional Development Office here at the Indiana State Library, I love making library visits in the fall. With the leaves beginning to change, and the weather turning colder, I like to use the drive time to reflect on all of the things that I can enjoy in the fall and winter months, like reading a good book – borrowed from my local library – while drinking a warm beverage and the start of basketball season. However, some of my favorites, of course, are games. One of the best months for games in libraries is fast approaching, International Games Month, which is celebrated every year in November.
I have been asked recently by many libraries how they might go about starting a game collection if they don’t currently have games. Just like any other library resource, to answer questions like this you need to consider many things about your community and library to best answer them. Is the library or the community most interested in a circulating collection? Is the library hoping to use games for programming and community building? Some of the resources I have suggested to libraries in the past can be found here. Unfortunately, there is no established “first purchase list” for games as a library collection, partially because games as a type of library collection are still relatively new, and because the answers to the above questions can play an outsized role in developing the collection.
To begin developing lists to help libraries, the Games and Gaming Round Table of the American Library Association formed a new committee a few years ago and began developing an award. This year during IGM, the Awards Committee of ALA’s GameRT will be announcing the first class of inductees – the Platy’s – into the Platinum Play Hall of Fame. The Hall was first announced this past January with a list of classic games that work well in library settings. Each year we plan to add newer games to this Hall with the focus remaining on games well suited for libraries. At the end of November, the nomination window will open for next year’s Platy’s. Once the nomination window opens, I will be announcing it on the Indiana Games Roundtable Listserv. If you are not currently a member of that listserv it is a growing community of Indiana library employees who use, collect and work with games of all types in their libraries and we would love to have you join that conversation. Details about joining this – or any Indiana library – Listserv can be found here.
This post was written by George Bergstrom, Southwest regional coordinator, Professional Development Office, Indiana State Library.
90% of what a child learns is through their vision.
85% of the foundation of learning happens the first five years of their life.
Did you also know that located in the heart of downtown Indianapolis is an exceptional preschool for children with visual impairments? It is called Visually Impaired Preschool Services, or more affectionately known as VIPS. It is an inclusive, nonprofit organization that was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1985 and “provides vision-specific, early intervention for young children, birth to three, who are blind or visually impaired and comprehensive support to their families.” It has since expanded to Indiana. Indiana’s VIPS took root in 2011 through the efforts of a teacher for blind and low vision children, who was also the mother of a legally blind child.
Their efforts paid off over time, because VIPS grew. In 2022, their new facility opened, and it is astounding. It has a sensory room, several playrooms, a little library section with print and braille board books, a kitchen area, a doctor’s room and so much more. There are even apartments above VIPS that can be leased out to families with visually-impaired children who need them. They offer a wide range of programming and services such as home visits, orientation and mobility services, preschool readiness programs, parent empowerment programs, summer programs and story times to name a few.
Those of us at the Indiana Talking Book and Braille Library love to go over to the VIPS facility for outreach and to provide story times for the children and their parents to enjoy. These story times allow us to read stories to the children and allow the parents and children to become familiar with braille books.
Besides partnering with us at the Indiana Talking Book and Braille Library, VIPS also partners with others in the community for outreach, such as the Indiana School for the Blind and the Indiana State Department of Health. This is to ensure that all the visually-impaired children they serve receive all the essential resources and help they need. The kind staff at VIPS is dedicated to the growth and happiness of the children and families they serve.
So, if you, or anyone you know, has a young child in need of the Visually Impaired Preschool Services you won’t be disappointed by all they have to offer. VIPS can be contacted at via their website, by calling 317-961-5001 or by visiting 1212 Southeastern Avenue in Indianapolis.
Visually Impaired Preschool Services is a non-profit organization and accepts donations.
This post was submitted by Kylie Brinker, reader advisor, Indiana Talking Book and Braille Library at the Indiana State library.
“Patience is the companion of wisdom” – St. Augustine
The Indiana State Library has been collecting federal documents for well over a century, some dating back to the early days of the republic.
