The University of Kansas

Inside Spencer: The KSRL Blog

Books on a shelf

Welcome to the Kenneth Spencer Research Library blog! As the special collections and archives library at the University of Kansas, Spencer is home to remarkable and diverse collections of rare and unique items. Explore the blog to learn about the work we do and the materials we collect.

Throwback Thursday: Cap and Gown Edition

May 16th, 2019

Each week we’ll be posting a photograph from University Archives that shows a scene from KU’s past. We’ve also scanned more than 34,800 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

Congratulations, Class of 2019! We wish each of you all the best in your future endeavors.

Photograph of KU students and Baby Jay walking down the hill at Commencement, 1974

KU students and Baby Jay walking down the hill at Commencement, 1974.
University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 0/17 1974 Slides: University General:
Commencement (Photos). Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Throwback Thursday: Commencement Edition

May 14th, 2015

Each week we’ll be posting a photograph from University Archives that shows a scene from KU’s past. We’ve also scanned more than 5,000 images from KU’s University Archives and made them available online; be sure to check them out!

Congratulations to the Class of 2015! We wish each of you all the best in your future endeavors.

Photograph of KU graduates walking down the hill to Memorial Stadium, 1950s

Photograph of KU graduates walking down the hill to Memorial Stadium, 1950s

KU graduates walking down Mount Oread to Memorial Stadium, 1950s.
University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 0/17 1950s Negatives:
University General: Commencement (Photos). Click images to enlarge.

Author and former KU chemistry professor Robert Taft provides a wonderful description of the KU graduation tradition shown in these pictures in Across the Years on Mount Oread (1941):

For the graduate of recent years and for many spectators, no Commencement sight has been more impressive than the long line of graduates marching down over Mount Oread from Strong Hall to the Stadium in the glory of a June evening [or, now, a May afternoon] for the Baccalaureate and the Commencement exercises. This striking feature was initiated in the Commencement of 1924, and has – weather permitting – been carried out annually since that day. Many and bitter have been the tears of the girl graduates who have been denied this privilege by the vagaries of the weather, and even the prosaic and matter-of-fact males must have felt some twinge of regret, when the same favor was withheld (104).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt, Megan Sims, and Abbey Ulrich
Public Services Student Assistants