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Although Edith Wharton may be best known for her novels analyzing New York’s upper crust, the author lived in France from 1907 until her death in 1937. There, she witnessed the ravages of World War I, especially the hardships endured by refugees. She helped by establishing The Children of Flanders Relief Committee and The American […]

While wandering through the labyrinth of books in the Archives and Special Collections, I came across a title that caught my eye. Taking it off the shelf, the tale of Ellen McGowan Biddle was unveiled in her memoir Reminiscences of a Soldier’s Wife. The story mainly focuses on experiences that occurred after the Civil War […]

In the Archives and Special Collections are watercolor reproductions of three University of South Dakota buildings: Slagle Auditorium (now called Aalfs Auditorium), the Carnegie Library (now houses the National Music Museum) and the Coyote Student Center (demolished in 2007, current location of the Muenster University Center). These images were created by Gray’s Watercolors. The Archives and Special Collections copies […]

Once again, Dakota Days has come. Though the festivities have begun early in the week, the parade is still an exciting highlight of Game Day. A screaming sea of red and white converges upon the Dome to cheer the Coyotes to victory. One lucky girl is crowned Miss Dakota. In the evening, merry USD students […]

While the Chilson Collection focuses on Midwestern history and culture, it also has many other interesting gems. One in particular that caught my eye was Water Birds of North America by Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway, a two-volume set containing hundreds of illustrations of heads and portraits of birds. In the set that can be found […]

Recently the Archives and Special Collections initiated a project to convert the 16mm movie films in the Educational Media Film Collection to digital formats. We hope to digitally copy 5-10 films per year. These movie films were originally part of the Educational Media Center on the USD campus. Some of Ed Media’s 16mm films were […]

Here is a sample of the books about Denmark and the Danish culture in the Chilson Collection and the Mahoney Music Collection. Crichton, Andrew. Scandinavia, ancient and modern: being a history of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway: comprehending a description of these countries, an account of the mythology, government, laws, manners, and institutions of the early […]

In addition to books, magazines, pamphlets, and ephemera, the Mahoney Music Collection also contains unpublished material such as the John Gould’s Violin Instrument Appraisals – 1945-1984. This collection is 2 linear feet of violin appraisal and identification forms. The Gould material is a “wealth of day-to-day material covering years in the life of an important […]

Within the Mahoney Music Collection, is a wonderful collection of illustrated Lyon and Healy catalogs. The Lyon and Healy Company was started in 1864 in Chicago by George W. Lyon and Patrick J. Healy. They began with a sheet music store but soon expanded into instrument selling and manufacturing. In 1871, “Healy developed a new […]

Atlas photographique de la lune by Loewy and Puiseux, a French atlas of the moon, is the largest book in the Archives and Special Collections. It is 83 cm by 63 cm (33 in. by 25 in.). This is a big book. The images of the moon were photographed through the Observatory of Paris’ telescope […]

Preliminary List of USD Campus Projects 1997-2011 For my first project as a volunteer at the University of South Dakota archives, I compiled a list of building projects that occurred from 1997-2011. This list will be added to for use in the Buildings, Other Structures, and Utilities collection at the archives. The main resource for […]

The Artistic Diversity of the Mahoney Music Collection […]

Lately I have been assigned to the exciting task of carefully vacuuming books and wiping the shelves clean in the Chilson collection. It is a task that would be boring if there weren’t so many interesting books on every shelf. I’ve been working my way through beautifully illustrated Native American children’s books, histories of Wounded […]

The earliest atlas of Dakota Territory in the Chilson Collection is Andreas’ Historical Atlas of Dakota published in 1884. Andreas’ atlas has county maps showing physical and cultural features, though the majority of the atlas is general thematic histories, county histories, biographies, and business descriptions. During the late 19th century, many state and county land ownership […]

William Henry Over was a natural historian who lived in Vermillion from 1913 to 1956. While in Vermillion, he served first as the Assistant Curator and then full Curator for the University Museum. He studied numerous subjects relating to the natural world, including botany; however, until recently, little was known about Over’s work with plants. […]

From Cleata B. Thorpe’s Education in South Dakota 1861-1961: Teachers will fill lamps, clean chimneys and trim wicks each day. Each teacher will bring a scuttle of coal and a bucket of water for the day’s use. Make your pens carefully. You may whittle nibs for the individual tastes of children. Men teachers may take […]

Gilbert C. Fite, Ph.D., a noted historian and USD alumnus, passed away on July 13, 2010. Dr. Fite, in 2002, arranged for the donation of his professional papers to the Archives and Special Collections. His son, James Fite, completed the donation in early 2011. The papers of Dr. Fite are a trove of correspondence, research […]

Last Friday, Doris and I were sent out into the world with an expensive camera as a part of a class that Sarah was teaching about using said expensive camera. It was daunting, mostly because I’m really clumsy so I was afraid of dropping and breaking the camera, but also exciting because I had never […]

The Delzell Education Center sits where a small lake once existed? According to the Dedication for the School of Education Building (1963), Due to the type of soil it was necessary to drive 271 wooden pilings to a depth of about 35 feet. These wooden pilings, which are creosoted and approximately the size of large […]

Today we got a lesson in photography. Sarah, the digitization and photographs associate at USD, taught us how to use the Archives’ Pentax digital camera to take high-resolution photographs for our student projects. She introduced us to the camera and helped us figure out everything from changing the lens cover to setting the light manually. We struggled at first but, […]