Drexel Archives

From today's DREXEL DAILY DIGEST.  Be sure to join us for the Library's Welcome Back Week event! and cook up a masterpiece.

Make Your Own Book at Hagerty Library
10 a.m. to 4 p.m., W.W. Hagerty Library, first floor atrium (33rd and Market Streets)
Students can add to the Library's shelves with their own masterpiece.

For a limited time the Archives will be offering Saturday hours!

We will be open for reference questions on:

March 13, 20 and April 3, 10, 17 and 24th from 10 a.m to 2 p.m.

We will be closed Saturday March 27.

As always we are happy to help you with your archival rese

A Toy Wagon to the Moon: Wernher von Braun and Rocket Engineering

By Martha Cornog

As a 12-year-old, little Wernher was hauled in by the police for setting off explosions on the street. The child had attached fireworks to his toy wagon, trying to make a rocket-propelled car like those developed by Max Valier and Fritz von Open. At school, he did not do well at math or physics until he realized the connection with space travel, which fascinated him.

Two Sugars, Cream, and an Extra Napkin with That: Portia Isaacson and the First Computer Store

By Martha Cornog

The bar napkin and the airline napkin have long served to record innovation before the keyboard. And thus flying home from the First World Altair Convention, Portia Isaacson used a napkin to pencil in her business plan for a computer store. Her Micro Store opened in March 1976 right across the freeway from Texas Instruments, part of a transition in computing that was far from micro in scope or impact.

Celestial Space and Eternal Darkness: The Piccards’ Engineering Feats

By Martha Cornog

When your father twice beats the record for the highest balloon flight, what can you do but explore the eternal darkness of the ocean’s depths? At first, Jacques Piccard was just helping out with dad’s bathyscaphe—his real career was teaching economics at the University of Geneva. Father Auguste was internationally recognized for his adventures in the upper atmosphere, having made twenty-seven balloon flights and setting a final record of over 72,000 feet.

By Martha Cornog

Last Friday, the Drexel community began celebrating National Engineers Week with a variety of events designed to raise public awareness of how engineers make modern life—well, modern.  In perhaps the most unique event of the week, students, faculty, and staff will build a contraption to cushion an egg so it can survive a fall of over 30 feet. Fun stuff? Of course.

Make it a Historic Valentine's Day!

Create your own Valentine's Day card using vintage Drexel images  from the collections of the Drexel University Archives.

We'll provide the construction paper, glue, glitter, and scissors - bring your creativity to . . .

Hagerty Library on  Friday February 12th from 10 a.m. till 4 p.m.

We've had a great response for our processing workshop, and the workshop is currently full. Please email us at archives@drexel.edu if you'd like to be added to the waiting list, and subscribe to our blog to hear about future events in the Archives.

Update: the workshop is currently full. Please email archives@drexel.edu to sign up for the waitlist.

Ready to go beyond reading books and articles about archives? Eager to get your hands dirty with genuine historical dust? Want to see how Archivists’ Toolkit works? Join the Drexel University Archives for a hands-on archives processing workshop on Friday, February 5th, 2010, from 10-4.

"A Manner Worthy of their Importance": Drexel's Standish Collection of Rare Books
Reception Wednesday January 27th from 4 to 6 p.m
on the lower level of Hagerty Library.

In 1898 the Drexel Institute received a large donation of rare books from George Miles Standish.  Starting as a campus treasure, over the decades the Standish collection became a burden to be disposed of, as confusion over the origin and purpose of the books mounted.  As appreciation for the collection again rises, the collection's trials and tribulations shed light on shifting library culture and preferences