Kenneth Spencer Research Library

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!

Today is Move-In Day, and new and returning Jayhawks are arriving on Mount Oread. This week’s post features a verbal description and visual depiction of what this looked like at the beginning of KU’s 1928-1929 academic year, according to the 1929 Jayhawker yearbook.

Happy greetings…hand shaking…taxis whizzing away loaded with newly arrived students…perspiring baggagemen swearing at an avalanche of trunks and suitcases…The sleepy town of Lawrence suddenly awakened to the realization that another nine months session had begun at K.U.

Selected pages from the 1929 Jayhawker yearbook. University Archives.
Call Number: LD 2697 .J3 1929. Click images to enlarge.

Subsequent pages in the yearbook describe the high points of the first week of freshman life at KU. Some events are familiar to modern students, for example participating in fraternity and sorority recruitment and learning about university customs and traditions. Other events – like taking a psychological examination, attending teas, and registering and enrolling for fall classes right before the beginning of the semester – would be foreign.

Selected pages from the 1929 Jayhawker yearbook. University Archives.
Call Number: LD 2697 .J3 1929. Click images to enlarge.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

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!

Fall classes start in a little over one week, and students are already starting to return to Mount Oread.

Two students on campus, circa 1940-1949. Note the freshman beanie.
Photo by Duke D’Ambra. University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG 71/0 1940s Negatives: Student Activities (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

The students in the photo are standing in front of Old Fraser Hall (located roughly where modern Fraser now stands). Our best guess is that they’re on the east side of the building, near the lilac hedges across from Battenfeld and Watkins Scholarship Halls on Lilac Lane.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

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!

Students at Potter Lake, 1981. T. Ontko, photographer.
University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 0/24/1 Potter Lake 1981 Prints:
Campus: Areas and Objects (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

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!

Wimbledon is underway this week, so today’s photograph features some of KU’s early tennis players.

The KU women’s tennis club, 1892. University Archives Photos.
Call Number: RG 66/20/18 1892 Prints: Athletic Department: Women’s Tennis (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

Information on the back side of the photograph indicates that it was taken at Christmas in 1892. From left to right, standing, are Jeannette Wheeler, Grace Colwell, Genevieve Howland Chalkley, Edith Snow, May Gardner, Hattie Ayres, and Jo Bassett. Seated from left to right are Grace Poff, Louise Towne, Anna Drake, and Madge Bullene.

Note that the left side of the image is stamped “DaLee’s Art Gallery, South Tennessee St., Lawrence, Kas.” Lawrence city directories place the gallery at 1537 Tennessee, which is the current address of KU’s Pi Kappa Phi fraternity chapter. Amon G. DaLee was an early photographer in Lawrence, arriving by 1860. DaLee passed away in 1879, and the 1880 census lists his widow Martha working as a photographer, apparently maintaining her husband’s business. By 1890-1891, photographer Elmer E. Willis was the manager of DaLee’s Studio.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt
Public Services Student Assistant

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!

Summer is great time for grilling and barbecuing!

Buffalo Barbecue at Memorial Stadium (visible in the background), 1961.
University Archives Photos. Call Number: RG 71/66/14 1961/1962 Prints:
Student Activities: Sports: Football Fans (Photos).
Click image to enlarge (redirect to Spencer’s digital collections).

The Buffalo Barbecue was held on Saturday, April 22, 1961, just after the Kansas Relays parade in downtown Lawrence.

Reporting on a dry run of the event earlier in the week, the Lawrence Journal-World stated that “entertainment at the barbecue includes square dancing, western band, barber shop quartet and folk singing. Tickets are $1.50 each. Four serving lines will ensure quick service for everyone.” The newspaper anticipated that 2,000 people would attend.

The barbecue also culminated a week of campus celebrations marking the centennial of Kansas statehood. According to the 1961 Jayhawker yearbook:

Hooped skirts and cowboy boots prevailed in campus dress during the K.U. Centennial Week, April 17-22. The western flavor was encouraged by the Centennial Co-ordinating Committee, composed of the major Hill organizations, the dormitory councils, the Douglas County Centennial Committee, and the K.U. administration. Even Chancellor Wescoe yielded to the spirit of pioneer Kansas with a carriage ride to his office Thursday. Drama was added Friday noon when the Registrar’s office suffered a staged payroll robbery. Four of the kidnapper-gunmen were captured in a running battle with the sheriffs on Strong Hall lawn, to the delight of the spectators. A Zone X square dance Friday night led into the Centennial K.U. Relays the next day (446-447).

Whether or not buffalo was actually on the menu at the barbecue remains undetermined.

Caitlin Donnelly
Head of Public Services

Melissa Kleinschmidt
Public Services Student Assistant