Ah, rules! Where would we be without them? According to some, we would be savages at the dinner table, we couldn’t shoe a horse, and Penn students would be dueling willy-nilly! As a result, rules have flourished: governments issued them, activists challenged them, and inquisitors enforced them. And literary critic Burton Rascoe (at the wild and fun party pictured below) had so little faith in his own ability to follow the rules of society that he purchased pre-printed apologies to send following events!
As part of Philly Archives Month, the catalogers of the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts selected some of their favorite medieval to modern role models and scape-graces who inhabit the Kislak Center’s collections. The event, held on October 25, 2016, and this exhibit represent only a minuscule sample of the characters, heroic and dastardly, who color the pages of our history.