This collection documents the works of noted Haitian Vodou priest, healer, educator, and performance artist of “electro-Vodou music,” Erol Josué. He has spent much of his career passionately practicing the Vodou religion and advocating to keep it alive through his performance art and by lobbying against government restrictions on religious practice. Items in the collection specifically focus on Josué's work as a healer and performance artist. It includes newsclippings and ephemera related to his performances, which feature Vodou and his Haitian cultural heritage as prevailing themes.
His full oral history, as part of the Haitian diaspora oral history collection, can be accessed from this page (see: Related archival materials note).
Fashion Project is a curatorial initiative situated in Bal Harbour, Florida, dedicated to creating exhibits where fashion is displayed as art pieces for spectators to appreciate the varied elements of design from modern couture to historical gowns and costumes. This collection currently contains pamphlets, flyers, programs, and catalogs created by Fashion Project for their events and exhibits.
Born Linnea Eleanor Yeager in March 13, 1929, in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, "Bunny" gained international fame as both a model and a photographer. She moved to Miami at a young age and first attracted local interest as a model, winning several pageants and gracing the pages of popular magazines. While she was modeling, she developed a knack for designing and sewing together her own bikinis, and her style became rather prolific in the fashion circuit for many years after.
Since creating portfolios was rather expensive while Bunny was trying to break out into the modeling industry, she was motivated to learn photography and took several night classes to hone her abilities and create her own portfolios. She eventually developed her signature method of photography that allowed her to take pictures of models using natural light through the "fill flash" method. Her style helped to reinvent the genre of nude and pin-up photography, taking it from its roots of overt raunchiness and elevating it into an art form that centered around playful sensuality and provocativeness. Her photos have been featured in Playboy, Redbook, Cosmopolitan, Esquire and many other big-name magazines, and she was also credited in helping to make Bettie Page into a household name as well as other famous pin-up models such as Lisa Winters. Her career also includes several self-penned books, including such titles as How I Photograph Myself, How to take Figure Photos, Photographing the Female Figure, and How I Photograph Nudes.
Bunny Yeager eventually passed away in May 25, 2014 in North Miami, but her legacy as one of the leading pioneers of pin-up photography remains. Her collection captures her eclectic history with an array of scrapbooks, correspondence, ephemera, photographs and clippings, all which illustrate her passion for her work.
A local poet who grew up in Manhattan and resided in Miami Beach, Florida for the latter years of her life, Judith Anne Berke (Sep 9, 1931 - Jul 24, 2013) wrote and published several works that embody the spirit of Florida, its unique history and its people. She attended Smith College in her youth and began writing when she was 49 years of age then published her first book in 1989. Outside of writing, she studied painting at l'Academie de la Grande Chaumiere in Paris and was a skilled sculptor. She also studied acting, designed puppets, and sang in the Opera Guild of Greater Miami, demonstrating a huge breadth of talent that spanned many disciplines.
Her papers include her manuscripts, drafts, and poems either in notebooks or in typescripts. Also included are some of her scrapbooks and a sculpted bust.
Originally born in West Virginia, Jefferson attended Washington & Jefferson College in Washington, Pennsylvania and studied architecture and industrial design at the University of Michigan. Afterwards, he worked with the Army Corps where he taught aerial photography then supported himself by working as a laborer on various construction sites. He eventually came to Miami in 1954 where he apprenticed under architects, Thomas Madden and Alfred Browning Parker. He ended up establishing his own private architecture firm in Miami in 1959 and dedicated himself to creating plans for residential, commercial, and public buildings. Later, he moved his firm to Stuart, Florida in 1968 and continued to provide the same services.
He also served as a Fellow in the American Institute of Architects and was certified by the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards and was registered with the National Trust for Historic Preservation. His accolades include several architecture awards and international exhibits as well as having his works featured in magazines, such as Architectural Record, House Beautiful, Better Homes and Gardens, Southern Living, Sports Illustrated, Palm Beach Life, American Homes, and L'Architecture d'Aujourd'hui.
This collection contains approximately 191 large format architectural plans and renderings from noted Florida architect, Peter Jefferson. The first 34 plans of his collection have been flattened and placed into map cases while the others remain in their original rolled up state.
