It shouldn’t be too big a surprise – many individual items in large collections are inevitably overshadowed for one reason or another – but here’s a great example of something really worth a closer look. This California hotel register from the 1880s, acquired by Gary Lowe for his collection of giant Sequoia-related material (the Gary D. and Myrna R.
Many years ago I was fascinated by the Shackleton expedition to the Antarctic, and how from 1914-1916 Shackleton and his crew were cut off from the world in their harrowing struggle for survival. A remarkable story of courage and perseverance, this epic adventure story captured my attention and imagination.
In the beginning of March, managers at Stanford Libraries began talking about working remotely and decided to set up shifts in each department – half working two weeks on site and half two weeks remotely. By the 6th of March the teams for our Collection Services group out in Redwood City were assembled, and the first group – Aries – stayed home for their first week. The Libraries were only one week into that first shift, when the state of California and Stanford decided that everyone should shelter at home starting on the 16th. The Aries team was taken off guard - we all were. Although we had discussed and lined up remote projects, not everyone had taken their computer and ergonomic equipment home with them. A few of us went in to grab equipment (desktop computers, monitors, etc.) and forgotten items (like reading glasses!) and drove around making deliveries – not everyone in the Bay Area drives a car!
While sheltering in place, the Rare Books Division of Special Collections has been working with colleagues around the country to produce content related to our collections or using technologies that allow sharing digital images across institutions. Here are three recent webinars from that effort:
I would like to share the behind-the-scenes story of a recent project at Stanford Libraries: we received a sizable coin collection from the Cantor Arts Center and have been working over the past year and a half to make it accessible for use. In honor of its origins, this collection is called the Cantor Arts Center collection of ancient coins and it contains approximately 8,700 coins from the ancient world. Currently there are circa 300 coins fully cataloged that feature digital images online and three preassembled study sets for use in the Barchas Room in Special Collections at Green Library.
The Department of Special Collections & University Archives is pleased to welcome Gurudarshan into a continuing position in our Redwood City branch, taking over from Malgorzata Schaefer who is retiring as of March 31st. I am doubly pleased with this outcome, as Gurudarshan has been working on a series of term and grant-funded positions at Stanford Libraries since 2014 – in both Special Collections and the Archives of Recorded Sound.
Special Collections is excited to welcome Annie Schweikert as our new Digital Archivist! Annie has been working with us at our Redwood City facility as our Born Digital Forensics Lab Assistant since last September, and we are thrilled to have her here full time. Annie has a strong background in audio-visual preservation with a MA in Moving Image Archiving and Preservation.
If you're interested in transportation, San Francisco Bay Area history, or old photographs, you're sure to get lost in this new exhibit of scanned images from the William Gardiner Transportation Collection, accessible here: https://exhibits.stanford.edu/gardiner-sfba.