Handwriting, Once an Art,
Shown by Old Manuscripts
MODERN SCRAWL—Trying to read the handwriting of many people today can make
you want to pull your hair. Old-time penmanship was often elegant, as in the
Declaration of Independence.
Anyoiw wlto has ever tried to read a doctor's
prescription knows that physicians have
notoriously bad luindwriting. A look at an
exhibit of fine /larulwriting in Perkins Ubrary
might proi’ide a welcome change.
By Earl Wolslagel
If you have ever had trouble
reading letters from your Aunt Tillie
or hastily scribbled messages from
well-wishing friends far away, it is
’probably because handwriting styles
follow no precise format these days.
They are largely the result of
individual preferences and habits of
the writer. There is little resemblance
between today’s “running round
hand” and 16th century “italic hand”
or the Gothic script known as
“secretary hand” that prevailed in the
later Middle Ages on into the 17th
century.
Carelessness and less frequent
practice and use of handwriting are
nteucom
6ukc univeRsity mcdic\l ccntcR
VOLUME 23, NUMBER 34
AUGUST 27,1976
DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA
Wife of Vice Presidential Nominee
Duke Trustee in National News
A Duke trustee gained the national
spotlight last week w hen her husband
was nominated as (ierakl Ford's vice
presidential running mate.
Klizabeth Hanford Dole, a federal
trade commissioner, will be “a great
help" to her husband Sen. Robert
Dole in the fall election campaign,
believes Jean Brumley, wife of Dr.
(ieorgc Brumley Jr., associate
professor of pediatrics.
Mrs. Brumley and (>)nniiissioner
Dole grew up together in Salisbury
and were undei graduates together at
Duke. The two women are still good
friends, and \hs. Brumley had been
looking forward to a quiet visit w hen
Commissioner Dole came to the
Duke tiustees' lueeting this year.
Now if there is a visit, it will hardly be
quiet.
Excellent Public Speaker
Mrs. Brumley described
(lonuiiissioner Dole as "an excellent
public speaker and a charming
Southern lady. She is ver\ poised and
makes her opinions known in a
tactful wav.
■'She married much after her
contemporaries," Mrs. Brumley
conuuented. "She's a career woman
in lier own right and lier husband
had to Ik‘ |uite a person." The Doles
dated for several years befoie they
married, the second mairiage for
him but the first for her.
•Missing the. Dole-Hanford
wedding last December was a
disappointment to Mrs. Brumley,
who just returned in June fiom a
v eai in Kiuope dm ing Di. Bi innle\'s
sal)batical fiom the medical center.
Senator Equally Delightful
■'1 certainh think a lot of i)oth oi
them," she said ol the Doles. ‘’Sen.
Dole is etjuallv deliglulul. He's a ver\
warm person, and our children are
vei \ fond of him. '-
Dining a trip to \VashingU)n, the
Brumle\ children especially enjoyetl
lunch in the Senate Dining Room and
a ride on the train between the
Capitol and the Senate Office
Building as guests of Sen. Dole.
-Mrs. Brumley expects
Commissioner Dole to maintain a
career regardless of the November
election outcome.
Good Training at Duke
She got good training in
administiation and public speaking
as piesident of Duke Women's
College in 1957-58. After graduating
Phi Beta Kappa, she earned a law
degree at Harvard and spent a
summer as an intern at the United
Nations.
She went to Washington in l%()
during the L\iidon Johnson
administration and began her career
1)\' representing indigent detendants
in the District of Columbia court
svstem and by serving on the staff of
tiie assistant secretar\ for education
in the Department of Health,
Education and Welfare.
Krom 1971 to 1973, Commissioner
Dole was deputy director of
consumer affairs. She won the
■Arthur S. lleming ,\ward for
outstanding goveiiunent service in
1972.
Leader of Tomorrow
In 1974 7’/W named her one of 200
"Voung Leaders of 1 omorrow, " and
Richard Nixon appointed her to a
seven-vear term on the Federal
I rade ('ommission, a post she may
have to resign because of possible
legal or constitutional problems
lelated to her husband's national
campaign and possible election.
i think F.li/.abeth is a very sincere
and warm person, " Mrs. Bnnnley
said. "She has remained
(lowii-to-eaith and iiuerested in old
fi iends and hometown ties."
She has been active in alunnii
affairs at Duke and in 1974 was
elected to the Board of Trustees bv
the alumni. She was chairman of the
I.oyalty Fund last year, the first vear
the drive went over SI million, and is
chairman again this year.
also to blame, experts say.
Bill Erwin, assistant curator of
manuscripts in the Perkins Library,
has more than passing interest in fine
handwriting.
Elegant Penmanship
He likes to talk about calligraphy, a
word that is perhaps more
appropriate to describe the old-time
elegant penmanship seen
infrequently these days.
Recently, Erwin began digging
through old manuscripts for
examples of fine script. He came up
with many samples of several
distinctive handwriting styles
developed in the last four centuries.
Now he has put them on public
view in the manuscript department
on the third floor of Perkins Library.
There are dog-eared pages of
hand-bound, hand-scripted volumes,
Veil-thumbed ledgers, notebooks,
diai'ies and copies of letters written by
werf-known figures of history. Each
item has its own background
information on handwriting style,
p^uliarities and source.
^nunonly Used Script
Erwin says that at the time of
Queen Elizabeth 1, two major styles of
handwriting were in competition for
common usage. One, “secretary," was
the Gothic script which had emerged
from the Middle Ages and “met the
need for writing that was widely
understandable in a world in which
business and literacy were
expanding.
"It was a script that could be
executed more quickly than the
formal hands used on documents of
that day,” he said. “But its
widespread use ceased in the 1600s.”
Chief competition with secretary'
hand was italic. Originating during
the Italian Renaissance and bearing a
definitive Roman script, it arrived in
(Continuedon page 3)
N.C/s First Relapsing Fever Cured
A former Duke student suffering
from the first known case of relapsing
fever in North Carolina was cured
this summer by a group of Durham
physicians.
Only three to five cases of the
possibly fatal, tick-carried disease are
seen each year in the United States,
mainlv on the west coast, said Dr.
Allan J. Lester, director of the Duke
Convenience Clinic, which provides
primary health care to the Durham
community.
Four days after his return from a
camping trip in California and
Oregon, the 25-year-old patient
l)ecame ill with flu-like symptoms,
high fever, chills and difficulty in
walking. After an examination at the
Convenience Clinic, the patient was
admitted to Watts Hospital with a
diagnosis of “fever of undetermined
origin,” Lester reported in the
Center for Disease Control’s Morbidity
and Mortality Weekly Report.
Routine lab tests were normal, and
Lester ordered a test for malaria. Dr.
Kenneth Grim, a pathologist at Watts
and one of the few American doctors
familiar with the relapsing fever
spirochete called Borrelia, recognized
the spirochete on the bloodsmear.
rreatment was begun at once.
.After an initial reaction to the
medication, the patient made a
steady recovery and was discharged
from the hospital four days later.
The patient evidently had picked
up the disease during his camping
trip even though he did not notice
any tick bites, Lester explained. The
Ornithodoros ticks that transmit the
disease do not have a painful bite and
often drop off before they are
noticed.
Cases of relapsing fever occur in
warm months when ticks are active in
logs, stumps, rodent burrows and
rustic cabins. Most infections involve
tourists, campers, hikers and hunters
who invade sparsely populated areas.
Visitors to such areas should
consider using insect repellants,
Lester recommended.
DISEASE CARRIER—This is the
Ornithodoros tick that transmits
relapsing fever. Found in the western
United States, it is a soft tick, unlike the
hard ones found in this area.