Unlike most of the students at Cornell, I actually did not know that Cornell was home to a vast amount of primary resources. And when I heard about it, I didn’t think much of it at first. That’s why I think the Kroch Rare & Manuscript Collection Tour really helped me realize how blessed I am to be at Cornell. What’s more exciting is the fact that all of these resources are meant to be shared with us (the students!).

One of the first things we got to see was the plaque that Abraham Lincoln signed that acknowledged the Emancipation Proclamation (if I recall correctly) and we found out that only 12 of them were signed because the Legislature was angry that Lincoln didn’t go through Congress first before passing it. It’s actually pretty surreal that there’s something that only 11 other people/institutions in the WORLD have access to. I also had fun looking around at the other artifacts and primary sources the Kroch Rare & Manuscript Collection had in that area. We were, then, moved into another room with a lot of literature.

In the new room, we were able to see (sort of) a timeline of primary sources. Starting from thousands of years ago, there were small stones with codified rules (?). According to our historian/tour guide, they were probably the earliest pieces of evidence that codified language existed. I actually went up closer to see the stones, but the way the stone was carved made me cringe a little (some sort of phobia, I suppose). However, I was particularly excited about the Shakespeare book. I was a Theatre major before I was an AEM major, so being able to see one of the original books/compilations of all of Shakespeare’s plays is extremely interesting to me. I really wanted to touch it, but our guide told us about how the books and artifacts are extremely delicate and they’re not something people can touch carelessly. I was particularly interested in a sonnet that I had done as a monologue once in an acting class (Sonnet 97) but apparently this book didn’t have the sonnets. So although it was kind of a bummer… I was quite content with being able to see (and slightly touch) one of the original copies of the Shakespeare plays compilation.