Now available in the Donohue Rare Book Room

The Library’s special collections are housed in the Donohue Rare Book Room, and feature more than 17,000 items including books, manuscripts, photographs, drawings, engravings, and other artworks.

These resources are described in the library’s online catalog. Here is a list of some of the newly cataloged special collections that are available for research:

• Eugene Schmitz collection, 1864-1928 ‘Handsome Gene’ Schmitz was Mayor of San Francisco from 1902-1907. He was found guilty of extortion & bribery, but later went on serve as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors (1921-1925). This collection, compiled by his daughter Evelyn, documents his career and personal life through typed speeches, proclamations, correspondence, photographs, and newspaper clippings. Materials touch on the reconstruction of San Francisco following the 1906 earthquake & fire, the suppression of the Carmen’s strike, and the attempted segregation of Japanese students in San Francisco public schools.
• Autograph poems, essays, letters, ca. 1900-1925. A bound volume of manuscripts written by English author and poet Richard Le Gallienne
• Richard Le Gallienne collection, 1890-1960, three boxes of letters, manuscript essays and poems
• Laura Riding correspondence, 1964-1968, 1 box of correspondence related to Laura Riding, an American poet and writer who founded the Seizin Press with Robert Graves
• Eric Partridge letters, 1932-1944, 1 box of manuscript material relating to Eric Partridge, a British lexicographer and writer
• Herbert Gold collection, 1956-1988, 1 box of newspaper clippings and corrected typescripts of American author Herbert Gold’s novel ‘The Man Who Was Not With it’ and his short story ‘Waiting for the Forty-One Union’
• Mary Pritchett collection, 1932-1975, 1 box of correspondence, photographs, and ephemera collected by Graham Greene’s American literary agent, Mary Pritchett
• Robert Graves collection, 1920-1973, 13 boxes containing correspondence, typed and handwritten manuscripts, photographs, press clippings, published reviews, and ephemera related to the British novelist and critic
• Bernard Rosenthal collection, 1892-1976, 3 boxes of publications, notes, clippings, slides, photographs, correspondence, and ephemera collected by Rosenthal as part of his research into his notable bookselling lineage
• The Bookseller [manuscript, ca. 1940] by James Lewis May
• P.W. Black collection, 1866-1881, 3 items related to Major P.W. Black, Thomas Francis Meagher, and Irish American participation in the American Civil War
• Valentina ; canonizationis beati Francisci Borgiae (1670) a printed broadside announcement of the canonization of Francis Borgia, S.J., founder of the Collegio Romano, and Commissary General of the Jesuits for Spain, Portugal and the Indies
• Documents relating to the beatification of Aloysius Gonzaga, 1605-1727, 1 folder of manuscript and printed material, including signed manuscript testimony from Gonzaga’s fellow Jesuits supporting his canonization

Gleeson Library Special Collections are available for students, staff, faculty, and researchers to view in the Donohue Rare Book Room. View our hours and contact us to schedule an appointment.