Tales from the Reuther Library Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University

Archivist Bart Bealmear explains how he rediscovered recordings of famed African American blues musicians Sippie Wallace and Son House buried in the Reuther Library’s Folklore Archives. One of the most famous female blues vocalists in the 1920s, Sippie Wallace left the blues stage for four decades, choosing instead to sing and play the organ at Leland Baptist Church in Detroit. The recording Bealmear uncovered in the Folklore Archives captures Wallace demoing T.B. Blues in her living room in 1965, prior to her professional comeback in 1966. Bealmear also shares a clip from an April 18, 1965 WDTM interview with American Delta blues singer and guitarist Son House, recorded when he performed at the DeRoy Auditorium at Wayne State University in Detroit. In the excerpt, House tells the story of discouraging a man named Robert from playing the guitar due to poor skill — a man who turned out to be famed blues musician Robert Johnson.

Bealmear also promotes an upcoming concert featuring Detroit’s “Soul Ambassador” Melvin Lincoln Davis and Dennis Coffey, R&B and soul guitarist for the Motown Records Funk Brothers studio band. The concert will be held in the atrium of the Reuther Library on January 23, 2020 on the stage of the historic Bluebird Inn, restored and on loan from the Detroit Sound Conservancy. Doors open at 6 p.m.

Related Collections

Folklore Archive: Studies and Research Projects

Folklore Archive: Student Field Projects Records

Folklore Archive: Student Field Projects Photographs

Sippie Wallace, T.B. Blues, 1965

Son House, WDTM interview, April 18, 1965 (excerpt #1)

Son House, WDTM interview, April 18, 1965 (excerpt #2)

More Information

Detroit Sound Conservancy

Dennis Coffey

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewee: Bart Bealmear

Sound: Troy Eller English

Image: Sippie Wallace, Walter P. Reuther Library, Virtual Motor City project: vmc49649_1

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink

Ivón Padilla-Rodríguez explains how labor laws helped define the modern boundaries of childhood and citizenship for both internationally and domestically migrant Latinx children working on American farms. Despite the child labor ban supposedly implemented in 1938 as part of the Fair Labor Standards Act and later laws, legal loopholes have allowed migrant Latinx children to continue to work on American farms today and have limited their access to education. Padilla-Rodríguez explains how advocates fought to enact social welfare initiatives for farmworking children along their migratory route, while teachers and women UFW organizers pursued legislative channels to try to get stricter child labor protections, and special educational and childcare programs created for migrant youth. Padilla-Rodríguez is a Ph.D. candidate in the Columbia University Department of History and a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Latinx Research Center.

Related Collections

Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee Records

Dolores Huerta Papers

Michigan Farm Worker Ministry Coalition Records

National Farm Workers Association Records

National Farm Worker Ministry Records

Ronald B. Taylor Papers

UFW Organizing Committee (UFWOC) Records

UFW Office of the President: Cesar Chavez Records

UFW Texas Records

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewee: Ivón Padilla-Rodríguez

Sound: Troy Eller English

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink

Matt Kautz explains how his observations while teaching in Detroit and Chicago led him to study the rise of suspensions and other disciplinary tactics in urban districts during school desegregation, fueling the school-to-prison pipeline. His research has focused particularly on Boston, Detroit, and Louisville during court-ordered desegregation, for which there is ample documentation of school disciplinary codes, statistics on usage against students, and responses from administrators, teachers, law enforcement, and the community. Kautz is a Ph.D. candidate at Teachers College, Columbia University

Related Collections

AFT Local 231: Detroit Federation of Teachers Records

Detroit Commission on Community Relations (DCCR) / Human Rights Department Records

Detroit Public Schools Community Relations Division Records

Wayne State University College of Education, Dean’s Office: Detroit Public Schools Monitoring Commission on Desegregation Records

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewees: Matt Kautz

Sound: Troy Eller English

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink

In the second of a two-episode series, artist Robbin Légère Henderson discusses the life of her grandmother, Matilda Rabinowitz Robbins, a Socialist, IWW organizer, feminist, writer, mother, and social worker. Henderson shares stories from Robbins’ autobiography, Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman: A Memoir from the Early Twentieth Century, explaining how the optimism of a 13-year-old immigrant from the Ukraine was soon undone by the realities of working in garment sweatshops on the East Coast, leading to Matilda Robbins’ brief but influential role as labor organizer for the International Workers of the World from 1912 to 1917.

Related Resources

Exhibit Announcement: “Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman”

Blog: Love Letters

Book: Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman: A Memoir from the Early Twentieth Century

robbinhenderson.com

Related Collections

Matilda Robbins Papers

Industrial Workers of the World Records

Ben Légère Papers

John Beffel Papers

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewees: Robbin Légère Henderson

Sound: Troy Eller English

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink

In the first of a two-episode series, artist Robbin Légère Henderson discusses her exhibition of original scratchboard drawings featured in the illustrated and annotated autobiography of Henderson’s grandmother, Matilda Rabinowitz Robbins, a Socialist, IWW organizer, feminist, writer, mother, and social worker. Henderson shares stories from Robbins’ autobiography, Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman: A Memoir from the Early Twentieth Century, explaining how the optimism of a 13-year-old immigrant from the Ukraine was soon undone by the realities of working in garment sweatshops on the East Coast, leading to Matilda Robbins’ brief but influential role as labor organizer for the International Workers of the World from 1912 to 1917.

Related Resources

Exhibit Announcement: “Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman”

Blog: Love Letters

Book: Immigrant Girl, Radical Woman: A Memoir from the Early Twentieth Century

robbinhenderson.com

Related Collections

Matilda Robbins Papers

Industrial Workers of the World Records

Ben Légère Papers

John Beffel Papers

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewees: Robbin Légère Henderson

Sound: Troy Eller English

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink

Eva Powers, recently retired associate professor and former chair of the Maggie Allesee Department of Dance, share the fascinating history and bright future of the modern dance program at Wayne State University. One of the longest-running dance programs in the country, it traces its origins to the Dance Workshop, founded in 1928 by Professor Ruth Lovell Murray. A pioneer in dance education, Murray’s philosophy, “You do it and you teach it,” was evidenced by the Dance Workshop’s influence on a robust dance program within the Detroit Public Schools well into the 1970s. Powers also describes the bright future of the dance program at Wayne State, with state-of-the-art facilities, an impressive roster of alumni renown as much for their teaching as for their artistry, and well-respected faculty drawing more students to dance than ever before.

Reuther Library archivist Aimee Ergas discusses the photographs, videos, choreographic notes, and other documents contained within the Wayne State Dance Department Records, as well as other robust collections contained within the Michigan Dance Archive at the Walter P. Reuther Library, including the personal papers and teaching notes of Harriet Berg, Denise Szykula, and Genevieve Siegel Schoenberg.

Related Resources

Michigan Dance Archives at the Reuther Library

Related Collections

Wayne State University Dance Department Records

Dance Oral Histories

Detroit Recreation Department Dance Program: Shirley Harbin Records

Michigan Dance Archives: Leslie O’Day Benyo Papers

Michigan Dance Archives: Harriet Berg Papers

Michigan Dance Archives: Marygrove College Department of Dance Records

Michigan Dance Archives: Genevieve Siegel Schoenberger Papers

Michigan Dance Archives: Denise Szykula Papers

Episode Credits

Producers: Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English

Interviewer: Dan Golodner

Interviewees: Eva Powers and Aimee Ergas

Sound: Troy Eller English

With support from the Reuther Podcast Collective: Bart Bealmear, Elizabeth Clemens, Meghan Courtney, Troy Eller English, Dan Golodner, and Paul Neirink