In January our colleagues in Technical Services and Cataloging added 73 items to Special Collections holdings.  Most (50 or so) fed into the main print collection (which we call REST) with several filling out the general rare books collection (which we call ‘C’) and the Taylor hymnal collection.  Of the 73, about 30 titles joined the bound REST periodicals collection.

We have a student worker dedicated to working on tracts and pamphlets for REST, and she is back at work.  I expect to see many more additions throughout the spring semester.

With a new year, I found a different old library photo to adorn these monthly updates. For 2023 we will use this photograph of the library from the old downtown campus…from the 1917 Prickly Pear.

Library, Abilene Christian College, 1917. The library was in the Administration Building on the old downtown campus. The Prickly Pear Yearbook for 1917 is available at: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth39970/m1/44/

Our goal is to build a comprehensive research-level collection of print materials by, for, and about the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement.  But beyond assembly and preservation, a collection should be discoverable by those who need the information.  Collecting and preserving is only part of our task; those objects must be described and made available.  Thanks to the close and careful work of our colleagues upstairs, who describe our holdings, these materials are now discoverable. By discoverable I mean a patron can utilize our online catalog (such as by searching by author, or title, or subject) to find these materials.

73 new items…cataloged, shelved, and ready for research: