This book was published as a companion work for the exhibition in the Rare Book Room of the Van Pelt Library. It proposes "A new culture of memory and archiving in the true spirit of the beehive." Anthony Grafton's essay "The Commonplace Bee; A Celebration" describes through historical commonplace books "how early modern playwrights and poets, scholars and scientists, ladies and schoolboys went about the vital task of mastering and using books - at a time when books were the most powerful source of knowledge about life, the universe and everything." The DVD "In which the thinking man finds himself" was produced by Aaron Levy and explores an archive in disarray in historic Founder's Hall at Girard College in Philadelphia. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.