All material collected by the state library and published by the Government Printing Office before 1966 is housed on the library’s third floor in what is referred to as the P.D. – or Public Documents – Room.
The shelves are crammed with every kind of document concerned with every sort of query – from polar expeditions that surveyed the heavens to explorations that documented fauna in Asia.
Papers relating to trade with foreign countries, treaties and diplomacy can be found side-by-side on the metal shelves along with state department-issued pocket travel guides.
At first glance, so unwieldy a collection may discourage the Hoosier enthusiast, but if one is willing to burrow (imagine the ground hog), there are discoveries aplenty. Congressional hearings, bland in appearance and recorded on thin white paper, capture the thousands of voices of those called before congress.
The Coast and Lighthouse Reports record buoys and stations on domestic bodies of water, including Lake Michigan. Soil surveys contain thoughtful county essays on farming, equipment, architecture, labor, and, well, soil conditions. Cattle, sheep and horse diseases are well chronicled, as are the travails of the railroad industry in the United States, from the metal used to lay tracks to the working conditions of the men who did it.
Is the family lore correct? Did Indiana experience one of its hottest summers in 1947? Climatological summaries of the state provide the answer, as do yearbooks compiled by the Department of Agriculture.
Maybe Grandpa Fisher really did thread the Rajah through the choppy waters of Westport, Massachusetts, in 1851, hands clasped behind back, headed to the southern seas in pursuit of whales. Find out by consulting “Whaling Masters Voyages, 1731-1925,” which lists ships, captains and ports.
Home to hundreds of thousands of documents, reports, papers, plates, graphs and census material, no mere introduction can do the P.D. Room justice.
So, visit the card catalog on the second floor of the Indiana State Library – which houses information on the P.D. Room holdings – and delve into a hidden world.
This blog post was written by Kate Mcginn, reference librarian, Indiana State Library.
When the word “pizza” is mentioned, Indiana doesn’t usually spring to mind. Despite nearby Midwestern states Illinois, Michigan and Missouri having their own pizza identity – tavern style and deep dish crust in Chicago; square Detroit-style crust in Detroit; and cracker thin crust and Provel cheese in St. Louis – Indiana doesn’t have its own signature pizza style. In fact, the two most well-known pizza facts involving Indiana are that disgraced former Papa John’s CEO John Schnatter started the chain in Jeffersonville in 1984, and that two brothers – Wendell and Bob Swartz – helmed the battle of the Pizza Kings in the late ’50s, as detailed in this 2019 Indiana Public Media report.
One little-known fact about Indiana, though, as it relates to pizza, is that the foundation of Pizza Hut has ties to Indiana. Another brother duo – Dan and Frank Carney – famously founded Pizza Hut in Witchita, Kansas while studying at Wichita State University. However, there was a third person involved who actually brought the recipe for the pizza to the business in 1958.
“We found a guy from Indiana that was an airman at McConnell, who lived at the same apartment complex as our sister and brother-in-law, and we talked with him, because we didn’t know how to make pizza,” Frank Carney said in the fall 2008 issue of Wichita State University Alumni Magazine, The Shocker.
That “guy from Indiana” was John Bender of Bloomington. Bender’s pizza making skills most likely developed when he was employed at Cafe Pizzaria in Bloomington. According to a July 25, 2015 Herald-Times article, Cafe Pizzaria “was the first restaurant in Bloomington to specialize in pizza.” Founded in 1953, it may very well be the first restaurant in the state to specialize in pizza.
Prior to the 1950s, pizza wasn’t on the menu for most Americans. A search for the word pizza in Hoosier State Chronicles, Indiana’s Digital Historic Newspaper Program, shows only 13 mentions of pizza between 1940 and 1949. However, between 1950 and 1959 that result jumps to 461. Then, the result explodes to 2,000-plus for each of the next four decades. On Nov. 30, 1957, the Saturday Evening Post published an article titled “Crazy About Pizza.” The article has been reported to the be the impetus that pushed the Carney brothers to pursue pizza after it was mentioned to them by a neighbor who had read the article. Author Richard Gehman begins the piece by saying, “Call it a tomato pie, a pizza pie or just plain pizza – this delectable, pungent Italian concoction is giving the hot dog a run for the money as the favorite American snack!” Undoubtedly, the ’50s was the decade when pizza went from a fad to a staple.
