Silva said the collection takes many forms, including published and unpublished materials, manuscripts, photographs, photo negatives, slides, printed and electronic records, microfilm, audio-visual recordings and architectural drawings. “Our most important users are the students of Slippery Rock University, but we also support the administration and faculty. Beyond that, if the general public has questions – grandpa went to school here and you want a picture – we do a lot of that too,” Silva said. “From a local historical perspective, we do a lot of genealogy work.” “We like to think of ourselves particularly as preservationists,” said McLatchy. Professors take advantage of archives for teachable moments. Three English faculty members recently took their classes to the archives to read original source materials that included old letters; honors geography students completed a project based on local records through the decades, and history students have been conducting research about SRU students who served during World War II. Archives and special collections’ holdings include items hundreds of years old and the contemporary. One of the oldest pieces, a book of poetry by English author Katherine Philips, dates to 1669. One book – the rarest in the collection – is sheathed in acid-free paper and has been featured in Polish and German journals and The Rocket student newspaper even though it is only 40 years old and written in Spanish. “El Largo Viaje” (The Long Journey) attracts attention because the book is bound in human skin. “This is probably our most unique and controversial item in the library,” said Silva. “We’ve decided as a faculty to offer it to a more appropriate collection. Meanwhile, people keep asking me about it. People can come and look at it. It has been documented to be human skin,” she said. A new cache includes the late Madame Nein Cheng’s personal library of more than 1,200 books. Cheng, a friend of Lou Razzano, SRU associate provost emeritus, was a Chinese political prisoner and author of the acclaimed memoir “Life and Death in Shanghai.” Chang, who died in 2009, bequeathed the entire corpus of her intellectual life to SRU, including the original manuscript of her book, personal papers, correspondence
and journals. The works provide insight into China’s “closed” history and will be of interest to researchers for years, Silva said. The archives, on the third floor of Bailey, also provide educational employment opportunities. Phipps, a history and English major from Slippery Rock, joined the office in 2010. She assists in the preservation and organization of materials coming into archives, which includes transcribing oral histories and the migration of materials to new formats. “Working in archives is particularly interesting to me because of what the pres-
ervation means,” she said. “For centuries, much of the past has been lost to us because records were not kept and important items were not preserved. I like to play a part in making sure that nothing – or very little – is lost from the current period in history.” Phipps said she majored in history to immerse herself in the past and learn from great thinkers and achievers from hundreds or even thousands of years ago. “To have that kind of influence even today is one of the more remarkable traits of historical people,” she said. Phipps’ experience is providing career preparation. She aspires to become a museum curator and plans to pursue a master’s degree in museum studies. “My position at the Bailey Library archives is giving me the real-world experience that I will need one day to succeed in my chosen profession,” she said. El Largo Viaje, by Tere Medina and published in 1972, is a book of erotic Spanish poetry. According to a write up affixed to the book, the Aguadilla tribe of the Mayaguez Plateau region preserves the torso layer of deceased tribal members. While most of the leather is put to utilitarian use, some finds its way into commercial trade markets. Silva said she did some research and determined that Bailey’s edition was the only one bound in human skin. She said the library does not know how SRU acquired the book or how much it originally cost. The book is kept in an acid-free box alongside other rare books, demonstrating the depth of SRU archives. “We have a gold mine of scholarly resources here,” Silva said.
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