Call Number:

Item 0013

Repository:

University of Delaware Library Special Collections

Extent:

1 volume

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

MSS 0093, Item 0013, Anne Daley autograph album, Special Collections, University of Delaware Library, Newark, Delaware.

Date:

1956 (inclusive)

Creator:

Daley, Anne

Form:

Autograph albums

Abstract:

Anne Daley attended Ursuline Academy in Wilmington, Delaware, in the 1950s. She kept this autograph album with signatures and inscriptions from her friends during her freshman year, 1956.

Wilmington, Delaware, resident Anne Daley was a high school student at Ursuline Academy during the 1950s. In 1956, she was a freshman in Class A at the school.

Ursuline Academy was established in Wilmington, Delaware, in 1893 by the Ursuline Sisters, a Catholic religious order. The school continues today with co-education until third grade and a girls school from fourth grade to twelfth grade.

The Ursulines originally came to Wilmington, Delaware, from Bedford Park in New York City to take over a boarding school for girls on Delaware Avenue previously run by the Visitation Nuns. The early days of the school were difficult and enrollment numbers were low. From 1919 to 1949, the school saw new growth and expansion to an adjacent property on Delaware Avenue. Enrollment again dropped during the Great Depression in the 1930s, but in spite of financial difficulty the school opened a small high school library in 1932. The financial situations improved with the end of the Depression and the school continued to expand during the 1950s and 1960s. The boarding school was closed in 1953. Lay principals were first appointed in 1975, and a separate middle school division was created in 1991 for seventh and eighth grade.

Ursuline Academy: 1893-1993. Edited by Martha R. Mitchell. Wilmington, Delaware: The Academy, 1993."Ursuline Academy School History." http://www.ursulineacademy.info/school_history. Accessed September 29, 2009.

This item is an autograph book belonging to Anne Daley, a student at Ursuline Academy in Wilmington, Delaware, during the 1950s. The autograph book dates from 1956 and contains autographs and inscriptions by classmates at Ursuline.

The variety of inscriptions might be useful to research involving teenagers’ usage of slang words and phrases during the 1950s. It also gives a glimpse into the social life and connections of a Catholic high school student.