The Ephemera Society of America invites applications for the Philip Jones Fellowship for the Study of Ephemera. This competition, now in its fifth year, is open to any interested individual or organization for the study of any aspect of ephemera — material defined as transitory printed documents. It is expected that this study will advance one or more aims of the Society:

— To cultivate and encourage interest in this material; — To further the understanding, appreciation, and enjoyment of ephemera by people of all ages, backgrounds and levels of interest — To contribute to cultural
understanding; — And to advance the personal and institutional collection,preservation, exhibition, and research of ephemeral materials.

The $1,000 stipend can be applied to travel or study expenses. The expected form and outcome of the project and its relationship to ephemera; when and how the outcome will be disseminated; and its benefit to furthering the goals of the ESA should be clearly stated in the application. Stipend money cannot be used to purchase ephemera items.

Ephemera includes a vast amount of paper material such as advertisements, airsickness bags, baseball cards, billheads, bookmarks, bookplates, broadsides, cigar box labels and bands, cigarette cards, clipper ship cards, board and card games, greeting cards, sheet music, maps, calendars, blotters, invitations, luggage labels, menus, paper dolls, postcards, posters, puzzles and puzzle cards, stock certificates, tickets, timetables, trade cards, valentines, watch papers, and wrappers. These are but a handful of examples*. *Please see the ESA website at www.ephemerasociety.org for more information about ephemera.

The Fellowship selection criteria include: 1. the importance of the project; 2. how it will be shared with ESA members and the public; 3. and the project’s relationship to ephemera and the mission of the Ephemera Society of America.

*Applications are due January 15, 2012*. Specific application instructions for this fellowship can be down loaded at
http://www.ephemerasociety.org/JonesFellowshipInst2012.pdf. In order to be considered these instructions need to be followed.

The applicant’s resume should include the applicant’s experience and proven abilities to carry out this project*. The completed application should be sent electronically to: ESAJones@cox.net* Decisions will be reported to the
successful individual or organization by March 1, 2012 and will be announced at the Society’s annual meeting and conference March 17, 2012, in Old Greenwich, Connecticut. The successful candidate is expected to write an
article about the project for an issue of the Society’s *Ephemera *News, and also prepare a presentation about the project for the following year’s annual conference.

*Examples of previously funded proposals are:*

— A study of Charles Magnus, one of the most prolific printers of ephemera during the nineteenth century, who was in some ways simply a job printer, producing a wide variety of books, maps, prints, and single sheet items, but
is worthy of study because so little has been written about him.

— Study of a specific ephemeral object, “The Negro Motorists Green Book” providing insight into the ways that black Americans responded to racial segregation, how they adapted to the changes in American life resulting from
the automobile and the interstate highway system, and how they found ways to confront racism while grabbing onto middle class life.

— An elementary school teacher’s project involving the school community in a project using ephemera to interest children in the social history of various cultures. This project also produced a lesson plan for an assignment that is available for other teachers to replicate.

— The Victorian custom of exchanging snippets of hair.