Special Collections News

Chad Williams will give a talk on the wartime experience of African American soldiers in World War I and the rise of the New Negro as part of The U.S. in the First World War, a lecture series commemorating the centennial of the entrance of the United States into World War I, sponsored by the department of history and the Willson Center and the UGA Libraries. He will speak Oct. 19 at 7 p.m. in the auditorium of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries.

Chad Williams is associate professor of African and Afro-American studies at Brandeis University. He is the author of Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers in the World War I Era and co-editor, with Kidada E. Williams and Keisha N. Blain, of Charleston Syllabus: Readings on Race, Racism, and Racial Violence, published in 2016 by the University of Georgia Press.

Lynn Dumenil will give a talk on “Modern American Women and World War I” as part of The U.S. in the First World War Oct. 5 at 7 p.m. in the auditorium of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries. This is a lecture series commemorating the centennial of the entrance of the United States into World War I, sponsored by the department of history and the Willson Center and the UGA Libraries.

  The Odum School of Ecology kicks off a celebration of its tenth anniversary—and the fiftieth of its precursor, the Institute of Ecology—with a lecture, discussion and pair of exhibitions at the Richard B. Russell Special Collections Library on Sept. 14 at 4:30 p.m. Featured speakers include Betty Jean Craige, University Professor of Comparative Literature Emerita and Director Emerita of the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts; David C. Coleman, Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus of Ecology; and James W. Porter, Meigs Professor of Ecology Emeritus.

During the era of Prohibition Americans could no longer manufacture, sell, or transport intoxicating beverages. Spirited: Prohibition in America, a new exhibition opening Sept. 1 at the UGA Special Collections Libraries explores this tumultuous time in American history, when flappers and suffragists, bootleggers and temperance lobbyists, and legends, such as Al Capone and Carrie Nation, took sides in this battle against the bottle.

Visitors will learn about the complex issues that led America to adopt Prohibition through the 18th Amendment to the Constitution in 1919 until its repeal through the 21st Amendment in 1933. The amendment process, the changing role of liquor in American culture, Prohibition’s impact on the roaring ‘20s, and the role of women, and how current liquor laws vary from state to state are among the topics addressed.

 The formative years of UGA’s football program is the focus of a new exhibit, “Covered With Glory: Football at UGA, 1892-1917” this fall at the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

Rarely seen artifacts and photographs from UGA’s earliest gridiron heroes are featured. Visitors will learn about: coaching legend Glenn ‘Pop’ Warner, the first UGA football coach to coach for more than one year; ‘War Eagle’ Ketron, who overcame parental objections to become one of Georgia’s greatest players of the 1900s; and Herty Field, the campus site of so many early battles.  The tragic story of Von Gammon, a UGA football player whose death during a game against the University of Virginia in 1897 nearly ended the UGA football program, is highlighted.

An extraordinary educator who took over operations of the family farm after his father 's death, Andrew Avery helped create the Decatur County Peanutorama, highlighting the crop and the surrounding county's contribution to its marketing.

Avery’s family has donated his papers to the University of Georgia Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, including correspondence, photographs, printed material, notes, legal documents, plats, and various ephemera.  Of note is the scrapbook documenting farm improvements he made for the Atlanta Constitution's Plant-to-Prosper contest of 1938, which he won, as well as many photographs of schools he was involved with in southwest Georgia.

A new exhibit on display in the rotunda of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries examines the history of a preservation non-profit celebrating its fiftieth anniversary in 2017. On display through August 25, Saving Athens: Celebrating 50 Years of the Athens-Clarke Heritage Foundation looks at the efforts of this local group to protect and preserve the the physical history of the Athens, Georgia. 

Gold nuggets, historic maps, photographs, postcards and other artifacts help tell the story of Georgia’s antebellum gold rush – which preceded the frenzy in California by two decades – in an exhibit at the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

Opening June 5, the exhibit features a complete set of Dahlonega Mint coins and illustrates how this  early development of southern industrialization, while profitable, was also destructive as it remade local economies, societies, and environments. In pursuit of wealth, miners ripped apart stream beds and hillsides, cut down forests, and erected miles of wooden flumes and towns of wooden shacks. Public and private mints sprang up to transform precious metal into currency and, with the help of the state and federal governments, speculators obsessed with the prospect of riches drove the Cherokee from Georgia.

The Hargrett Library and the ITA Men’s Tennis Hall of Fame will be co-hosting a panel discussion on the history of the NCAA Tennis Championships in Athens on Wednesday, May 3, at the University of Georgia’s Richard B. Russell Special Collection Libraries. The discussion is free and open to the public, and will run from 5:30-6:30 p.m.

When the NCAAs return to Athens for the 29th time beginning May 18, it will mark the 45th anniversary of the championships’ first appearance at Georgia’s tennis facility, now called the Dan Magill Tennis Complex. Georgia men’s tennis coach Manuel Diaz was a Bulldog freshman playing for Magill when the NCAAs first arrived in 1972; he’s now in his 29th season as the Bulldogs’ head coach and has won three of his four national championships on the Dogs’ home courts.

The Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries at the University of Georgia will host its bi-annual reception celebrating new exhibitions April 13 at

5:30 p.m. The event will include live music, spotlight tours, light refreshments and gallery games. The reception is free and open to the public.

Exhibitions highlighted are: “Necessary Words & Images: 70 Years of the Georgia Review,” “Slavery at the University of Georgia,” “Equality Under the Law: History of the Equal Rights Amendment,” “A Championship Tradition: The NCAA Tennis Tournament in Athens,” "The Art of the Press Kit," and “On the Stump: What Does it Take to Get Elected in Georgia?” and “Olympic Lens: Exploring the 1996 Atlanta Games”