A place for news and information about rare books, manuscripts and university archives.
With such strong interest in Special Collections & Archives’ local history resources this semester, we wanted to offer the larger community with information that we provided three classes. In recent posts we covered some of the frequently used resources such as general histories, theses and student papers, maps and directories, print and manuscript holdings. Of … Read more
The past few blog posts have identified some of the Middletown history resources available in Special Collections & Archives—general histories, theses and student papers, maps and directories. What about resources for social or intellectual history? Beyond the resources identified in prior Middletown on My Mind posts, there are a very large number of resources useful … Read more
…nor a library closure due to noxious fumes will keep Special Collections & Archives from the preparations for the New England Archivists workshops on Friday (23rd) and meeting on Saturday (24th). Our apologies to the students, staff, faculty, and other researchers who planned to use SC&A holdings on Thursday. We hope to be open our … Read more
Special Collections & Archives has good local history holdings and these are being heavily used by Wesleyan students this semester. Current Middletown streets and structures show much of the town’s architectural history—but what about features that are no longer there or obscured by recent growth? Where was the Beman Triangle located? When did the course … Read more
With Wesleyan classes, and others, using the Middletown-based resources in Special Collections & Archives, we’re using the opportunity to summarize some of most the frequently used resources. This blog takes a look at some of the student-prepared resources. Many recent student theses (Bachelors and Masters) and dissertations have been added to WesScholar by the authors. … Read more
What most people imagine when they hear “special collections” What special collections is about … The focus of work in Special Collections and Archives is about service–reference service to the students and others who use the holdings. The Wednesday before spring break we extended our service hours knowing that two classes … Read more
Middletown is on a lot of students’ minds too—Considering the Campus (ARST 441), Exploring Middletown’s History (HIST 171) and Middletown Materials (ANTH 227) are looking at Middletown from different perspectives. Special Collections & Archives staff have shown these classes some resources that will be helpful to their work. We’d like to use the next few … Read more
Last spring, a group of rare, Jewish-related books arrived at Special Collections & Archives, as a result of a new partnership between Wesleyan University’s Special Collection & Archives, Wesleyan’s Jewish and Israel Studies Program, and Middletown’s Congregation Adath Israel. These rare books from Adath Israel are now on long-term loan to Special Collections & Archives … Read more
The other day, I discovered a mystery in Special Collections: an extremely skimpy catalog record for a book in our collection. All it said about this book was: Bible. N.T. [for New Testament]. French [Nouveau testament] [S.l. : S.n., not after 1762.] 665 p. ; 19 cm. Title page missing. What does all that mean? … Read more
Archivists review the historic materials to put them into a level of order and to describe the content so others may use them. Occasionally, we’ll see something that gives one pause. I have been working on family papers that include nineteenth and twentieth century correspondence. Various family members made contributions to their fields such as … Read more