With pizza established as a popular new dinner item in the ’50s, those selling the pies had to advertise. A great way to advertise was via phone book, a book delivered at no cost to nearly every household in a given town, city or county and conveniently listing phone numbers of local businesses. Prior to Cafe Pizzaria establishing itself as a business focusing mainly on pizza in 1953, another Bloomington restaurant was serving pizza in 1951. In that year’s telephone directory, Joe Natalie’s Italian Village placed an ad featuring a stereotypical Italian chef, who would become a pizza advertisement standard. While pizza was listed first in the ad, the name of the restaurant was still a general reference to Italian food.
Joe Natalie’s Italian Village; Bloomington; Bloomington Telephone Directory, 1951, page 80. Indiana State Library Digital Collections.
By 1956, pizza was getting top billing in the names of many restaurants serving Italian food. Elkhart’s Papa’s Pizzaeria & Spaghetti House lists pizza first in their name, giving it top billing over spaghetti and opting to eschew the word Italian in its moniker. Pizza is also listed first in the food hierarchy over spaghetti, sandwiches and raviola. It’s unclear whether this was a misspelling of ravioli or a reference to the Italian pastry.
Papa’s Pizzaeria & Spaghetti House; Elkhart; Elkhart Telephone Directory; 1956; page 148. Indiana State Library Digital Collections.
Moving into the 1960s, phone book ads started becoming a bit more stylized and telephone exchange names began to be phased out. A 1960 ad from Homer’s Pizza in Terre Haute features a picture of a pizza, 3D lettering, steaming pies and the good ‘ol Italian chef, although his moustache is a little thin here.
Homer’s Pizza; Terre Haute; Terre Haute Telephone Directory, General Telephone Company of Indiana; 1960; page 108. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
While Bunky’s Carry Out Pizza in Connersville had an updated phone number with a prefix, the restaurant’s 1963 phone book ad has nearly identical elements to the Homer’s Pizza ad from three years prior, right down the the “chef’s kiss” gesture. In a collective effort to stand out, a lot of pizza parlors’ advertising became derivative at this time. One business that actually did stand out in this era, however, was Michigan-based Little Caesars. One year prior, in 1962, they introduced perhaps the most famous pizza mascot of all time, Little Caesar. He was – and still is – the face of the Little Caesars pizza chain.
Bunky’s Carry out Pizza, Connersville; Connersville Telephone Directory; 1963; page 72. Indiana State Library Digital Collections.
By the 1970s, phone book pizza ads really started to ramp up. This aggressive 1973 ad from Deb’s Pizza in Indianapolis features a tricked out car and boasts “Fast Free Delivery.” While the vehicle doesn’t seem very efficient for pizza delivery, the ad definitely gets its message across. A 2011 obituary in the Indianapolis Star states that Omar Rooks owned and operated Deb’s Pizza for 15 years and lists his hobbies as “restoring vintage cars and watching NASCAR races,” so it’s no surprise that he chose this design for the ad.
Deb’s Pizza; Indianapolis; Indiana Bell’s Yellow Pages; 1973; page 676. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
Another well known pizza mascot emerged in the ’80s, the Noid. The gremlin in a skintight rubber suit was created by Michigan advertising company Group 243 for Domino’s Pizza. According to Ernie Perich, executive vice president creative director on the campaign, the Noid was “The personification of all things that can go wrong.” While the ’80s were full of colorful and outrageous mascots – from the California Raisins to Spuds MacKenzie – Saylor’s Pizza of Fort Wayne opted to go with a fairly simple sailor mascot, a play on the restaurant’s family name. The Saylor family’s pizza businesses date back to the ’60s in Chicago. The Fort Wayne locations were operated by Walter Saylor.
