The Civil War photograph album collection contains one photographic album with portraits of famous Confederate and Union statesmen and army officials from the Civil War era, including President Abraham Lincoln, Union Army General and President Ulysses Grant, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, W. F. Cody or "Buffalo Bill," Whig Party politician Edward Everett, Confederate Army General A. P. Hill, Confederate Army General J. E. B. Stuart, Union Army General and Senator Ambrose Everett Burnside, Union General George Meade, and Union General John McClernand.
The pamphlets, published in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, consist of political essays, economic commentaries, treatises on the poor, religious sermons, speeches on current events of the time, reports to government, notes on history, almanacs, plays, music and literature.
The Laurence Donovan Papers include correspondence, poetry, artwork, book reviews, writings, subject files, and other documents concerning the life and career of Laurence Donovan, an English professor at the University of Miami.
The correspondence dates from 1945-2001, and includes letters from Donovan’s family, friends, and professional associates. It provides insight into Donovan’s personal life, in addition to documenting his writing, artwork, and teaching. Most of the letters are incoming, but the series does contain some outgoing letters.
The collection also contains poetry, artwork, and writings by Donovan. The poetry includes typescripts and published poems. The typescripts are undated, and some have handwritten revisions. The artwork includes a small selection of Donovan’s published illustrations. The writings include typescripts and photocopies of book reviews that Donovan wrote for the Miami Herald, as well as papers and other materials.
The subject files include materials related to Donovan’s teaching and work at the University of Miami, as well as his poetry and artwork. Also included are articles and other materials about literary figures and works; programs and flyers for exhibitions, readings, shows, and other events; and writings and other materials by and about his friends and colleagues.
The Edgar Hay Papers contain articles, short stories and other writings, correspondence, photographs and scrapbooks with clippings of the column "Show Folks" which he wrote for the Miami Herald.
The Aldemaro Romero Archive is comprised of the artistic and intellectual production of the Venezuelan composer from 1945 to his death in 2007. His collection is divided in two sections: concert and popular music. Aldemaro Romero's concert collection is made of one hundred original manuscripts and copies of scores with works for symphonic orchestra, chorus and orchestra, solo concerts for wind and string instruments with orchestra, and chamber music. The popular music collection contains 126 songs and 31 instrumental works (vol. 1 and vol. 20), manuscripts and copies of the lead sheets and/or lyrics and recordings.
The Evelyn Frink Scrapbook documents the activities of the Miami Beach garden clubs that led to the construction of the Miami Beach Garden Center and Conservatory. The clippings, photographs, reports, speeches and correspondence capture Mrs. Frink’s work as chairman of the Garden Center Committee from its inception to the inauguration of the garden center and conservatory.
A comprehensive and eclectic collection of contortionist images. Subjects include contortionists performing before audiences; child contortionists; twin contortionists; families of contortionists; contortionists posing privately in apparent studio settings; in costume; in various states of undress; indoors and outdoors; etc.
Richard A. Kahn was a lawyer and economist who taught economics and business law courses, published numerous articles and held a variety of positions in the United States government. The Richard A. Kahn Papers, arranged in three series, contain correspondence, newspaper clippings, book manuscripts, copies of published articles, and marketing research. Much of the content of this collection concerns his work with various fishery institutions, such as the U.S. Branch of Commercial Fisheries and the Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute.
Author Laura Kalpakian, described by some critics as one of the "most unheralded, brightest talents" in the country, has published several novels and short story collections, novellas, short stories, essays and interviews for magazines and newspapers including Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, and Hawaii Review.
The Laura Kalpakian Papers contain manuscripts and drafts of stories, novels, and speeches. Correspondence relates to the creation and publication of several works. Writings are arranged in chronological order within three series: Novels, Short Stories and Other Writings, and Short Story Collections.
Ephemera, exhibition catalogs, newsletters, and books related to Miami's contemporary art scene. Items featured in the collection document much of César Trasobares' personal life work as a local Cuban-American artist whose pieces often illustrate ties to his heritage as well as touching upon various topics, such as poverty, homosexuality, religion, social issues, and personal expression.
The Firefly Zine collection is a collection of zines donated to the University of Miami Libraries by former residents of the Firefly, a local Miami collective house and important part of Miami's punk rock and activist subcultures. There are over 2,000 zines held in the collection.
