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UNLV Special Collections in the News

Image  featured in the Mid-Century modern exhibit in Special Collections. from the Glenwood Development brochure, Farnsworth Collection, MS-00177

We are thrilled that the work of Special Collections staff has been the subject of recent feature articles in the local Las Vegas press:

The French Connection exhibit curated by Karla Irwin was highlighted in the Las Vegas Weekly : UNLV Exhibit Takes Historical Look at the Feather-Decked Icon of the Vegas Showgirl.…Read More

Las Vegas Pride! by Franklin Howard

For many in the LGBT community, summer is a season of travel and celebration. Beginning in June, cities across the United States hold LGBT Pride parades and festivals that draw thousands from the community and its allies. Las Vegas is no exception—the Las Vegas Pride Night Parade will be held on September 18th this year. The Southern Nevada Association of Pride, Inc. (SNAPI) has been in charge of planning Las Vegas LGBT Pride since 1995 and Special Collections has some of the records of one of its executive members, Strutt Hurley, from the early years of the organization.


Hurley was the Director of Entertainment of SNAPI in 1996 and 1997 and her collection features documents that demonstrate how the parades and Pride events were constructed. Among the documents…Read More

Exhibit Highlight: From Tract House To Bauhaus The Modern House In Mid-Century Las Vegas

Illustrations:  Paradise Palms housing development brochure. From the Farnsworth Collection MS-00497.

Special Collections Curator Peter Michel has created a new exhibit about mid-century modern home design in Las Vegas.  The exhibit cases feature original architectural designs drawn from UNLV's collections on architects Elmo Bruner, James B. McDaniel and Dale Scheideman as well as the Las Vegas Historical Building Survey Collection, historical housing development…Read More

Staff Highlight: Our Award-Winning Staff

Some of our award-winning staff:  Su Kim Chung, Lindsay Oden, Cyndi Shein, and Michael Frazier. Not pictured: Silvia Southwick. 

The spring 2015 semester saw a number of Special Collections staff honored for their work both in the UNLV Libraries and campus-wide. Please join us in congratulating our staff on their accomplishments!

Special Collections Head of Public Services Su Kim Chung was selected as "McPhee Librarian of the Year" by her peers in the UNLV Libraries.  She was nominated by Director of Special Collections, Michelle Light. …Read More

Eadington Gaming Fellow Monica Steinberg | In Residence June 1-June 30

Steinberg is a Doctoral Candidate in Art History at The Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Her work focuses on the intersections of humor, identity, and contemporary art in the global context. She has contributed to exhibition catalogues including “The Abstract Impulse” (New York, 2007), “The Commonist” (Baku, 2012) and the Venice Biennale’s “Love Me, Love Me Not: Contemporary Art from Azerbaijan” (Venice, 2013); and is currently a Lecturer in the Department of Art and Art History at Tufts University.

Within UNLV Special Collections, Steinberg will conduct research for an article-length project examining aspects of chance and risk that informed…Read More

Staff Highlight: Welcome Summer Interns 2015

Thanks to funding from the Libraries Advisory Board, Special Collections welcomed a new 2015 summer intern cohort of UNLV graduate students this week who will be working on two important projects.

Building on the work of our summer 2014 cohort, history graduate students Kayla McDuffie, Franklin Howard, John Grygo, and Angela Moor will continue work on manuscript collection finding aids using the ArchivesSpace archival collection management system.

Their work will enable us to place many more manuscript collection guides (also known as finding aids) online, making them available to the public. Researchers will then be able to discover more of the rich historical material available in our collections.

Joseph Belmonte, a graduate student in criminal justice, will be working on the Pit…Read More

Celebrating Asian-Pacific Heritage Month: A Look at Asian-Pacific Entertainers on the Las Vegas Strip

Las Vegas Show Programs Collection MS-00333

Entertainment on the Las Vegas Strip has a rich and glamorous history .  It most commonly brings to mind images of the Rat Pack cavorting on stage in the Copa Room at the Sands Hotel or of glittering showgirls descending staircases in spectacular headdresses in elaborate production shows such as the Lido de Paris or Folies Bergere.  Perhaps less known were the contributions of performers of Asian-Pacific heritage – those of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Hawaiian, Filipino, Polynesian and Tahitian ancestry for example.

In celebration of Asian…Read More

Eadington Lecture Preview- An Enchanting Witchcraft: Masculinity, Melancholy, and the Pathology of Gaming in Early Modern London

Read more about Eadington Fellow Celeste Chamberland's research in Special Collections on gambling and addiction in 17th century London and come to the lecture "An Enchanting Witchcraft: Masculinity, Melancholy, and the Pathology of Gaming in Early Modern London" on Thursday, May 14 at 3pm in the Goldfield Room, Lied Library, UNLV campus.

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Eadington Gaming Fellow Celeste Chamberland | In Residence May 4 - May 15

Dr. Celeste Chamberland holds a copy of The Compleat Gamster from the historical gaming collection in UNLV Special Collections.

Dr. Celeste Chamberland holds a copy of Cotton's The Compleat Gamester (1680) from the historical gaming collection in UNLV Special Collections. It is protected by a specially-designed clamshell box made by UNLV Libraries Conservator Michael Frazier. 

Chamberland (Ph.D., University of California, Davis, 2004) is currently an Associate Professor of History at Roosevelt University. Specializing in early…Read More

Event Highlight: Celebrating the French Connection: May 17 Panel Discussion

Special Collections librarian, Karla Irwin, is busy installing her exhibit "The French Connection: Lido de Paris and Folies Bergere in Las Vegas" this week on the 1st floor of Lied Library. To celebrate the opening of this fabulous exhibit we will be holding a panel discussion on May 17 (2-4pm)  with long-time Folies Bergere creative director and choregrapher Jerry Jackson, and former dancers and showgirls Jillian Hrushowy, Dawnie Sachs, and Trenna Howard. Please join us!

Admission is free and the public is welcome, but please RSVP as seating is limited: https://www.library.unlv.edu/…Read More

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