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Washington's Dispatches

Stack of Books from Miller Library

Welcome back to school, Adults!

09/10/2024

To welcome the WAC community back to campus, we would like to take a break from the regularly programmed Special Collections and Archives post and instead highlight some books from our circulating collections. These books encompass a range of genres- from memoir to dark fantasy- but all belong to my favorite made up category of “back to school books for adults”.

  • Back to School
  • Diversions
  • Books
Washington College

Around the Calendar: Washington College in the 1930s

09/03/2024

The Washington College Archives recently received a generous donation from Rena Fowler; those funds allowed us to digitize some of our oldest audiovisual materials, including film reels, reel-to-reel audio tapes, audio cassettes, and VHS tapes.

  • 1930s
  • Audiovisual
  • Film
  • Student life
  • Archives
Miller Library sign

May Day Reflections

04/30/2024

Since its first celebration at Washington College in the spring of 1967, May Day has involved different traditions that have changed with the times. Last year, we covered the earliest May Day traditions, when free cases of beer were given to the first student arriving at the local liquor store sans clothing on May 1, and naked photos graced the pages of the Elm in the days following.

  • Bennett Lamond
  • May Day
  • Poetry
  • Archives
Howard Dean

Digitizing our Audio-Visual Collection

04/23/2024

The archives hold a vast amount of material and material types, some of which are easier to preserve and make accessible than others. Often it is the more recent items that have the most issues. The pages of an 18th-century letter book are made of sturdier material than a newspaper from the 1930s. A letter from the Revolutionary War will be readable for centuries while your emails will be lost to obsolescence in a few years. And a videotape from the 1980s… well, that requires some outside help.

  • A/V materials
  • Talking Democracy
  • Archives
National Poetry Month

National Poetry Month

04/16/2024

The American Library Association’s National Poetry Month poster this year features Maryland’s first African American Poet Laureate of Maryland, and just the second woman to hold the position, Lucille Clifton. The lines come from her poem, blessing the boats. She visited Washington College and gave a talk and poetry reading in March 1989 and received an Honorary Doctor of Letters in the 1989 commencement ceremony.

  • Poetry
  • Archives
Washington College

National Poetry Month

04/16/2024

April is National Poetry Month so come and explore what the Library & Archives of Washington College have to offer.

  • Literary House Press
  • Poetry
  • Special Collections
  • Archives
Frank Adams in uniform

National Home Front Project - Meet Frank Adams

04/12/2024

The National Home Front Project is a major grassroots initiative under the leadership of historians at Washington College. Our innovative oral history program partners with individuals, communities, and organizations across the United States to record, preserve, and share audio interviews with civilians who experienced World War II.

  • National Home Front Project
  • Starr Center
  • World War II
  • Archives