Pictures of Madison (finally)

I spent the week of June 15-20 in Madison, Wisconsin, a beautiful college town built on the isthmus between Lake Monona and Lake Mendota.

I attended the Institute for the Editing of Historical Documents (nicknamed "Camp Edit"), put on by the National Archives, and had the opportunity to meet with folks working on papers projects for famous folks like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Thomas Edison, and cool little projects, like the WWII love letters of a Japenese-American couple. We learned about every phase of publishing a documentary edition (that is, a collection of papers related to a person or topic), from gathering documents to transcribing, annotating, indexing, and selling them. It was fun to share some of my experiences (like putting together the index) and learn from others.

But don't worry, I'm not going to bore you with details of the conference. I'm going to tell you about what I did the rest of the time. Things like:

-Exploring the Wisconsin Historical Society collection. I know what you're thinking - boooring. But I was amazed by their Mormon collection - dozens of books published in the mid- to late-1800s, available to be checked out. There was the first publication of the Joseph Smith Translation, printed by the Reorganized Church in the 1860s. There were copies of the Book of Mormon from the 1890s. There were first editions of fanous nineteenth-century works, like George Q. Cannon's biography of Joseph Smith, and Lucy Mack Smith's history. There were church newspapers published in England, right back into the 1840s.

Wisconsin Historical Society, where Camp Edit was held.

-Sightseeing. Saw the capitol, saw a couple botanical gardens, saw their historic campus buildings that put BYU to shame.

Under the capitol dome.

The student union. Slightly cooler than the Wilk.

You've probably always wondered if Madison's botanical garden has a Thai pagoda in it.

Why yes, yes it does.

-Eating strange and exotic food. Ethopian! (shredded meat and vegetables scooped up with spongy sourdough bread.) Nepali! (dumplings filled with ground beef and spices, smothered in tomato sauce, and yogurt to drink.) American ! (Five Guys Burgers and Fries - burgers overrated, fries delicious.)

-Renting a bike and getting horribly, horribly lost. But found the arboretum.

If I had to pick a school outside Utah for graduate studies, I'd say UW-Madison would be up there. But then again, I visited in the summer.