» Scrapbooking Life

This post is written by Nate Hubler, the Avery Research Center’s Liberatory Legacies Archival Fellow, who started in this position in February 2024. She will contribute blog posts about the collections she is processing through the grant. 

Scrapbooking is a popular form of memory keeping that allows a person or family to create and curate their archives in a readily accessible and shareable way. It is easy to reach for a scrapbook, flip through the pages, and immediately feel taken back to the moments when you placed an item within the scrapbook. Scrapbooks may not be the best long-term preservation strategy for family archives. Still, their power remains palpable when turning from page to page, whether it is your scrapbook or a scrapbook from generations before. 

While processing Mrs. Louise F. Holmes’s scrapbook, I felt that tangible history. Given her personal curation, her scrapbook contains articles, photographs, correspondence, and memorabilia documenting not only the successes and accomplishments of herself and her loved ones but also the tragedy of loss and the minutia of day-to-day life.  

She was born in 1872 to James H. Fordham and Mary Weston Fordham and was one of six children. Her parents and their careers feature prominently in her scrapbook. Mary Weston Fordham was a schoolteacher and a poet who is best known for her 1897 published collection of poetry, Magnolia Leaves. She taught at the Saxon School, a predecessor to the Avery Normal Institute in Charleston and other schools throughout the county.    

Her mother’s poetry likely influenced Mrs. Holmes’s own love for the craft, as the scrapbook is full of published poems carefully cut from local newspapers and published receptions to her mother’s Magnolia Leaves. There is even a letter from poet Edgar A. Guest thanking her for suggesting a topic he could touch on in his poetry.  

Her father was a police lieutenant during Reconstruction for more than twenty years. He was commissioned third lieutenant in 1871 by Mayor Wagener and served in the role until the city was placed under the metropolitan police system in the 1890s. Once the metropolitan police system was in place, he was dismissed by the police commissioner appointed by the Governor. His dismissal led to public outcry in the city. The scrapbook is filled with newspaper clippings documenting his work as a police lieutenant and public reactions to the city’s police force merging with the metropolitan police system and his subsequent dismissal.  

Louise and her husband, Dr. William Francis Holmes, graduated from the Avery Normal Institute in 1880 and 1888, respectively.¹ It’s not clear from the scrapbook when the couple first met, but a program from the Avery Alumni Association’s Thirteenth Annual Reunion shows that, at the very least, Dr. Holmes was in attendance as he sang a solo of “The Lights Far Out at Sea” and participated in a duet of “Ship Ahoy!” In 1899, he taught in Florence, S.C., and she taught in Orangeburg, S.C.  

The couple married in 1912 and lived together in Florence, S.C. Dr. Holmes was the principal of the Wilson School in Florence, and Mrs. Holmes also worked as a schoolteacher there.  Dr. Holmes was more than an educator; he also worked as a doctor and as an activist with the local NAACP. 

There is undoubtedly great joy and love in the pages of Mrs. Holmes’s scrapbook, but there is also an immense feeling of loss as newspaper obituaries and written tributes of family and friends are pasted throughout the book. The loss of her husband in 1938 and the loss of her aunt, Jennie Bonneau Weston, in 1933 are seen throughout the pages of the scrapbook. Anyone who has experienced such a heartfelt loss may be able to relate to the assumed rhythm Mrs. Holmes’s found by cutting out the same newspaper obituaries and tributes time and time again so that the tragedy of their departures could be remembered as much as their lives so fully lived.  

In many ways, scrapbooks lay bare the innumerable threads that weave the tapestry of our lives together. It is an impossible task to highlight each thread, let alone give it the justice it deserves. In recognition of this, I have a few more scanned images from my time processing Mrs. Holmes’s scrapbook that, despite finding it difficult to naturally fit them into my blog post, deserve to be included. 

The Mrs. Louise F. Holmes scrapbook is open to the public for viewing and research. Please peruse the finding aid to learn more about Mrs. Holmes and the scrapbook itself, and make an appointment to visit us in our reading room! 

Footnotes

1. Catalogue of the Teachers and Pupils of Avery Normal Institute, 1899, Edmund Lee Drago collection, Box 6, Folder 2, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA.  ↩︎

Image Citations 

Portrait of Louise F. Holmes, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Unidentified family sitting on a porch, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Mildred Louise Drayton baby announcement, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Birthday card, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Letter from Stewart Woodford to Mary Weston Fordham, 1898, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Letter from Edgar A. Guest to Mrs. L. F. Holmes, 1934, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Avery Alumni Association Thirteenth Annual Reunion program, 1889, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Scrapbook page with NAACP membership drive letter, undated Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Scrapbook page with excerpt from minutes of meeting of the Board of School Commissioners of the School District of Florence, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

An appreciation by one who has felt and valued her influence, c. 1933 Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Scrapbook page in memoriam of Jennie B. Weston, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Report of the Board of Trustees, Physician and Teacher of the State Orphan Asylum Located at Charleston, S.C., for Fiscal Year Ending October 31, 1873, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Funeral Services for President R. S. Wilkinson, 1932, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Wesleyan Academy commencement program, 1894, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Teacher’s Institute at the Simonton School session 1 program, 1897, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Scrapbook page with Longfellow Literary Club first anniversary program, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA. 

Louise F. Holmes standing in a garden, undated, Mrs. Louise F. Holmes Scrapbook, Avery Research Center, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA.