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Recently added to the Archives and Special Collections website are instructions for navigating and searching through finding aids on ArchivesSpace: The Archives and Special Collections department is moving our Richardson Collection finding aids to ArchivesSpace. Though the physical location and the format of the finding aids are changing, you can continue to access the finding […]

They are land ownership maps. The Archives and Special Collections has many cadastral maps, both as sheet maps and in atlases. Library records for most of these maps and atlases are in the library catalog and can be found using subject terms and key words such as cadastral, real property maps, landowner maps, land use, […]

– about past United States epidemics are in the Archives and Special Collections in the Health Sciences Rare Books Collection: Carey, Mathew. A Short Account of the Malignant Fever, Lately Prevalent in Philadelphia: With a Statement of the Proceedings That Took Place on the Subject in Different Parts of the United States. 3d Ed., Improved. […]

The Alan H. Schell Collection of Campaign Buttons, Pins, and Political Ephemera contains 2 watches in addition to nearly one thousand pins, buttons, and ribbons that date from 1884 to 2008. Can you tell which watch was meant to support a candidate and which one was meant to lampoon a candidate?

and that the Archives and Special Collections is not a scary place.

Archives and Special Collections recently received: The water cure: archaeological investigations at the sanitarium and bath house, Cascade Springs, South Dakota. Abstract: “The Water Cure is an overview of the growth of health tourism in the southern Black Hill of South Dakota during the 1890s. During this era, medical doctors believed in the curative powers […]

When did the USD football team play Notre Dame? 1913-1917 Information from The history of intercollegiate football, basketball, track, and baseball at the State University of South Dakota, Richard T. Haase, USD M.A. thesis. Consult Haase’s thesis to find out if USD beat Norte Dame and when. Image of USD football team from Digital Library […]

The Archives and Special Collections has a 1970s poster promoting the Library with the caption “Looking for a date? Visit the I. D. Weeks Library.” What do you think, can 1970s attitudes towards dating and women in universities be inferred from this poster? If so, are current attitudes the same or different?

From the William Lyon Papers, Archives and Special Collections.

according to a book in Chilson Collection with this title. Hint – many of the letters that look like a “f” are actually a “s”.

to USD’s COVID-19 Experiences Project? Don’t be shy. I will let you read two of my less-than-great haikus, written at different stages of the pandemic: Ha, TP hoarding Funny until you run out Shelves are still empty Please don’t come near me Your breath and touch dangerous I so want to live

-while at the time having a region called New South Wales in a book with a long title in the Chilson Collection in the Archives and Special Collections: Payne, John. A New and Complete System of Universal Geography; Describing Asia, Africa, Europe and America; with Their Subdivisions of Republics, States, Empires, and Kingdoms: The […]

Autobiographies by Lewis Akeley and Edward Churchill have vivid descriptions and fun stories centered around their teaching experiences at the University of South Dakota. Akeley’s book covers approximately 1887 to 1933. Churchill’s book covers approximately 1920 to 1961. My favorite stories are Churchill’s description of the campus in 1920 and how it felt to teach […]

I need to find a bowler hat and a dark suit. Should I dress up and sit outside of Old Main now while there are not many people on campus, or wait until fall when the leaves are off the trees, allowing us to photograph a clearer view of Old Main and East Hall? Image […]

The Alan H. Schell collection of campaign buttons, pins, and political ephemera contains nearly one thousand pins, buttons, and ribbons that date from 1884 to 2008. While working with the collection this summer, I found surprises. There is a pin for Charlene Mitchell, very likely the first woman to appear on the general ballot as […]

– are maps intended primarily to influence opinions and beliefs rather than to communicate objective geographic information. They are meant to convey a message. Persuasive maps can be divided into intentional and unintentional. The Archives and Special Collections has a few persuasive maps. Most are dated from the homesteading period and are from land companies, […]

An outdoor theatre begun at the close of [WWI] by Clarence Lyon was formally inaugurated in June, 1920, with a commencement play. Located in a former wasteland back of the Science Hall [and between the Pardee Estee Laboratory and the National Music Museum] it emerged throughout the next ten years as a moderately attractive facility. […]

It happened a little over 100 years ago. On October 15, 1918, through November 10, 1918, the University of South Dakota suspended classes and sent the students home in a effort to stop the spread of the Spanish flu. No regular students, staff, or faculty died. Seven soldiers on campus for SATC training were not […]

To inspire us, this “Library Work” poster from the American Library Association is hanging up in the Archives and Special Collections. ALA believes the poster is from 1926.

What is more embarrassing than a Belch in the library? In the library a Belch rumbles through the corridors. It booms in the shocked silence. It echoes extra loudly. It startles the people and everybody looks at you, some disapproving, over the tops of their glasses and some laughing, behind their books, at […]