Louis Borris Magid Visual Materials Collection
Collection
Identifier: VAM054
This collection contains visual materials related to sericulture. Although most of the images are general images of silkworm production, machinery, and people associated with sericulture worldwide, there are some images directly related to the Sericulture and Manufacturing Company in Tallulah Falls, Georgia.
This collection is written in English, German, and Japanese.
(295 items)
None.
Permission to publish materials from this collection must be obtained from the Head of Archives and Special Collections.
3.5 Linear Feet
The Louis Borris Magid Visual Materials Collection contains a scrapbook, photographs, lantern slides, and glass plate negatives relating to sericulture and silk production. The majority of images in the scrapbook seem to be clipped from Magid's journal Silk (the archives has volume 1, bound, in Neely Room SF541 . S4).
Most of the loose photographs depict machinery used in various stages of silk production. However, there are a few photographs that show Magid, people, and products related to the Sericulture and Manufacturing Company of Tallulah Falls, and some unidentified sericulture-related locations.
The majority of lantern slides are of Japanese origin, showing Japanese men, women, and children at work in various stages of sericulture. The slides have captions in Japanese and are numbered as in series or sets. There are a few lantern slides that have one or both sides of glass broken; they are housed in a separate box. Because most of the captions are in Japanese, the item titles are only descriptions of what appears in the slide.
The majority of glass plates are negatives of book illustrations, although there are glass plates for most of the photographs related to the Tallulah Falls company.
Louis Borris Magid, a native of Germany, came to the United States with his parents after graduating from the University of Padua. While operating the Magid-Hope Silk Company in the northeast, Magid traveled to Tallulah Falls, Georgia in the spring of 1901.
He began purchasing land in Habersham County in north Georgia, propagating mulberry trees and developing plans for the silkworm industry. He promoted Georgia's climate as ideal for the culture of silk, and cited that silk had been produced in Georgia prior the Revolutionary War. By founding the Sericulture and Manufacturing Company of America, Inc., he planned to divide his large landholdings into smaller farms that Italian immigrants would till. He also became involved in various business concerns in the area. Magid published the short-lived magazine, Silk, as well as serving as the President of the Silk Culture League of America.
The materials in the Louis Borris Magid Visual Materials Collection are organized by material type. A scrapbook, photographs, lantern slides, and glass plate negatives comprise this collection.
29D3
A print copy of this finding aid is available in the Georgia Tech Archives reading room.
The library received these papers in 1944; however, the Georgia Historical Society had physical custody of them for several years.
Accession #1988.0505; old number: 88-05-05.
The manuscript materials are processed and described separately as MS054. Three empty film packs and a bee light meter (0.2 linear feet) were separated and placed in the artifacts.
(295 items)
Mandi D. Johnson processed these visual materials in April 2008.
Part of the Archives and Special Collections, Library, Georgia Institute of Technology Repository