USC Upstate Library News - LibGuides at University of South Carolina Upstate

Photo of Coordinator of Library Instruction John Siegel; Research and Instruction Librarian Allison Read; and USC Upstate Chancellor Bennie Harris. All are standing in front of a green Upstate backdrop. Research and Instruction Librarian Allison Read has been recognized for her outstanding achievements in community engagement by USC Upstate faculty, staff, students, and community partners. She is this year's winner of the Faculty Excellence in Volunteerism Award. The award was presented to her on April 4 by Dr. Dave Marlow, Director of Engage Upstate: Service Learning & Community Engagement, at the USC Upstate Celebration of Community Engaged Education 2024.

Allison is actively engaged in several community initiatives both as a participant and as a leader. One of these is the Spartanburg Period Project. This organization provides menstrual products to people in need in Spartanburg County, especially in area schools. Allison volunteers with the Period Project throughout the year, creating menstrual product packs, which she then distributes to schools and community centers.

The USC Upstate Library holds an annual menstrual product drive each fall, collecting products and money from donors across campus. The library's Outreach Committee began this effort in 2020. Through the efforts of Allison and others, each year since the library has collected and distributed hundreds of dollars' worth of menstrual products to people in our community. The library has also hosted "period packing parties" at which library employees and other volunteers create menstrual product packs for distribution.

Allison also volunteers with the League of Women Voters, serving on the board of the Spartanburg County chapter. She is an active planner and participant in voter registration drives and has participated in voter registration drives at USC Upstate and at Spartanburg Methodist College.

Allison also contributes her professional expertise as a librarian to the Unitarian Universalist Church of Spartanburg (UUCS) Archives Committee. This committee maintains the history of the UUCS and ensures that the Spartanburg County Public Library has UUCS historical information in their archives.

Allison has served as a full-time Research and Instruction Librarian at USC Upstate since 2019.

Congratulations, Allison, on this much-deserved recognition!

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Image courtesy of USC Upstate. From left to right: John Siegel, Coordinator of Library Instructional Services; Allison Read, Research and Instruction Librarian; and USC Upstate Chancellor Bennie Harris.

The University of South Carolina Upstate's #DayOfGiving is officially on! This year's Day of Giving starts at 12 noon on Tuesday, April 1 (no foolin') and continues until 12 noon on Wednesday, April 2.

We would appreciate your support of the University Libraries Excellence Fund, which we use to develop our collections, provide services, and offer programs and activities at the USC Upstate Library.

To encourage your contributions, we have two special offers for you.

The Dean of the Library, John Barnett, challenges you to give to the University Libraries Excellence Fund. He will match your contributions up to a total of $250. Just make your contribution here. When the total contributions reach $250 or more, the Dean will contribute a matching amount.
While a donation of $75 will get you a snazzy pair of USC Upstate socks, for a contribution of $50 or more to the library's Excellence Fund, we will send you a stylin' Goostavo tote bag! It's the perfect shade of green for a USC Upstate spring. And did you know the Goostavo logo was designed for the library by students in the Art Studio Graphic Design program at USC Upstate? 'Tis true!

We look forward to seeing you around campus with your snazz-tastic USC Upstate socks and style-licious Goostavo tote bag!

Open Access logo resembling an open combination lock, orange in color USC Upstate faculty who want to publish in Springer Nature hybrid journals under the principles of Open Access to research literature do not have to pay fees to do so. These Open Access fees will be covered thanks to an agreement made between Springer Nature and the Carolina Consortium (CC).

The USC Upstate Library is a member of the Carolina Consortium (CC), which is primarily composed of academic libraries in North and South Carolina. The library’s membership qualifies USC Upstate faculty to participate in this agreement. USC Upstate faculty must be corresponding authors affiliated with the university and must use their USC Upstate email address to be eligible.

This agreement will continue through December 31, 2026.

Questions? Please contact Springer Nature at this email address.

To learn more about the principles of Open Access to research literature, please follow this link to an article by Peter Suber, Senior Researcher at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.

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Image: Open Access logo, designed by PLoS. This image is made available under a Creative Commons CC0 1.0 University Public Domain Dedication. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

The story of these letters and the subsequent digital exhibit begins with a fairly simple question: who were Margaret Payne and John Dolin? Margaret Payne was born in Piedmont, South Carolina on July 9, 1925 to James Huff Payne (37) and Blanche Peden Payne (32). She had three older brothers - James (who died in infancy), Harold, and William, and one younger sister, Lillian.

Piedmont in the early 20th century was a small mill town, and people who knew Margaret and her sister Lillian "Lil" shared that she lived a fairly typical life for a girl in the 1940s. There is mention of "Lil" in the letters, and we have been told that Margaret, Lillian, and their cousin Ruby Payne (who was just a year older than Margaret) enjoyed spending time together. At right is a photograph of Margaret, Ruby, and Lillian taken on the street (location and date unknown).

Margaret met John Dolin at some point in 1942 while he was stationed at Greenville Army Air Base. From the letters and other background research we surmise they may have met at a social event or dance, most likely at or near the base or in nearby Greenville SC. Margaret was about 17 at the time and living at home with her parents, brother William, and sister Lillian at 58 Main St., Piedmont SC, in one of the mill houses owned by the Piedmont Manufacturing Company. Margaret worked in several places during her lifetime, including the Piedmont Manufacturing Company mill with her father and brother, but never married; some friends and family speculate that John broke her heart. She died in 2016 in Greer, South Carolina when she was about 91 years old.

The seeds of the Women & WWII Digital Exhibit: The Letters of Margaret Payne were planted in the fall of 2022, when three students began doing transcription work on 44 handwritten letters from the Margaret Payne Collection held at the Piedmont Historical Preservation Society (PHPS). These letters were mainly written by John Dolin to Margaret, although there are a number of letters written to Margaret by John's sister Isabel. The transcription project was part of a History Internship (HIST 499), working with Professor Tammy Pike and Mr. Joe Hursey of the PHPS. In December 2022, the University Archivist, Ann Merryman, suggested a collaboration with Professor Pike to expand the planned transcription work in her upcoming Spring 2023 Service Learning / Community Engagement-designated HIST 391 course into a digital exhibit project, providing students with the opportunity to strengthen their research skills as well as create digital content that could be highlighted on their resume.

In the Spring of 2023, twelve students in professor Pike's HIST 391 "Women and World War II: War, Propaganda, and the Homefront" course (seen in the photo at left) continued to transcribe 27 additional letters from the Margaret Payne collection; each student was assigned two letters, with a few students being assigned a third letter. In addition to providing transcriptions, the students did background research into elements mentioned in the letters or events happening locally, nationally, or globally during the time each letter was written. The transcriptions and accompanying background research were used to build out separate pages for each letter, providing context and depth to the transcribed letters and bringing a point in history to life for the students.

In order to bring balance to both sets of letters in the digital exhibit, the University Archivist, a Faculty Librarian, and the work-study student in the University Archives researched and provided additional content for letters 1 through 40, mirroring the work students were being assigned in HIST 391.

This digital exhibit combines digitized letters, transcriptions, and related background information provided by the students working on the project. The University Archives plans to do a deeper dive into the remaining materials of the Margaret Payne Collection, hopefully uncovering additional letters to finish telling Margaret Payne's story. The collection can be accessed HERE.

And the winner is ... Faculty Excellence in Volunteerism

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