If You Did It, Show It: A Confessory Manuscript for Deaf People

This post, by Ellen Welch, Manuscript and Archives Processor, is about the recent acquisition: Illustrated Manuscript Confessory for Deaf People (MSS 16803). This leather-bound manuscript serves as a confessional aid, containing illustrations depicting a variety of sins from which a … Continue reading

Call for Artists: As Big as We Make It! Contemporary Artists in Conversation with the Harlem Renaissance

The Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia is excited to announce a call for artists to submit proposals for large-scale artwork to be created in conversation with poems highlighted in a forthcoming exhibition, Their … Continue reading

Staff Spotlight: Elizabeth Nosari

Elizabeth Nosari is currently working on reprocessing the Small Library’s collection of William Faulkner papers as well as contributing to On These Grounds. She was previously the Nau Project Archivist for the John L. Nau III Civil War History Collection. … Continue reading

Frances Clayton and the Women Soldiers of the Civil War

This post contributed by Elizabeth Nosari, Nau Project Archivist at the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library. Her work involves processing the John L. Nau III Civil War History Collection, which includes correspondence, diaries, photographs, military records, currency, and … Continue reading

Special Collections Catalogs and Catalogers

This post was contributed by Seonyoo Min, Rare Book Cataloging Intern at the Small Special Collections Library. The Guanhailou Collection is a collection of East Asian rare books formed by Soren Edgren, Editorial Director of the Chinese Rare Book Project … Continue reading

Nick Biddle and the Commemorative Power of the Carte de Visite

This post contributed by Elizabeth Nosari, Nau Project Archivist at the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library. Her work involves processing the John L. Nau III Civil War History Collection, which includes correspondence, diaries, photographs, military records, currency, and … Continue reading

Othello Tillo Freeman and the Otis Mead Chalmers Family Papers

Small Special Collections Library Manuscript and Archives Processor Ellen Welch is back with another story from her work to process the papers of Anna Maria Hickman Otis Mead Chalmers (1809-1891):    It has been very exciting to process this collection and … Continue reading

Juneteenth 2022: The Nansemond County Training School 1924-1970

Juneteenth was originally established to commemorate June 19, 1865, when enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas heard the reading of the Emancipation Proclamation and learned that they were free. However, Juneteenth is not the only freedom celebration in the United … Continue reading

A Curator’s Wunderkammer: A Decade of Collecting for UVA

On the occasion of his retirement—after a decade of curatorial work at the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library—David R. Whitesell departs the University of Virginia Library having made significant contributions to the collection. Upon his arrival in 2012, … Continue reading

Herbarium Pictum: 2022 Historic Garden Week in Virginia

Each April, we celebrate Historic Garden Week in Virginia. Next week—April 23-30, 2022—private landscapes, public gardens, and historic sites across Virginia will offer tours showcasing our beautiful state at the peak of spring. In this post by Manuscripts and Archives … Continue reading