Morris Library

07/23/2026

In Episodes 260 and 261 of INSIDE THE BLANKET FORT, we explore new and backlist books celebrating our July theme of "America 250." Check out these patriotic books at the links below!

Episode 260: https://www.wsiu.org/2026-07-09/inside-the-blanket-fort-episode-260
Episode 261: https://www.wsiu.org/2026-07-23/inside-the-blanket-fort-episode-261

07/22/2026

Spotlight today is "LIVES OF FORT DE CHARTRES COMMANDANTS, SOLDIERS, AND CIVILIANS IN FRENCH ILLINOIS, 1720–1770" by David MacDonald!

Fort de Chartres, built in 1719-1720 in the heart of what would become the American Midwest, embodied French colonial power for half a century. The book contains details of the French colonial experience in Illinois from 1720 to 1770 through vivid depictions of the places, people, and events around the fort and its neighboring villages. Together, the biographies and historical narrative in the volume illuminate the challenges that shaped the French colonies in America.

Get the book at this link: https://www.siupress.com/9780809334605/lives-of-fort-de-chartres/

07/21/2026

Ernest Hemingway's birthday today is a good excuse to revisit this post about our copy of his first book and its ties to the Special Collections Research Center.

As of January 1, 2019, most works published in 1923 are now in the public domain. The library holds important first editions from that year, including one of only 300 copies of Ernest Hemingway's first book.
This small volume has ties to several of the library's Special Collections. Our copy belonged to the blacklisted screenwriter John Howard Lawson, whose papers we hold. It was published by Robert McAlmon, who edited and typed the handwritten manuscript of James Joyce's Ulysses. McAlmon's memoir of Paris in the 1920s, Being Geniuses Together, was co-written with Kay Boyle, whose papers we also hold.
Finally our copy has a nearly illegible note on the front cover, scrawled by Lawson's friend, the novelist John Dos Passos, which appears to read, "Don't you think the first and third stories are pretty swell."

07/21/2026

Frequently employing rhyme, meter, and traditional forms, these poems examine what it means to be both a military spouse and an academic, straddling two communities that speak in very different and often conflicting terms.

https://www.siupress.com/9780809336098/dots-and-dashes/

07/20/2026

Don't miss the "Writing Criminology" Zoom panel on July 30th, 2026, at 5PM CST which will feature two SIU Press nonfiction authors, Paul F. Joyce and Rasul T. Freelain.

About Paul F. Joyce: Paul F. Joyce is an assistant professor and chair of the criminal justice and criminology department at Salve Regina University in Newport, RI. He was a police officer for more than thirty-one years, including twenty-eight years with the Boston Police Department, policing street gangs and developing strategies to address youth gang violence.

Find his book at the link here: https://www.siupress.com/9780809339440/it-started-with-the-hats/

You can also find the Zoom link for the panel at the link here: https://zoom.us/j/97957463268

07/20/2026

Sidney G. Denny brings detailed historical information in his book "COLONEL BENJAMIN STEPHENSON AND THE HISTORY OF EARLY ILLINOIS!"

Colonel Benjamin Stephenson, a founding father of both the city of Edwardsville and the state of Illinois, played a crucial role in the emergence of Illinois from a territory into the nation’s twenty-first state in 1818. Informed by a treasure trove of primary sources, Colonel Benjamin Stephenson and the History of Early Illinois traces Stephenson from his childhood in 18th-century Pennsylvania to his experiences on the Illinois frontier and, eventually, to his final residence, which is now a museum of his life and times in Edwardsville.

Find the book at this link: https://www.siupress.com/9780809370153/colonel-benjamin-stephenson-and-the-history-of-early-illinois/

07/19/2026

How do the funding, setting architecture, and exhibition of a presidential library shape our understanding of the president’s character? And how do diverse performances of the presidency create radically different opportunities for the practice of American citizenship? In PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARIES AS PERFORMANCE: CURATING AMERICAN CHARACTER FROM HERBERT HOOVER TO GEORGE W. BUSH, Jodi Kanter analyzes presidential libraries as performances that encourage visitors to think in particular ways about executive leadership and about their own roles in public life.

https://www.siupress.com/9780809335206/presidential-libraries-as-performance/

07/18/2026

We highlight the wonderful book of poems "AMERICAN FLAMINGO" today!

In his fifth collection of poetry, Greg Pape melds memorable images from the natural world with the drama of ordinary experience to capture small transformations of human character in American settings from Arizona’s Sonora Desert to the icy streets of Washington, D.C. Through elegies, character sketches, and lyric and narrative evocations of family and place, Pape offers lucid and startling poems that bridge the spaces between the past and the present, men and women, and urban and rural landscapes.

Get the book at this link: https://www.siupress.com/9780809326228/american-flamingo/

07/18/2026

On Thursday, July 30th at 5 p.m. (CST), SIU Press will be holding the second of its 70th anniversary author panels entitled "Writing Criminology!" The panel will feature Rasul T. Freelain along with Paul F. Joyce, author of IT STARTED WITH THE HATS. Freelain is the author of WHEN LAMBS BECOME WOLVES: THE CHILLING CASE OF SHEILA VON WIESE-MACK.

In this gripping and empathetic memoir, Freelain traces the Mack family’s descent from privilege to tragedy, bringing overdue attention to CPVA as a critical yet overlooked public health crisis. He recounts the glamorous but troubled world of the Macks—the parties, the talent, the dysfunction—and his efforts to support both mother and daughter. With rare insight into the web of trauma, race, wealth, and grief that surrounded them, he shows how the system failed them both—and how, even after Sheila’s death, he remained committed to seeking justice and change.

Catch the panel at the Zoom link here: https://zoom.us/j/97957463268

07/17/2026

Today's dates from July 1963. The library is in the center just below Thompson Woods. Floors 3-7 were under construction.