I recently went to the Morgan Library in New York City, primarily to see the Holbein exhibition that’s currently being shown there. (Well worth seeing and it closes soon, so go if you can!) The Morgan is also currently showing an exhibition about Woody Guthrie, which happens to feature quite a few notebooks!

This composition book was the first thing that caught my eye. It was mounted in case next to one of Guthrie’s Gibson guitars.

Here’s a couple more, including a spiral notebook with one of Guthrie’s comic sketches, and an address book from the 1940s, open to a page listing the blues musician Lead Belly and Alan Lomax, who is known for recording, archiving, and popularizing American folk music.

A daily diary in which Guthrie wrote to his unborn daughter:

A spiral notebook recording things said by Guthrie’s daughter Cathy at the age of 4. Sadly, Cathy died in a fire later than year.

Another daily diary in a larger format, in which Guthrie mused about love and sex:

There were lots of other interesting artifacts in the exhibit. I had seen images of some of Woody Guthrie’s notes and sketches before but had no idea he was such a prolific notebook-keeper!