The Darwin Online project at the National University of Singapore (NUS) publishes for the first time today: Charles Darwin’s personal Address Book. It offers an astonishingly personal glimpse into the life and work of the great scientist.
Charles Darwin’s Address Book is a small brown leather notebook, with “VISITS” and “ADDRESSES” printed on its spine (photo 1) and index-letter tabs in alternating black and red. The entries were begun by his wife, Emma Darwin, and are in her pleasant, rounded handwriting (photo 2), shortly after their marriage in January 1839. Latter entries were by Darwin (photo 3), and he continued to use this Address Book throughout his lifetime.
In addition to scans of the entire notebook, Darwin’s hard-to-decipher handwriting has been expertly transcribed and meticulously edited. Hundreds of editorial notes and links reveal the identities of the abbreviated entries and where they were mentioned in Darwin’s thousands of pages of publications and handwritten notes.
https://www.scholar-inbox.com/account_recovery?e=dca@duck.comThe small leather notebook is only 48 pages long but contains about 500 entries. It was begun by his wife Emma Darwin shortly after their marriage in January 1839, when the Darwins began their married life together in London. Darwin proceeded to write almost all further entries there and after the family moved to the village of Down in 1842. He continued to use the Address Book throughout his lifetime.
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area.
He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit.
Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.
