Special Collections

February 19, 2021

Priceless, ancient coins find a home at UW Libraries

Ancient coins, federal agents, mysterious circumstances at an international border…what sounds like a scene out of an Indiana Jones movie is a real-life story of lost artifacts that have now found a home with UW Libraries Special Collections. The story begins in 2017 at the US/Canadian border in Blaine, WA.  When a vehicle was refused…

November 5, 2020

Labor Archives of Washington Spotlight: RIDGE Records Showcase Coalition-Building among Labor and Environmental Activists

This fall, I am working at the Labor Archives of Washington (LAW) in Special Collections at the University of Washington Libraries as their archivist-in-residence. Through a paid internship with Northwest Archivists, I have been processing the RIDGE records remotely from my home in Iowa.  The newly-acquired collection documents land use activism in Kittitas County, WA….

October 16, 2020

Labor Archives of Washington Spotlight: Creating Bilingual Access to Collections Documenting the Latinx Experience

This summer, the Labor Archives of Washington (LAW) within the UW Libraries Special Collections, was lucky enough to have Diana Rocha, MLIS student from the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, complete their final semester practicum with us. Working remotely, Diana enhanced access to several important collections documenting the histories of the Latinx community in Washington….

May 29, 2020

Going the distance: An Acquisitions Trip to SE Asia at a Time of Pandemic

In early February, before travel restrictions were implemented, and the true nature of the global pandemic was fully understood, I made an acquisitions trip to Southeast Asia to purchase materials for the UW Libraries SE Asia collection. While adhering to all of the CDC and UW guidelines for travel, it was still an anxious time…

April 27, 2020

Listen and Learn: Exploring Oral Histories at UW Libraries for #preswk

It’s Preservation Week 2020! This month marks the 10th anniversary of Preservation Week®, a public awareness initiative that aims to promote preservation and conservation in communities with the help of libraries, institutions and museums. Preservation Week inspires actions to preserve personal, family, and community collections in addition to library, museum, and archival materials. It also…

April 6, 2020

Documenting COVID-19 – A Service of UW Libraries Special Collections

The University of Washington Libraries Special Collections brings together the most rare and unique resources held by the larger University of Washington Library community. From papyrus to born digital, our holdings span history and the globe and offer boundless opportunities for exploration and discovery. While many people associate our work with physical materials—our digital archives…

November 21, 2019

Mythbuster: The Facts About Greta Thunberg’s Photo Twin

One of the images within UW Libraries Special collections has garnered a lot of media attention lately regarding the resemblance of a young girl in a photograph from 1898 to 16-year-old Swedish climate change activist Greta Thunberg. Several creative theories abound from time travel to how Greta’s image may have been inserted into a historical…