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Arts, Architecture & Literature in Special Collections

This guide offers brief descriptions of relevant art, architecture, and literature collections. Links are provided whenever online inventories exist.

Performing Arts Related Guides

Teaching with Primary Source Materials

Our collections exist to be used. When students work directly with primary source materials, historic photographs, and documents that are old or unique, they discover an excitement and passion not generated by textbooks.

Primary source documents can inspire, but they also teach about learning to verify sources, tracking down connections, finding evidence from content and from physical clues.

Performing Artists and Musicians | SCUA Collections Documenting Women, Gender, and Sexuality

Special Collections and University Archives collects in the topical area Women, Gender, and Sexuality, including Women’s Back to the Land movement, women linguists focusing on gender issues in language, women who have affected the political process and cultural landscape.

Bogart, Mayo Methot. (1904-1951)

Memorabilia. 1910-1950. 1 box.
Mayo Methot was a child actress and later the third wife of Humphrey Bogart. The collection includes photographs, letters, and memorabilia.
(CA B633/PH103)

Kelly, Katherine Wick (1887-1937).

In Frederic C. McConnell Papers. 1913-1968. 4.5 ft.
Katherine Wick Kelly was an actress and playwright with the Cleveland Play House. Her papers include diaries, 1906 to 1926; manuscripts by Kelly; records and notes of the Cleveland Play House; and correspondence.
(Ax 513)

Prescott, Nettie, collector.

Scrapbooks. 1884-1890. 2 volumes.
Nettie Prescott collected theater programs from Tacoma, Washington, Boston, Massachusetts, and Portland, Oregon, which she bound into scrapbooks. The collection also includes a holograph letter to Prescott from Emma Abbott, February 18, 1887.
(CA P923)

Speare, Dorothy (1897-1951).

Papers. 1914-1948. 6 ft.
Dorothy Speare was an opera singer, Hollywood writer, and teacher of creative writing at Boston University. The collection includes correspondence; manuscripts, including the play "Prima Donna" that became the motion picture One Night of Love; radio programs; and scrapbooks of her operatic career.
(Ax 366)

Williams, Jean (1876-1965).

Papers. 1941-1957. 1 box.
Jean Williams was an English-born composer. The collection includes correspondence, music, manuscripts, published works, clippings, and publicity releases.
(Ax 387)

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Preferred Citation Format for SCUA Materials

[Identification of item], Date (if known), Collection Title, Collection Number, Box and Folder number [or photo ID number], Special Collections & University Archives, University of Oregon Libraries, Eugene, Oregon.

Mission | Special Collections & University Archives

Special Collections and University Archives is the primary repository for the University of Oregon’s archives, rare books, historic photographs, and one of the largest historical manuscripts collections in the Pacific Northwest. Our mission is to acquire, preserve, and make available a clearly defined set of primary sources and rare books, reflecting the written, visual, and audio history and culture of Oregon, the Pacific Northwest, and selected aspects of American and world history. Our diverse collections support all types of research, from K–12 education to international scholarship. We strive to play an active and creative role in the teaching, research, and service missions of the University.

Historical Collection Strengths

  • Oregon history, politics, culture
  • Authors and illustrators of children’s books
  • The conservative and libertarian movement in the last half of the twentieth century
  • Popular literature, with an emphasis on Western fiction
  • Missionaries to foreign countries, especially in the Far East
  • Labor History
  • Journalism and Communications
  • Photographs of the Northwest, including the Major Lee Moorhouse and Angelus Studio collections
  • Environmental history
  • Northwest literature, including fiction by Ken Kesey, Damon Knight, Kate Wilhelm, Ursula K. Le Guin, Molly Gloss, and William Stafford
  • Doris Ulmann photograph archives of Appalachia
  • Utopian and intentional communities
  • Northwest architecture
  • Northwest economic history