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Here are a few helpful tips for the lucky ones visiting an archive. Give yourself enough time. Looking through archival collections is time-consuming, and you will need more time than you expect. Believe me. Check with the archival staff beforehand and ask them a lot of questions. Will they be open the days you want […]

To learn more about Labor Day and labor issues in South Dakota, check out the Albert J. Maag papers in the Archives and Special Collections. Albert J. Maag (1891-1965) was the president of the South Dakota State Federation of Labor. This collection contains correspondence, minutes of the annual AFL conventions, and yearbooks of the […]

I have been waiting. Image from Catalogue of the University of South Dakota for the year 1892-3.

You can see photographs from the early days of the Casa Grande National Monument and Frank Pinkley in the Mabel Townsley Papers at the Archives and Special Collections. “The General Land Office took over management of the ruins and hired a young man named Frank Pinkley in 1901 to be the first on-site […]

The Allan H. Schell Collection of Campaign Buttons, Pins, And Political Ephemera was created by Allan H. Schell, and chiefly contains political pins, buttons, posters, pennants, and ephemera related to United States and South Dakota political positions in the 20th century. Pins from US Presidential and SD Gubernatorial campaigns are on display in the […]

Freshmen Initiation Friday, September 19, 1913, otherwise known as Black Friday, the newly acquired graduating class of 1917, gathered outside of Main Hall (today one could assume they meant Old Main) promptly at 7:30 pm to begin their journey through the time honored tradition of hazing the incoming freshmen. Though this practice has gone by the […]

The first week of May everyone on campus was cramming for finals and preparing for summer. I was in the same boat as everyone else, cramming for finals and preparing to head home for a week. It was within that week that I was informed that a position in the archives was open and I […]

Archives and Special Collections recently received the 1920 edition of the Official Automobile Blue Book. This is a great resource for anyone interested in the history of roads because it gives a description of the automobile routes in our area before the Good Roads Movement. The book includes a general index map of routes described in […]

The Archives and Special Collections has a small collection on the USS South Dakota. These images are from that collection. There have been 2 naval ships named after South Dakota and a new one will be joining the fleet in 2017. The middle one of these three was a battleship that served during WWII. The […]

You’ll want to read Civil Defense In-Shelter Guide for University of South Dakota (November 18, 1963) to find out what learning to love crackers has to do with bomb shelters. It is in the USD Archives collection General Publications. Do you know what movie title I am misquoting for my title? Hint, it came out in […]

It is a fun day in the Archives and Special Collections when we get a batch of Mahoney Music Collection books back from the catalogers. The library at the University of South Dakota is in the process of creating catalog records for all the books in the Mahoney Music Collection. Having catalog records in the […]

Nineteenth century General Land Office surveyors wrote descriptions of landforms, soil, water, vegetation and wildlife in their field notebooks while they were surveying in the midwest and western United States. These notebooks are used by researchers reconstructing the ecology of an area during a particular slice of time. Surveyors vary in how much detail they […]

The Archives and Special Collections has this book in the Oscar Howe Papers: O. H. Bonnell, Translation of the Sioux Indian Language into English: figures, money, definitions, words, sentences, &c. Chamberlain, Dakota Territory: Democrat Print. 1880. 8 pages. 19 cm. [Update: Translation of the Sioux Indian language into English; Figures, money definitions, words, sentences, etc. […]

Beginning to work at the Archives and Special Collections department at USD’s I.D. Weeks Library seemed to be a little mysterious at first. What would I find in that special back room? Will I be putting books back on shelves all day? Will I be able to listen to music?! These concerns were alive and […]

The Archives and Special Collections has recently received five 1968 aerial photographs showing parts of Vermillion or areas close to Vermillion. These photos show that in 1968 not much of the town or the University of South Dakota was north of Cherry Street, and that the Mulberry Bend area looked very different before the construction […]

The Chilson Collection of Western Americana has many Dakota Territory and South Dakota books and journals and a few surprises. I found this early South Dakota chronology in The Monthly South Dakotan, March 1899, vol. 1 no. 11, pages 191-193. May contain offensive language.

During the 1980s and 1990s, University of South Dakota commencement program covers often presented brief descriptions of USD buildings. In 2004, this building was remodeled and renamed the Dean Belbas Center. It houses Undergraduate Admissions, Financial Aid and the Office of the Registrar.

This year, one of my personal projects is to find out more about Fort Vermillion. When did it exist and where? Here is what I know so far: Fort Vermillion was a trading post established by Pierre Chouteau, Jr., and Company along the Missouri River in the vicinity of what is now Vermillion, South Dakota. […]

During the 1980s and 1990s, University of South Dakota commencement program covers often presented brief descriptions of USD buildings.

The South Dakota Oral History Project’s first year was described in a 1970 South Dakota History article. “This past summer an oral history project was inaugurated in South Dakota. Five thousand dollars was funded by the state legislature at the request of Dayton Canaday, State Historian, and Professor Joseph Cash of the University of South Dakota. Professor Cash and Mr. Canaday suggested to the state legislature that a project be initiated among white settlers while reminis