University Libraries

Washington University Libraries has selected the winners of the 2020 Neureuther Student Book Collection Essay Competition. The competition offers prizes to both undergraduate students and graduate students who write short essays about their personal book collections. 

Fifty-five years ago, on March 7, 1965, the events of “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Ala., forever changed the civil rights movement and the life of Rep. John Lewis. He recalled his experience in 1985 for the landmark documentary series “Eyes on the Prize.” Lewis’ interviews, along with those of Sheriff James Clark, Gov. George Wallace and others, are available online through Washington University Libraries’ Film and Media Archive.

McKelvey School of Engineering student Zach Eisner traveled to Sierra Leone, a nation with no emergency medicine, to teach 1,000 residents how to stop bleeding, conduct CPR, splint a broken bone and transport an injury victim on a motorcycle. “The taxi driver, the teacher, the person on the street — these are the people who, with the right training and support, can save lives,” Eisner said.

Clara McLeod, earth and planetary sciences librarian for University Libraries, received the 2019 Mary B. Ansari Distinguished Service Award of the Geoscience Information Society at the society’s annual meeting last month in Phoenix. The honor recognizes significant contributions to the field of geoscience information.

The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a $226,392 grant to Washington University Libraries’ Film & Media Archive to fund the “Eyes on the Prize II” Interview Digitization and Dissemination Project.

“Eyes on the Prize,” which was created and produced by Washington University in St. Louis alumnus Henry Hampton, is the recipient of the 2019 Cinema Eye Legacy Award. University Libraries has preserved and made available original interviews for the documentary on the civil rights movement.

What happened on July 4, 1776? Not what you might think. On that historic day more than 200 years ago, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence. But it would be weeks before the Founding Fathers actually signed the handwritten document now housed in the National Archives in Washington. In the meantime, official broadsides were printed and posted on courthouse doors across the colonies. One of those broadsides is now on view at Washington University.

Washington University Libraries recently received a $50,000 grant from Newman’s Own Foundation, created by late actor and philanthropist Paul Newman. The funding will support the libraries’ Modern Literature Collection and the digitization of student publications in the University Archives.

In its second installment, WashU Spaces visits the University Libraries Preservation Lab on the West Campus. The lab repairs and restores hundreds of damaged books every year.

Angela Bauman, director of admissions operations for Olin Business School’s Executive MBA program, and Nadia Ghasedi, associate university librarian for University Libraries, were selected for the fall 2017 class of FOCUS St. Louis’ Emerging Leaders program.