The Ins and Outs of Cataloguing Atlases

The Ins and Outs of Cataloguing Atlases

Many years ago, a fellow map librarian said to me, “If you want to study old maps, be ready to do gymnastics.”  Those words stuck in my mind as I undertook to help a Dutch colleague by photographing all the maps in a series of Dutch atlases in our collection.  As the...
Clements Library SAA Archives Blitz

Clements Library SAA Archives Blitz

Image credit: Claire MilldrumPost by Noa Kasman, Joyce Bonk Library AssistantOn the mornings of November 14th and November 18th, the University of Michigan’s Society of American Archivists (SAA) Student Chapter and the William L. Clements Library organized a two-part...

From the Stacks: Unannounced Visitor to the White House

Post by Cheney J. Schopieray, Curator of ManuscriptsGone are the days of lawful, unannounced visits to the White House. The security of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW has increased steadily since World War II and, for the protection of the First Family, will likely...

From the Stacks: Rachel and Andrew Jackson in the Lamb-Sykes Family Papers

Guest post by Katelyn JedroKatelyn Jedro, former graduate student at Wayne State University’s School of Library and Information Science (grad. Spring 2013), completed her 2013 winter semester practicum at the William L. Clements Library. She confronted the...

Staff Favorite: Domestic Fiction

JJ Jacobson has been Curator of American Culinary History at the Clements since 2009. She has many favorites from the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive, including cookbooks, domestic manuals, etiquette manuals, and menus. Her current favorite is Ten Dollars...

Classicists in the Map Division

Mary Pedley’s former Latin students have found new opportunities with cartography. Two of her former students, both classics majors, were seeking summer internships at U of M that would use their talents with ancient languages. Hannah Sorscher studies at the...

Volunteer Interview: Phil Zaret

Welcome to our new series of interviews with the wonderful Clements Library volunteers, in which we’ll get to know the people who put their time and energy into processing collections, acting as docents, and assisting our curators on special projects.Phil Zaret...

Staff Favorite: Hand-Colored Astronomical Charts

Emi Hastings has been Curator of Books at the Clements Library since 2009. Although she is constantly discovering new favorite items in the stacks, one of the current top contenders is the Astronomicum Caesareum of 1540. The Astronomicum Caesareum, perhaps the most...

Staff Favorite: Map of Ticonderoga

Michel Chartier de Lotbinière’s “Plan du Fort de Carillon . . . .” (1758) Brian Leigh Dunnigan has served as Curator of Maps since 1996 and Clements Library Associate Director from 2010.  Having come from a history and historic site museum background, he has a...