Collections : [Wesleyan University -Special Collections and Archives]

William Manchester (1922-2004) was a noted author of eighteen books and dozens of articles. His first book, Disturber of the Peace, was a biography of H.L. Mencken published in 1951. Manchester wrote three novels during the 1950s, after which he published A Rockefeller Family Portrait in 1959, based on a series of magazine articles on John D. Rockefeller and the two generations that followed him. Manchester wrote one more novel before returning to non-fiction in 1962 with Portrait of a President, a study of John F. Kennedy. Manchester suddenly rose to national prominence in 1964 when Jacqueline Kennedy selected him to write the authorized account of John F. Kennedy's assassination. Robert F. Kennedy was also closely associated with the project. Two years later, Mrs. Kennedy sued Manchester to prevent its publication, setting off a controversy that played out on the front pages of newspapers around the world. Following a settlement, The Death of a President was published in 1967. With his reputation established, Manchester steadily published works of non-fiction: The Arms of Krupp (1968) chronicled the German munitions family; The Glory and the Dream (1974) provided an analysis of American history, 1932-1973; Controversy and Other Essays in Journalism (1976) included Manchester's own account of the Death controversy; American Caesar (1978) profiled Gen. Douglas McArthur; Goodbye, Darkness (1980) was Manchester's memoir of his World War II Pacific combat experiences; The Last Lion (1983 and 1988), a two-volume biography of Winston Churchill; and A World Lit Only By Fire (1992), an overview of the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Manchester was associated with Wesleyan University for more than 40 years, first as an editor for American Education Publications (the publisher of My Weekly Reader and other periodicals formerly owned by the University) starting in 1955, and later as a writer-in-residence and adjunct professor.

John Cage (1912-1992) was an experimental musician, composer, and writer.

Second Stage is an organization of students at Wesleyan University dedicated to producing theater and other performances. Founded in 1973, the mostly volunteer student group manages the administration, staging, finances, and selection of approximately thirty-five shows each academic year, usually staged in the '92 Patricelli Theater. Second Stage provides an opportunity for aspiring playwrights, directors, actors, and technicians to stage their very own productions. The Theater Department and Second Stage work closely together, sharing facilities and equipment.

Samuel Proal Hatfield was a non-graduate of Wesleyan in the class of 1862. He enlisted as private, 4th Conn. Infantry in 1861. He then served as First Lieutenant, 1st Conn. Heavy Artillery from 1862-64, and later served as major of the same.

Willbur Fisk (1792-1839) was a Methodist minister and the first president of Wesleyan University.

This collection concerns the planning and construction of Phase II of the Science Center, completed in 1970. The building is now known as the Exley Science Center.

The Queer Periodicals Collection contains over 490 different gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender periodicals published between 1966 and 1998. The bulk consists of English-language titles from the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, though examples from the European continent, Russia, and Israel are also present. The extent of each title may vary from a single issue to several complete (or near-complete) volumes. The collection is arranged into three separate series by size, and alphabetically by title thereunder

Wesleyan University began holding reunions for its alumni in the late 1860s. Prior to that, alumni stayed in touch with one another through correspondence. The University began compiling news and events related to its graduates beginning in the 1850s, and these collections of updates were frequently gathered into volumes distributed to class members.

John Cecil Rushworth Whiteley (1904-1959) was a member of the Wesleyan Class of 1925. He was also the recipient of a Rhodes Scholarship and attended Waldham College in Oxford.

Social Credit has been an economic theory, a social philosophy, an ideology, and a political party in England, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States since it was first advanced in 1920 by Major C. H. Douglas. He believed finance capitalism deprived individuals of sufficient purchasing power to buy otherwise available products. To overcome this Douglas proposed offering to every citizen dividend payments based on the community's real wealth. As monetary reform and as social theory Social Credit attracted intellectual support in England and the United States especially during the 1930s. Gorham Munson (Wesleyan class of 1917) was the most eloquent and durable Social Credit leader in the United States. In 1932, he became American correspondent for The New English Weekly, defended Social Credit in The Nation and helped form a key Social Credit organization, the New Economics Group of New York. In 1933 he initiated a vital Social Credit journal of the arts and public affairs, New Democracy, and was its chief editor during its three-year life.