Beyond the Reading Room

For anyone interested in marginalized communities and the progress of social movements, the Special Collections Library has a wealth of primary and secondary resources. Examples of institutionalized racism, in particular, can be found throughout the Special Collections Library, and are a reminder that even objects we tend to revere such as rare books cannot escape their historical context.

A new exhibit, "The Life and Death of Gourmet — The Magazine of Good Living," is on display through December first in Special Collections' 7th floor exhibit space

This Wednesday's watermarks feature: hand / glove motifs in papers of manuscripts from the Islamic Manuscripts Collection.

Since we are now “celebrating” Banned Books Week, I thought that readers of our blog would be delighted to know that the Special Collections Library holds an important selection of early-printed editions of the justly infamous Index librorum prohibitorum (List of Forbidden Books).

Many finding aids for our archives and manuscript materials are online, but some are not (yet). When a Special Collections catalog record says “Unpublished finding aid available in repository,” these are what we’re talking about.

We are elated to announce that the Tom Hayden Papers are now part of the Special Collections Library's Joseph A. Labadie Collection.

Although it is not widely known today, the Margarita Philosophica helped shape the world view of Renaissance Europe's movers and shakers. Educated men learned that science and mathematics were inextricably tied to the world as a creation of God; philosophy in Reisch's text has as much to do with the Christian Bible as the works of Aristotle.

A singular bird’s last breath is not often met with sadness, nor does it necessarily signify the emphatic end of an era. However, on September 1, 1914, the last living passenger pigeon, Martha, passed away at the Cincinnati Zoological Gardens. In the course of a century, the passenger pigeon went from being the most abundant land bird in North America to an extinct species. As September 1st, 2014 marks the centennial of Martha’s passing, the University of Michigan’s Special Collections Library and Museum of Natural History remember this native bird.

This Wednesday's watermarks feature: three crescents motifs in papers of various manuscripts from the Islamic Manuscripts Collection.

The Ted Kaczynski Papers are part of the Special Collections Library’s Joseph A. Labadie Collection which documents the history of social protest movements and marginalized political communities from the 19th century to the present. The Ted Kaczynski papers were acquired in 1998 and the bulk of the collection includes correspondence written to and by Kaczynski since his arrest in 1996. Other materials in the archive include legal documents used during his trial, writings by Kaczynski, clippings and articles, some audiovisual material and FBI files.