Scholarly scandal!

UA librarians tied to Post

Libraries are, by tradition and necessity, silent and somber sanctums where serious, studious people gather to, you know, be serious and study. Silently. And somberly. Some may even be sanctimonious.

The Mullins Library on the University of Arkansas campus has always been such a place. Though the walls aren’t covered with ivy, the Mullins Library is covered with the same scholastic aura found at many others institutions of higher learning that reflects quiet reserve and respectful dignity.

That is, maybe, until now.

Through what must have been a series of odd and unlikely circumstances, the Mullins Library is now in possession of and home to more than 1 million photographs from the New York Post, a publication that can be described in many ways that don’t include the words reserved or dignified.

You know what we mean. The New York Post is the proud home of naughty, all-caps headlines, the Page 6 gossip column and a fervent disdain for the standards of journalistic objectivity or decorum.

The Post actually has a rich history, founded 218 years ago today by Alexander Hamilton. Yes, that Alexander Hamilton. The fact that he was shortly thereafter killed in a duel may or may not be relevant.

The Post calls itself the nation’s oldest continuously published daily newspaper. It has undergone many changes over the years, from broadsheet to tab; from liberal to conservative; from scrappy underdog to sensational brick-thrower.

Today it is perhaps the most outrageous of the dwindling number of irreverent bigcity papers.

The Post maintains its reputation as the champion of salacious news by playing up sensational stories, frequently about the personal lives of celebrities or the embarrassing behavior of common folk, and doing so with vicious wit and loaded words.

Just this week, a Post headline refers to a middle-aged man engaged to a woman 41 years younger than him as “Pervy.” Its cover story for Thursday this week? Well, it’s about the impeachment inquiry. Sort of. It’s actually about a man dressed as a woman who attended the impeachment hearings in Washington D.C., complete with a photo of the subject in a bright red dress. The headline? “It’s a drag!”

This is the same newspaper that headlined a story about allegations President Trump gave money to a Playboy model who claimed the two had an affair with “Paymate!” A few years back during the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s emails while she was running for president, the headline read, “Deleter of the free world.” Its most famous headline ever, written for a story of a gruesome murder in a strip joint in April 1983, is, “Headless body in topless bar.”

Many more wickedly clever, but wildly inappropriate, headlines can’t be repeated here in a family newspaper.

So, reserved and dignified, it’s not.

How did the Post’s photo archive wind up in a library in the Ozark foothills, far from the City That Never Sleeps?

No one’s really saying, except that it was the gift of an anonymous donor back in 2017. However, the photos themselves — some dating back 150 years — didn’t arrive on campus until last month.

It’s likely that researchers from across the country will want to take a look, once the photos are ready for inspection. That could take a while. The library folks aren’t even sure exactly what they have. They’ll spend the next few years cataloging and sorting the photos before making them available for scholarly — another word not usually associated with the New York Post — review.

Truth be told, the archive is an historical treasure trove. It will give researchers a chance to review first hand the snapshots of American life they represent. They help tell at least part of the American story, though much of it might not be a story you’d be willing to share with your kids.

We read in the paper that the archive is full of images of famous people, some even with Arkansas connections. Examples include Babe Ruth, who “trained” in Hot Springs prior to returning to the Big Apple each season for another stint with the Yankees; and Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, the 1930s-era outlaws who terrorized several mid-South states, including this one. An Alma lawman was allegedly among their many victims.

No word yet on whether the photo that accompanied the “Headless man” story is in the archive. Here’s hoping it is. Even a quiet, reserved place like the library needs a little excitement once in a while.