Distinctive Collections
Increasing opportunities for engagement with unique, special and archival collections
The University Libraries’ Distinctive Collections offer opportunities for experiential learning and research with collections unique to Western or items with limited availability. This includes our Digital Collections, Regional History Collections, Special Collections and the WMU Archives.
Digital Collections
We preserve our scholarly and cultural legacies for future generations by digitally expanding, enhancing and preserving our collections and scholarly efforts developed in cooperation with the WMU community and strategic partners.
We also engage students in community-based digital storytelling projects, including capturing oral histories and cultural heritage materials to create digital collections.
Your gift to the Dwight B. Waldo Library Development Fund helps us digitize and preserve our community’s cultural and historical legacies, expanding access to these one-of-a-kind resources for researchers and students.
WMU Archives
We preserve the University’s history through yearbooks, catalogs, photographs, publications, scrapbooks and artifacts. We also digitally conserve versions of yearbooks, music performances, oral histories and the Western Herald newspapers.
Regional History
We reposit artifacts and historical records from southwest Michigan, including public records of 12 counties: Allegan, Barry, Berrien, Branch, Calhoun, Cass, Kalamazoo, Kent, Muskegon, Ottawa, St. Joseph and Van Buren. These collections consist of letters, diaries, business records, organizational records, photographs, publications, newspapers and other materials documenting southwest Michigan’s social, business, political and institutional history.
Your support for the Archives and Regional History Collections Fund helps preserve and share the unique stories, voices and artifacts that define Western and our region.
Special Collections
We support teaching, research and community engagement at the Zhang Legacy Collections Center. Hundreds of students visit annually to get hands-on experience with unique and specialized materials, enriching their futures by broadening their educational experience and honing their analytical skills by observing physical artifacts.
This cornucopia includes the David Small and Sarah Stewart Archive, medieval manuscripts, children’s pop-up books, women’s poetry, WWII documents and many other holdings that support curricular and research needs.
Support the Special Collections Endowment and help students explore history firsthand through rare and remarkable collections that bring the past to life.