All those April showers (rain and snow alike) brought over 3,300 new items to the Digital Commonwealth.  The largest donation came from the National Archives at Boston with its Watertown Arsenal Photographs collection.  The photos of bright shining new armaments contrast sharply with the Franklin Historical Museum’s riveting Images of World War I Battlefields collection.  (See Avant l’assaut to left.)

On balance, the Noble & Cooley Center for Historic Preservation and Jacob Edwards Library (Southbridge) have added images of everyday life in small town Massachusetts.  The Boston Public Library enhances the everyday with the artistic and, happily, the humorous.  In this case, most of us might associate running and bulls with Ernest Hemingway and Pamplona.  For Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, the association becomes running from bulls – and there is nothing macho about it.  (See La vache enragée below.)

Boston Public Library
Emily Tennyson Letters, 1858-1873 – 83 items
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901). Prints and Drawings – 351 items
Mary Cassatt (1844-1926). Prints and Drawings – 8 items
Paintings and Fine Arts Collection at the Boston Public Library – 1 item added to existing collection
Walt Whitman Collection (1819-1892) – 1 item

Franklin Historical Museum

Images of World War I Battlefields – 48 items
Maps of Franklin, Massachusetts – 9 items

Jacob Edwards Library
New Topographical Atlas of Worcester County – 3 items

National Archives at Boston
Watertown Arsenal Photographs – 2,833 items

Noble & Cooley Center for Historic Preservation
Life in Granville, Massachusetts Collection – 11 items
NCCHP Museum Collection – 2 items added to existing collection
Noble & Cooley Business Correspondence Collection – 1 item added to existing collection
Noble & Cooley Catalog Collection – 1 item
Noble & Cooley Employee Collection – 3 items added to existing collection
Toy Manufacturing Industry – 1 item
Trade Catalog Collection – 13 items added to existing collection