Kelci Baughman McDowell
On May 13, 2020 Santa Clara’s Mission Church will celebrate the 92nd anniversary of its dedication, which happened on May 13, 1928. 1928—I hope you caught that—is not during the famous mission era of California history. What’s going on with this timeline? Here at Santa Clara we all know and love the Mission Church, but […]
Not being able to meet face-to-face hasn’t stopped our students from interacting with Archives & Special Collections materials! For one of our Critical Thinking & Writing II (CTW II) classes, Librarian Summer Shetenhelm and Professor Amy Lueck asked students to create social media posts inspired by an object in SCU’s Digital Collections. The activity was […]
Santa Clara has gone through its fair share of crises—fires, earthquakes, and world wars, just to name a few—but so far we have always been able to use the crisis to evolve and improve. If we can learn anything from the outcome of the 1918 flu pandemic on our beloved school, it’s that tragedy and […]
Sometimes you have to leave the confines of your own library to discover something new, even when you’re a special collections librarian and have access to thousands of interesting things every day. In my case, I traveled half way across the world over the holiday break to a small town in the foothills of the […]
I found God in myself and I loved her fiercely — Ntozake Shange The Catholic Women’s Network newspaper asserts the above quote literally on page 2 of issue 4, and the mantra of this quote imbibes the very being of the publication throughout its fifteen-plus year run. To dig into the complete backfile of the newspaper […]
You might remember from our Founders’ Day blog post that Father Nobili was the Italian Jesuit who founded Santa Clara College in 1851 and worked to make it a tenantable place that taught habits of moral control and mental stamina in line with Jesuit pedagogy of ratio studiorum. While Archives & Special Collections has a […]
Last week I gave my customary History of SCU presentation to this year’s crop of Orientation Leaders. One had an excellent question for me: how did we get the bronco as our mascot? According to Henry L. Walsh, writing of the time period October — November, 1923: Students of later days will be interested in […]
On this day 200 years ago (May 31, 1819), Walt Whitman came into the world. Arguably the first great American poet, he dispensed with tightly controlled verse that rhymed in meter and instead embraced long lines that flowed like the expansiveness of his inclusion. Walt Whitman tried to be everyone when celebrating himself, and for […]
Earlier this week, a group of English 14 students visited Archives & Special Collections to receive instruction on different editions of Shakespeare’s works, with a focus on his famous sonnets. The materials included books from the main stacks curated by Humanities Librarian Leanna Goodwater, as well as books from Special Collections curated by myself… No […]
On this day in 1775, Jane Austen was born. That makes today her 243rd birthday! To celebrate her birthday and all the good times she has provided readers, I would like to draw your attention to a nifty little book we have in our Special Collections, Three Evening Prayers by Jane Austen. This thin volume was […]
