This blog post was written by Lynn Eaton, Director of the Special Collections Research Center.
Another school year begins, and the Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) team of archivists and records managers is excited to welcome students and faculty back to campus! A lot has happened over the past couple of months, and I’d like to share a few highlights from our summer.
James Buchanan receiving the Nobel Prize in Economics.
On August 21, our new Records Management Analyst/Specialist begins! Clancy Smith brings records analyst experience from her time at the University of Southern Mississippi. The Records Management program will have another busy year working across all four campuses helping offices with their records and staying compliant with requirements from the university to international organizations. Interested in learning about this part of the university? Visit the website (https://recordsmanagement.gmu.edu/) and discover more about the mission and work of this vital unit. 
Interested in learning about the history of George Mason University? Bob Vay, University Archivist, along with our former GRA Charlotte Corneliusen, created an online tour of Mason with Curatescape available both online (https://pastandpresent.gmu.edu/) and as a phone app. Titled The Mason Experience: Past & Present, users can travel back in time through stories and photographs of some of the people, places, and things that have made the Mason of today.
We have also been quite busy processing collections to make them accessible for Mason students and researchers the world over. The papers of the Nobel Prize-winning economist James M. Buchanan are open for research after a two-year grant-funded project. This work, generously supported by a National Endowment for Humanities grant and with tuition support for a Graduate Research Assistant from the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, was successfully led by the SCRC NEH Project Archivist, Rebecca Thayer. We will celebrate the opening of this collection on Wednesday, October 18, 2023 in Fenwick Library – we hope you will join us for that event!
QR code to download “The Mason Experience: Past & Present”
We are looking forward to many other events this fall, including celebrating collections coming open and a presentation and discussion about the Appalachian Trail (AT) with Mills Kelly and local Osher Lifelong Learning Institute members who have hiked the AT November 8. More of that to come soon!
Follow SCRC on Social Media and look out for future posts on our Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter accounts. To search the collections held at Special Collections Research Center, go to our website and browse the finding aids by subject or title. You may also e-mail us at speccoll@gmu.edu or call 703-993-2220 if you would like to schedule an appointment, request materials, or if you have questions. Banner photo credit: GMU Office of University Branding.