Zines are typically independent and self published booklets popular in underground subcultures. The first zines were fanzines, started in the early 20th century by science fiction fans documenting the genre. The format truly took off with the punk rock movement of the 1970s, as a do-it-yourself spirit inspired legions of underground punk fans to start raw but vibrant journals documenting the nascent music scenes in their communities. Zine topics would broaden throughout the 1980s and 1990s to cover a variety of subject areas, from comics to anarchist politics to women’s rights, to more mundane subjects like dumpster diving, alternative fashions, tattoo art, and much more. Despite the expansion of topics, the format usually remained the same—self-published booklets printed in limited editions and typically produced with a photocopy machine.
The Firefly Zine collection in particular is significant for its materials documenting political beliefs and causes such as anarchism, direct action, women's rights, lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender (LGBT) rights and environmentalism. There are also many zines about the punk rock music scene and subculture, the rights of indigenous peoples, and alternative forms of transportation such as bicycles. As with many zine libraries, there is also a strong collection of zines that are of a more personal nature. Zines about South Florida, Latin America and the Caribbean regions—important collection areas of University of Miami Special Collections—are also significant in number.
The Jean P. Lesperance Papers consist of correspondence, articles, book manuscripts, and newspaper clippings relating to the merging field of management studies. Lesperance joined the University of Miami faculty in 1947and taught management courses. He later served as the director of the Time and Motion Study Laboratory.
FAULTY PRODUCTS 1978-80. Small archive of official records from the Independent Label, "Faulty Products." Various concert fliers, correspondence between owners of the record company, and newspaper articles from different sources on the bands signed by the label. This label was established by Miles Copeland initially to distribute a welter of new musical talent that emerged in 1977, in the period of "punk rock," via its three in-house record labels, Illegal Records, Step Forward Records, and Deptford Fun City Records.
The M.S. Mishler Collection consists of two account books of Mr. M.S. Mishler and one account book of the Little River Mutual Telephone Co. of Little River, Florida. Mr. Mishler and his family moved in 1899 from Chicago to Little River, an area south of Opa-Locka and east of Hialeah in Miami-Dade County. The account books also contain notes and clippings regarding South Florida weather and the hurricane of 1926.
The records of the Save the Alhambra Water Tower Committee document the successful mission of a local historic preservation organization to protect the Alhambra Water Tower, a Coral Gables landmark. The collection includes scrapbooks, committee records, financial documents, photographs, and minutes of meetings.
The Alhambra Water Tower, once a functional part of the Coral Gables water system, has survived time and weathering to remain an architectural symbol of the community. The Save the Alhambra Water Tower Committee raised money and awareness to contribute to the refurbishment and preservation of the historic structure.
Carlos Sanz was the author of several articles and books dealing with cartography and the discovery of the New World. The Sanz map collection includes 19 reproductions of maps and charts originally published between 1482 and 1598 by well known cartographers such as Mercator, Juan de la Cosa, Contarini, and Ptolemy. These maps form part of 50 items reproduced and published with a commentary by Sanz in his two volume work entitled Mapas antiguos del mundo: (siglos XV-XVI) (Madrid, 1962).
Between August 1964 and December 1968, the Rand Corporation, under contract to the U.S. Department of Defense, conducted approximately 2,400 interviews with Vietnamese who were familiar with activities of the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army. Reports of these interviews, totalizing approximately 62,000 pages, constitute a rich source of information about political and military upheaval in a developing country, Vietnamese rural life, the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese armed forces and many related subjects. The documents describe conversations with prisoners captured by South Vietnamese or U.S. forces, defectors who voluntarily left the Viet Cong or the North Vietnamese Army as well as refugees from battle areas. Many of the reports have a poignant, human quality; nearly all are informative about conditions in Vietnam. In December 1971, action was initiated to make these interview reports available to the public. The decision to provide access to these documents entailed a scrupulous double reading of all the reports and blocking out of information that might enable identification of the respondents.
The University of Miami holds approximate 1,780 (48,000 pages) out of the 2,400 interviews conducted under this study.
The Lester L. Evans Collection contains U.S. newspaper clippings of cartoons and caricatures published during World War II. Many of the clippings are from the Chicago Sun-Times, the Times Herald, the Times-Picayune from New Orleans, the Kansas City Star, the Detroit News, the Washington Post, the New York Times, the New York Post, and the Los Angeles Times.