Saylor’s Pizza; Fort Wayne; GTE’s Fifty Years of Telecommunications directory; 1982; page 343. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
In the early ’50s, pizza was merely a mention in a phone book ad of an Italian restaurant. By the ’90s, though, pizza was so popular that it had its own category in the Yellow Pages and often took up several pages. The 1993 issue of Indiana Bell’s Ameritech PagesPlus for Columbus/Seymour illustrates how popular pizza really was at the end of the century. Yes, the Italian chef and his mustache are back.
Columbus/Seymour; Indiana Bell’s Ameritech PagesPlus directory; 1993; page 152. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
In the the new millennium, pizza remained as popular as ever. Founded in the ’50s, Pizza King was still alive and well in 2001. They were also using a lot more colored ink in their phone book advertising while letting the reader know that they were “not only the best pizza in town,” but that they were also “unmatched” and a “pioneer.” This ad is as aggressive as a revving muscle car.
Sorrento’s Pizza King; West Lafayette; Verizon SuperPages directory; 2001; page 270. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
During the 2000s, pizza places, like J&J’s Pizza Shack of Northwest Indiana, opted to keep their ads simple. While the ad is unassuming, the 45-piece 18″ x 26″ party size pizza is rather grand. In 2024, the party size meat pizza will set one back $75.00. Owners John and Linda Bogdan retired in 2000, leaving each of their children to run their own J&J’s Pizza Shack with their families in Lake Station, Portage, Hobart, Valparaiso and Demotte.
J&J’s Pizza Shack; Portage/Valparaiso, Verizon Yellow Pages directory; 2006; page 276. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
In modern times, telephone directories aren’t as essential as they once were since everyone can look up contact numbers right on their phones. While times were changing in 2013, Third Generation of Chesterfield was throwing it back to the ’50s with another portrayal of the Italian chef.
Third Generation; Anderson; AT&T’s The Real Yellow Pages directory; 2013; page 154. Indiana State Library Phone Book Collection.
While some pizzerias – like Pizza King and J&J’s Pizza Shack – have survived over the decades, many – like Deb’s Pizza and Third Generation – are long gone, just like the phone books themselves. Just a few weeks ago, Cafe Pizzaria, a pillar of Indiana pizza, made the announcement on their Facebook page that they were closing “effective immediately” after 70 years of serving Bloomington. While Indiana doesn’t rank high on the list of places associated with pizza, it does have its own unique history and contributions to the business. One thing is for certain, though: one cannot cook pizza without a moustache.
This blog post was submitted by John Wekluk, communications director.
In recent years, the intersection of artificial intelligence and copyright law has become a hot topic, especially as AI-generated content becomes more prevalent. The U.S. Copyright Office plays a crucial role in shaping the legal landscape for these emerging technologies. The U.S. Copyright Office administers the national copyright system and provides guidance on copyright law to Congress, federal agencies, the courts and the public. As AI technology advances, the office has been active in addressing the unique challenges it presents.
Historically, the U.S. Copyright Office has maintained that copyright protection is reserved for works created by humans. This means that purely AI-generated works, without any human involvement, are not eligible for copyright protection. However, the landscape is evolving. In March 2023, the Copyright Office issued formal guidance stating that if a human significantly contributes to the creation of a work in which AI was used, it may be eligible for copyright protection. The office has been receiving applications for the registration of works that include AI-generated content, reflecting the increasing integration of AI in creative processes. As a result, preliminary guidance has been issued for those seeking to copyright works that involve AI content and that guidance can be found here. The office has also received complaints regarding the use of copyright protected art and text in the training of AI tools.
Recognizing the growing importance of AI in content creation, the Copyright Office launched a new initiative in early 2023 to examine the copyright issues raised by AI. This initiative aims to explore the scope of copyright in AI-generated works and the use of copyrighted materials in AI training. As AI continues to transform the creative landscape, the U.S. Copyright Office’s efforts to adapt copyright law to these new realities are crucial. By providing clear guidelines and exploring the implications of AI in content creation, the Copyright Office helps ensure that copyright law remains relevant and effective in the digital age.
This blog post was written by Sylvia Watson, library law consultant and legal counsel, Indiana State Library.
