Special Collections
- For in-depth research questions, including anything involving the Wadsworth Family Papers or the Carl Schmidt Collection in Historic Architecture, please make an appointment using our Consultation Form.
- To request access to specific in-library use special collections items, please use ourform.
- For all other inquiries, please email the Special Collections Librarian at argente@geneseo.edu or call 585-245-5194.
College Archives Collection
The College Archives Collection includes faculty publications, books published by alumni and students, yearbooks, the Lamron (student newspaper), ENCompass (college newspaper), departmental and alumni newsletters, photographs, and more.
Martha Blow Wadsworth Photographs
A subcollection of the Wadsworth Family Papers, this includes thirty-three albums, and approximately 350 glass lantern slides, of photographs taken by Martha Blow Wadsworth (1864-1934) between 1890 and World War I.
Walter Harding Collection
The Walter Harding Collection consists primarily of Harding's writings about Henry David Thoreau and transcendentalism. Harding, a member of SUNY Geneseo's English faculty from 1956 until his retirement in 1983, was one of the 20th century's most prominent Thoreau scholars.
Carl Schmidt Collection in Historic Architecture
The Carl F. Schmidt (1894-1988) Collection includes notes, manuscripts, slides, photographs, pencil sketches and measured drawings created and collected by Schmidt in preparing his many books on historical architecture, which focus primarily on homes in the Genesee Valley area.
Traditional Music & Dance in NY State
The James W. Kimball Traditional Music and Dance in New York State Collection is a curated selection of Kimball’s significant research recordings between 1976-2008, and includes unique interviews and community performances of notable fiddlers, square dance callers, dance musicians, and community members whose knowledge bridges 19th-century repertory to contemporary practice of the tradition.
Genesee Valley Historical Collection
The Genesee Valley Historical Collection is the Library's largest and most accessible collection of local history materials. Its geographical scope covers eight counties surrounding the Genesee River in New York State.
Wadsworth Family Papers
The Wadsworth Collections concern the first and continued settlement of land in the Genesee region known as the Phelps and Gorham Purchase, and cover the years 1790 to about 1950.
"X" Special Collection
The "X" Special Collection consists mainly of rare books held by the Library, plus books that are extremely fragile and/or valuable. It also includes an extensive collection of writings by and about Aldous Huxley and portions of the Walter Harding Collection. (The "X" Special Collection is so called because all of the call numbers within it are preceded by an "X.")
