-
This Week in Princeton History for December 7-13
In this week’s installment of our ongoing series bringing you the history of Princeton University and its faculty, students, and alumni, a history professor gets national attention, undergraduates protest new library rules, and more. December 7, 1776—The British Army reaches Princeton to begin the “20 days of tyranny.” Annis Boudinot Stockton hides the papers of…
-
The History of the Princeton University Senior Thesis
The senior thesis has been a requirement of all undergraduate students at Princeton University since 1926. During a Faculty Meeting on February 19th, 1923, the Committee on the Course of Study submitted a report for a new study plan known as the “Four Course Plan.” The four course plan called for an extensive reading program for…
-
Meet Mudd’s Jarrett M. Drake
Name/Title: Jarrett M. Drake, Digital Archivist Responsibilities: As the digital archivist at Mudd, I’m responsible for the development, implementation, and execution of processes that facilitate the effective acquisition, description, preservation, and access of born-digital archival collections acquired by the University Archives. The emphasis on ‘born-digital’ is to distinguish my work from that of digitization, which…
-
Records Management and University Archives: Perfect Together
The job of the Princeton University Archives is to keep in perpetuity the University records that should be kept, and the University Records Manager, Anne Marie Phillips, helps to identify them. She also helps offices determine how long non-permanent records must be kept before they can be destroyed. With the University’s first financial records retention schedule coming online,…
-
Our NHPRC-Funded Digitization Project at Six Months
Late last year, the Mudd Manuscript Library was granted an award by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) to digitize our most-used Public Policy collections, serve them online, and create a report for the larger archival community about cost-efficient digitization practices. Excerpts from our six-month progress report is below. Work so far Project planning…
-
Archives for Everyone
In each of the last two springs, several staff of the Mudd Manuscript Library and other members of the Department of Rare Books and Special Collections have judged at the regional qualifier of the National History Day competition held on Princeton’s campus. This is a contest for middle and high school students who, based on…
-
Why — and How — We Digitize
It’s February, and we’re now in the second month of our NHPRC-funded digitization project. In twenty-three more months, we’ll have completed scanning and uploading 400,000 pages of our most-viewed material to our finding aids, and anyone with an internet connection will be able to view it. This is just the most recent effort to introduce…
-
The Daily Princetonian is digitized and keyword searchable
The Princeton University Archives, working in conjunction with the Princeton University Library Digital Initiatives, has completed a monumental project that will change the way researchers investigate University history. The student newspaper, The Daily Princetonian, has been digitized from its inception in 1876 through 2002.
-
Most used Princeton theses
Dear Mr. Mudd, I was wondering what is the most popular/most requested senior thesis in the University Archives collection? This is a perennial question and the short answer is that with the exception of celebrity alumni theses, there are few theses that are pulled with any regularity, yet the collection as a whole (totaling over…
-
University Archives featured in Princeton Alumni Weekly
Every few weeks the Princeton Alumni Weekly focuses one segment of the magazine to highlight items from the Princeton University Archives entitled “From the Vault.”
This blog includes text and images drawn from historical sources that may contain material that is offensive or harmful. We strive to accurately represent the past while being sensitive to the needs and concerns of our audience. If you have any feedback to share on this topic, please either comment on a relevant post, or use our Ask Us form to contact us.