Collections : [University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library]

The University of Michigan's highest governing body is the Board of Regents. The Regents deal with virtually every aspect of university policy and campus life. The records of the Regents reflect this broad range of interests and authority. This record group contains exhibits from meetings beginning in 1899. These exhibits are the most complete record of the actions of the Regents, supplementing and detailing the published minutes Proceedings of the Board of Regents. Additional documentation in this record group includes manuscript minutes, 1837-1870, correspondence, material by and about the Regents, photographs, audio recordings of meetings, 1977-2011, and material on recent presidential searches.

As the official governing body of the university, the Regents deal with virtually every aspect of university policy and life. The records of the Regents--which includes exhibits of Regents' meetings, topical files, correspondence files, audio and visual material, and archived web content--reflect this broad range of interests and authority. But while the documentation is wide-ranging, it is not continuous. Certain types of records are continually before the Regents, particularly information regarding salaries, leaves of absence, appointments to faculty positions, and formal approval of degrees conferred upon students. More often, however, the Regents are presented with a specific problem and asked to resolve it through the creation of policy. After the creation and successful implementation of a policy, the situation which caused the issue to arise is usually no longer a matter of Regental concern. The Regents' records reflect this pattern of action. Issues arise, are resolved, and then are supplanted by new concerns.

Founded in 1841, the College of Literature, Science and the Arts (LSA) is the liberal arts college of the University of Michigan, encompassing over 100 academic departments and non-departmental centers, programs, institutes, museums, and laboratories. The record group includes correspondence, meeting minutes, memoranda, reports, proposals, subject files, and program materials from the administrative offices of the dean and the academic units that make up the college.

The records of the College of Literature, Science and the Arts (LSA) of the University of Michigan date from 1846 with the first meeting of the literary college's faculty. They now span more than a century and a half and comprise 549.4 linear feet (in 550 boxes), 3 volumes, and 169.9 GB of minutes, correspondence, memoranda, reports, and subject files detailing the activities of the college from its early beginnings in the mid-nineteenth century to its present status as the largest of the university's colleges.

The administrative records of the college have come to the library in six major accessions beginning in 1942 with small periodic accessions thereafter. In addition, the college has periodically deposited bound record copies of the minute books of the meetings of the LSA faculty. Covering the years 1846 to 2007, the minute books (oversize volumes, boxes 204 to 209, and box 388) are the most important source of information about the college, especially for the period before World War I because few other extant records document the activities of the university's liberal arts college.

Harlan Henthorne Hatcher (1898-1998) was president of the University of Michigan from 1951 to 1967. The papers span the years 1837-1998 and document Dr. Hatcher's University of Michigan presidency, Ohio State University career, literary career, organizational involvement, personal life, and family history. Includes correspondence, newspaper clippings, manuscripts, speeches, yearly datebooks, oral history interview transcripts, magnetic audio tape recordings, an audiocassette recording, and photographs.

The Harlan Henthorne Hatcher Papers document his University of Michigan presidency, Ohio State University career, literary career, organizational involvement, personal life, and family history. The collection spans the years 1837-1998, with the bulk of the materials covering 1891-1986. It includes correspondence, newspaper clippings, manuscripts, speeches, yearly datebooks, oral history interview transcripts, magnetic audio tape recordings, an audiocassette recording, and photographs. The collection is strongest in its documentation of Dr. Hatcher's presidency at the University of Michigan, especially in correspondence and speeches. Documentation is weakest on the subjects of his Ohio State University career before 1944 and organizational involvement before 1967. The collection may be useful to researchers interested in the history of the University of Michigan from 1951-1967, the duties of university administrators and their spouses, authors of the 1920's to 1950's, and environmental activism in Michigan in the 1970's and 1980's.

The Harlan Hatcher collection has been divided into two subgroups of files: those which were created or accumulated from his tenure as president of the University of Michigan (1951-1967) and those materials (mainly personal) dated either prior to or subsequent to Hatcher's presidential years.

The library, as archives of the University of Michigan, is the repository for all of the files of its presidents. For historic reasons, all of the papers of presidents up to and including Harlan Hatcher have been treated as personal collections and cataloged under the name of the president. Beginning with Hatcher's successor - Robben Fleming - and continuing to the present, the files of individuals occupying the president's office have been considered both personal and institutional. Records created from an individual's responsibility as president, usually materials from the years when he was president, are treated as office files and have been cataloged as part of the University of Michigan President's Office record group. Materials from either before or after an individual's tenure as president have been treated separately and have been cataloged under that president's name.

Records of the Law School document the evolution of legal education at the University of Michigan as well as tenures of various deans and faculty. Documentation includes historical and class files; student organizations and activities; planning and construction of Law School buildings; information on William W. Cook and his bequest; topical files; deans' correspondence; reports and minutes. Also included are materials related to the Thomas M Cooley and William W. Cook lecture series and portraits of faculty and students, photographs of activities of the Judge Advocate General's School held at the Law School during World War II, the construction of the Law Quadrangle and Law Library addition, and student activities.

The Law School Records begin in 1852 and span the years through the end of the twentieth century. The records document the history of legal education at the University of Michigan, the administration of the Law School, and the lives of some of the scholars who have studied and taught there.

The physical arrangement of the records reflects the various accessions of material that have been received from the Law School over the years. This finding aid is structured to reflect the intellectual organization of the records - continuing series and like materials have been brought together regardless of when the records were transferred to the library. The Summary Contents List provides and overview of the organization of the records.

There are eight major series in the record group: Historical and Class Files (1865-1974); Deans of the Law School (1852-1999); Faculty Files (1859-1994); Student Files (1894-1996); Law Quadrangle and William W. Cook, (1919-1938); Law School Lecture Series; Committee of Visitors and Audio/Visual Materials.

The University of Michigan's first professional school; the Medical School record group includes historical and administrative records related to the school and its faculty and administrators, 1850-2010.

The records of the Medical School span over 160 years, beginning in 1850 and continuing through 2010. They include 389.7 linear feet of material, 10 oversize volumes, 9 oversize folders of miscellaneous documents, and 3.3 GB of digital material stored online. The records include dean's correspondence and subject files, executive committee minutes, faculty minutes, annual reports of departments, school accreditation and review files, a variety of special reports and studies, and extensive files on the Replacement Hospital Project (Taubman Center). The record group also contains photo prints depicting faculty, students and facilities, including a remarkable series of photographs taken by J. Jefferson Gibson circa 1893.

The Medical School records have been organized into five subgroups: Dean's Records, Subordinate Administrative Officers, Faculty Records, Audio-Visual Materials, and Miscellaneous records. Within each subgroup there are a number of series and these series may be further subdivided to reflect the date span of the records received in each accession.

The Medical School records have been received in several accessions and the physical arrangement of the records (the number order of the boxes) reflects the various installments in which they were received. The accessions sometimes reflected the tenure of a particular dean or other administrator, but frequently appear to have been somewhat arbitrary transfers of files. Records from individual subgroups, series and subseries often continue across multiple accessions--sometimes with consecutive date ranges, but often with overlapping date spans.

In this finding aid the records are described in their intellectual order -- subgroups and series are brought together irrespective of the particular accession in which they were received. As a result, in the detailed contents listing the box number order will not always be consecutive.