Over the course of her decades - long singing career in the mid-20th 100 , Marian Anderson used her status as one of the human beings ’s most lionize alto to advocate for civic right and break barriers for Black entertainer . In 1939 , when the Daughters of the American Revolution prohibited her from performing at Constitution Hall in Washington , D.C. , Anderson ( with the help of First LadyEleanor Roosevelt ) organise her own concert at a much grander venue : the whole step of theLincoln Memorial . Sixteen year by and by , she became the first black-market vocalizer to perform in a lead role at New York City ’s Metropolitan Opera .
Now , a new digitized collection from the University of Pennsylvania Libraries is giving us an opportunity to see what her life was like backstage , too . More than 2500 item of archival material , including letter , diaries , journals , interviews , scrapbooks , performance programs , and secret recordings , are available to view online through a enquiry portal called “ Discovering Marian Anderson . ” Many of the holograph were donated by Anderson , who was born and raised in Philadelphia , before she break at long time 96 in 1993 .
Not only can you see scanned images of Anderson ’s handwritten to - do list , personal letter , and more , but you could also easy search them by keyword : subroutine library staff member have latterly fetch up transcribe about 1500 pages of text . These works divulge little - known inside information about Anderson ’s hardworking endeavor to boost social DoJ on a world scale .
“ I rightly anticipated that I would retrieve a tidy sum about her domestic and outside travels , since she performed around the populace , but I was surprised to also learn that she crop as a State Department Goodwill Ambassador and delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee , ” Andrea Nuñez , a Penn Libraries archival photographer who helped with the transcription , said in apress release . “ I imagine that the transcribed journals highlighting her governmental work will open up further opportunities to empathize the significance of her function during a tumultuous clip in chronicle . ”
you’re able to explore the collectionhere .
