UCI will celebrate its 40th anniversary in 2005, and the 50th anniversary in 2015 will be here before we know it. In anticipation of these campus milestones, the Libraries have launched the Historical Records Project, a special initiative to ensure that campus history is well preserved and documented in the University Archives. Housed in the Libraries’ Department of Special Collections and Archives, the University Archives exists as the institutional memory of the university and provides the larger community with a broad historical focus on UCI’s evolution and role in society.

Left to right: Vice Chancellor L.E> Cox, architect Kenneth S. Wing, Cancellor Daniel G. Aldrich, & Dean Frederic Reines at one of the UCI's first buliding sites

The Historical Records Project is a collaborative university effort to assist the Libraries in recording and documenting UCI’s institutional history. Through this project, the Libraries are systematically collecting inactive official records; documenting important milestones and events; updating the official UCI history; and soliciting the deposit of scholarly papers of distinguished UCI faculty.

Professor Emeritus Spencer Olin was appointed by Chancellor Cicerone to work with library staff on the project. “I am thoroughly enjoying my work with the library,” said Olin. “The University Archivist and I have met with the deans and vice chancellors to promote the importance of documenting UCI history, to offer our help in encouraging them to preserve historical materials relevant to their respective units, and to transmit those materials to the University Archives. We are also implementing a UCI History Website to include various tools for research on the history of the campus.”

Spencer Olin

Plans are also under way for a symposium and library exhibit in the fall 2005 to honor UCI’s 40th birthday. “The symposium will feature discussions of land acquisition for the campus, academic planning, and UCI’s built environment,” said Olin. “We are also launching an oral history program designed to record the contributions of those faculty, staff, students, and community leaders who have been influential in the development of UCI as a major research university.”

For further information about the Historical Records Project or the University Archives, please contact Jackie Dooley, Head of Special Collections and Archives, at (949)824-4935.