This post was written by Special Collections student assistant Jen Wachtel. Thank you, Jen!

The Retriever Weekly, our university’s proud student newspaper, began publishing as UMBC News in 1966. Special Collections and the University Archives maintain the print copies of all issues of the Retriever, and a large section of the issues (1966-1981 and 2002 to the present) are available online in UMBC's Digital Collections. With monetary support from UMBC's Office of Institutional Advancement, students and staff have been preparing to send the remaining issues to Creekside Digital, a digitization vendor located a short drive away in Glen Arm, MD. This project is a part of the Lyrasis Digitization Collaborative.

I conducted an inventory of the issues of the Retriever dating from January 1983 to May 1997, totaling over four hundred newspapers. Along the way, I found insights into some of UMBC’s hot-button topics of the 1980s and 1990s, including contentious construction projects and students’ demands for increased parking spaces (ed. note - complaining about parking is a long-standing UMBC tradition!). I particularly enjoyed following the timeline of the university administration, including the appointment of one Freeman A. Hrabowski III to Vice Provost at UMBC and his later position as Interim President for a “full academic year and possibly longer.” Of course, no inventory of The Retriever would be complete without the satirical Deceiver. Published annually on the week of April 1^st, the Deceiver  featured such choice headlines as “Giant Terrapin attacks UMBC” (referring to College Park’s mascot) and “SCHPORTZ” (1993).

Jen Wachtel working in Special Collections.

I also noticed some strange anomalies in The Retriever’s numbering system. From miswritten Roman numerals (XXVIV for 29 and IXX for 24) to a startling continuity error, the Retriever always had special surprises in store. The most bizarre circumstance was that in the academic year 1995-96, the Retriever accidentally published two separate versions of Volume 31 – one for fall, and one for spring, before continuing with Volumes 32 and 33 in 1996-97. This means that since spring 1996, every volume of The Retriever has been one number short!

Special Collections is located on the first floor of the library behind the gallery. We are open Monday through Friday from 1-4pm, on Thursdays from 1-8pm, and by appointment.

The Summer Undergraduate Research Opportunity in Chemistry (SUROC) provides students from outside the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill an opportunity to engage in hands-on cutting edge research in our state of the art facilities. This is an opportunity to experience Carolina Chemistry, recognized by ACS as one of the top ten graduate programs.

During the 10 weeks of research, students will be exposed to the various facets of independent research. A small cohort of 10 students will work together building a strong scholarly foundation. The experience will be heightened with the opportunities outside the hands-on laboratory work: site visits to large pharmaceutical and small startup companies; introduction to scientific entrepreneurship; experience presenting scientific research; training in research ethics; and exposure to chemical equipment and facilities.

This post was written by Special Collections Graduate Assistant Nichole Zang. Thank you, Nichole!

UMBC Special Collections is pleased to announce that the Office of Institutional Advancement records are now open to researchers! This collection contains newspaper clippings, press releases, Office of Arts and Management publications, and information on UMBC faculty and departments from the 1960s through 2009. This collection is useful tool for any researcher looking into the university’s exciting past.

The first series of the collection is composed of about forty years of newspaper clippings relating to UMBC. The many clippings in these files share parallels for what we may see around campus today. In August of 1975, for example, construction on the Library Pond began as a flood control dam, creating a scene not unlike the one students walk past on their way to class every day. Come see what other exciting news stories were written about UMBC over the past 50 years!

For anyone looking for the university’s statements on university events between 1963 and 1991, this is also the collection to choose! Series II of the collection contains press releases from those years, arranged by date. The Office of University Relations created the releases for the media in order to inform them of commencements, awards ceremonies, campus events, and other university news. One of these releases describes the festivities of the Fine Arts Building’s open house in November 1975. The newly constructed building was intended to house the visual and performing arts concentrations, as well as art exhibits and performances.

Are you interested in past UMBC art, dance, or gallery events? The Office of Arts Management series of the collection includes publications and photographs printed for advertisement of various shows throughout campus, including Shakespeare on Wheels, theatre and dance performances.

The collections also consists a select number of records regarding university faculty, departments, and other campus events from the mid-1970s to late-2000s. Topics of these files include the proposed UMBC and UMB merger, commencement ceremonies, faculty member CVs and correspondence, and the education department.

A finding aid is available on the Special Collections website.

7th National Conference on Individualized Major Programs