The forgotten 60-second Marine Corps. recruiting spot fades in with the familiar symphonic chorus of “MacArthur Park” – “Someone left the cake out in the rain . . .” But the voice is not that of actor Richard Harris, who sang the ubiquitous hit in 1968. It’s Waylon Jennings singing his Grammy-winning, countrified version of …
Continue reading "Waylon and Lefty: Marine Corps pitch men?"
The Digital Preservation Coalition cites November 7th as World Digital Preservation Day. It is just another day here at The Wittliff Collections, but I thought it would be a good opportunity to share with you some of our ongoing digital preservation work. You may be familiar with some of The Wittliff materials that are available …
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By Wittliff student worker, Jessica Henriquez. Jane Sumner, an award-winning film journalist for The Dallas Morning News, has interviewed directors, producers, writers, book authors, and the former Governor of Texas, Ann Richards. Through the years, she’s kept her roughly-recorded microcassettes and has now donated them along with her archive of article drafts, awards, and interview …
Continue reading "Processing Jane Sumner’s audio archives opened up a fascinating world to me."
The Wittliff has recently acquired the extensive Tejano music archive of Ramón Hernández, a San Antonio publicist, journalist, and photographer. The collection includes music memorabilia consisting of various artist’s costumes, records, original marketing posters, handwritten sheets of music, personal photographs, and more, and will soon be available for research at The Wittliff. This accumulation is …
Continue reading "Susannah Broyles discusses “The Ramón Hernández Tejano Music Collection.”"
In 1963, shortly after graduating from the University of Texas at Austin, Bill Wittliff and his wife, Sally, founded the Encino Press on the kitchen table of their Dallas apartment. The press focused on regional material about Texas and the Southwest, taking advantage of Bill’s editing, book design, photography, and illustration skills to produce finely …
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The Rogers & Hammerhead Show aired from 1996-1997 on the Austin Music Network on cable access TV. Freddy Powers and Bill McDavid created the show to shine a spotlight on songwriters who developed country music in Texas—and whose songs made various country musicians famous. Powers is a legend in his own right, penning hits …
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Are you ready to celebrate Austin Film Festival’s silver anniversary? We at The Wittliff are looking forward to yet another festival full of fun, interesting, and inspiring film screenings and discussion panels. In fact, the Wittliff, in collaboration with AFF staff, is putting select panel recordings from past festivals online. Hear Ed Solomon, who also …
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Forty-one issues of the indie music newspaper It’s Only Rock ’N’ Roll have been digitally preserved by The Wittlliff Collections at Texas State University. You can view the inventory here. Published in San Antonio by music journalist Ron Young, the preserved issues cover the period from March 1978 to April 1982. It’s Only Rock ’N’ …
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Scholars of Texas, U.S. and world history can now access an innovative online resource that showcases the earliest written account of Texas and the Southwest. Texas State University Libraries and The Wittliff Collections today launched a website celebrating La relación, a book written by Spanish conquistador Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and originally published in …
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(by Katie Salzmann) This fall semester, twelve graduate students from Texas State University’s Public History program have been processing several archival collections at the Wittliff as part of the “Archival Management” course. Lead Archivist Katie Salzmann teaches the seminar class that is designed to introduce students to the principles and theories of archives. In addition …
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