A growing collection of documents, photographs, and correspondence pertaining to the capture, purchase, bargaining, and freedom of enslaved people in Europe, Africa, and the Americas from the 18th to the 20th century. The collection contains a variety of petitions, contracts, estate settlements, and ephemera that record the activities of enslaved people during that era and illustrate the relationship between enslaved people and the people who enslaved them, as well as local government policy regarding enslavement and ownership in various parts of the Americas. Also included the collection are images and ephemera that feature racial caricatures, which were prevalent during their time of printing.
The Little Palm Island Collection consists of a promotional packet from the Little Palm Island Resort & Spa, containing ephemera such as brochures and hotel restaurant menus. The island resort, located three miles offshore in the Atlantic Ocean and 28 miles east of Key West, has its own unique history. Well known visitors have included President Harry Truman and his wife, John Foster Dulles, and Admiral Bull Halsey. The island was also the setting of the 1962 Warner Brothers production, "PT 109", a biographical war film about John F. Kennedy's naval service during World War II.
The Florida culinary history collection contains a wide range of materials related to Florida's rich history of food, its unique restaurants and dishes, and its domestic food production. Items within the collection include pamphlets, flyers, ephemera, periodicals, and other memorabilia originating from Florida.
This collection contains several pamphlets that address socio-political issues among the Africana communities and focus on a range of topics that have affected the community, such as desegregation, discrimination, poor education, social and political injustice, the concepts of black nationalism and black socialism, Marxism, and the Civil Rights Movement. Notable pamphlet authors include George Bretiman, Kelly Miller, Margaret Price, Carey McWilliams, Tony Bogues, C.L.R. James, George Novack, and Langston Hughes.
The University of Puerto Rico Student Movement collection (2010-2011) documents through digital photographs and ephemera (30,061 KB) the student led strike to protest austerity and tuition measures announced by University of Puerto Rico administrators.
The James Hutchinson Exhibition Catalog collection includes catalogs for an exhibition of Seminole Indian paintings by James Hutchinson at the Lowe Art Museum.
Daniella Levine Cava was elected as the Miami-Dade County Commissioner in 2014 and 2018, representing District 8. Her collection contains materials from her successful 2014 campaign, including correspondence, interviews, and periodicals documenting her initiatives on the campaign trail.
This collection features an array of scrapbooks, many of which are homemade, from the 19th and 20th centuries. Subjects covered in these scrapbooks include fashion, advertising, history, Robert Louis Stevenson, Pat Cannon's congressional run, garden clubs, cruises, and more. These scrapbooks are comprised of portraits, photographs, postcards, newspaper clippings, programs, brochures, maps, drawings, telegrams, and more. Some of the creators are unknowns or names without renown, but these scrapbooks highlight their personal tastes and interests, offering some unique insight into their lives.
The Bob Simms collection documents the life and activities of Robert H. Simms in the black communities in Coconut Grove and Miami and reflects his work with the Community Relations Board and the Defense Race Relations Institute. The collection also contains campaign materials from Leah Simms, the first African American female judge in the state of Florida, and the "Glory in the Grove" photographs of people and events at the George Washington Carver elementary and high schools in Coconut Grove before desegregation. A final component of the collection includes photographs, correspondence and clippings of General "Chappie" James and his family. General James was the first four star African American General and married Dorothy Watkins.
The Virgil Barker Papers document the career of an influential critic and historian, and provide a interesting record of American art history from 1920-60. The papers contain Barker's writings on art history, American culture, literature, his own life and critical perspective, the post-World War I generation and other topics. In addition to Barker's writings and correspondence, programs from European and American art exhibitions, newspaper and magazine clippings, prints, sketches and other materials appear among the papers.
A handwritten bound pamphlet by General Lloyd entitled: "A rhapsody on the present system of French politics on the projected invasion and the means to defeat it." The papers also include diagrams and maps.
A bound typescript of "Der II Weltkrieg Inhaltsangabe" by Willy Ottmann presented to Dr. Grover A. J. Noetzel, a University of Miami professor. The papers also include hand drawn maps.
The translated title is : "World War II - Prisoners and Prisons"
