{"id":50347,"date":"2018-02-12T11:11:04","date_gmt":"2018-02-12T16:11:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=50347"},"modified":"2024-07-29T11:27:00","modified_gmt":"2024-07-29T15:27:00","slug":"a-place-to-shine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2018\/02\/12\/a-place-to-shine\/","title":{"rendered":"A place to shine"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Wright State graduates Ann and Rob Weisgarber are among the first donors to support the Discover Your Story campaign, which will build a new home for the university’s Special Collections and Archives.<\/p><\/div>\n

As they pored over scrapbook after scrapbook of newspaper clippings on the Dayton Gems hockey team and photos of holiday displays in the former Rike\u2019s department store in downtown Dayton, memories from childhood and adolescence rushed through the minds of Rob and Ann Weisgarber.<\/p>\n

Ann remembered getting dressed up in her finest holiday attire, taking the bus downtown, meeting Santa Claus at Rike\u2019s and having lunch in the department store\u2019s restaurant.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt brought that all back,\u201d she said. \u201cWith that, comes great pride for the community. It\u2019s people\u2019s lives that have been preserved here. It\u2019s very touching to come here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Visiting Santa at Rike\u2019s and cheering on the Dayton Gems are among the millions of memories and stories that live on in Wright State University\u2019s Special Collections and Archives<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Tucked away in a corner on the top floor of the Paul Laurence Dunbar Library, Special Collections and Archives houses more than 1,000 local and regional history collections that celebrate the lives of the men, women and families that shaped the Miami Valley. It is a hidden gem that many have yet to discover. Even the Weisgarbers \u2014 ever the proud Wright State graduates \u2014 only recently learned of the treasures on the library\u2019s fourth floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really didn\u2019t know it existed until we were on the campaign cabinet for Rise. Shine. The Campaign for Wright State University,\u201d she said. \u201cThat was really the first time I knew it was here.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Ann may not be intimately acquainted with the archives at her alma mater, she is well versed on the invaluable services that an archive provides.<\/p>\n

An award-winning novelist of historical fiction, the Galveston, Texas, resident has utilized the resources of archives around the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose of us (fiction writers) who are really serious about getting the details right \u2014 we all work in archives,\u201d said Ann.<\/p>\n

From the archives of a weather bureau to the collections of Badlands National Park, Ann reads diaries, listens to oral histories and examines old photographs as part of her quest to find accurate, historical information.<\/p>\n

When the Weisgarbers first learned about Wright State\u2019s archives, they assumed that all of the collections focused on aviation. While the university\u2019s Wright Brothers Collection draws historians and aviation experts from around the globe, the Weisgarbers soon discovered that there was a whole other world to explore.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost people think it\u2019s the Wright brothers and that\u2019s it,\u201d said Rob. \u201cThe foundation was the Wright brothers, but it\u2019s a national aviation collection that is internationally known. There is also a significant part that is not aviation related \u2014 local history, prominent families.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the Weisgarbers were amazed at the depth and breadth of the collections, they were alarmed at how the timeless treasures and priceless stories of the past have been crammed into such a small, constricting space.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so crowded that you lose sight of what\u2019s here,\u201d said Rob.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know how they work in this space,\u201d said Ann. \u201cIt\u2019s way too small.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the not-too-distant future, Special Collections and Archives may finally have the space it so desperately needs. And the Weisgarbers are helping to make sure that it happens.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Discover Your Story: The Campaign for the Wright State University Archives Center will transform the former corporate headquarters of the Wright-Patt Credit Union at 2455 Presidential Dr. into a new home for the Special Collections and Archives.<\/p><\/div>\n

Bringing history to life<\/strong><\/p>\n

On October 4, 2017, the university launched a $6.5 million fundraising campaign to create the Wright State University Archives Center.<\/p>\n

Discover Your Story: The Campaign for the Wright State University Archives Center<\/a> will transform the former corporate headquarters of the Wright-Patt Credit Union at 2455 Presidential Dr. into the new home of Special Collections and Archives.<\/p>\n

The Archives Center would almost triple the space for the university\u2019s world-renowned collections \u2014 from 12,000 square feet scattered across two buildings to nearly 30,000 square feet in one central location.<\/p>\n

The Weisgarbers are among the first donors to support the Discover Your Story campaign. They are excited about the potential and possibilities that a new Archives Center would provide.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t shine here (in the library), the way it could shine,\u201d said Ann. \u201cIt will be in its own standalone building, which makes it so less intimidating for people to come in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Located directly across Colonel Glenn Highway from Wright State\u2019s Dayton Campus, the proposed Archives Center will offer a reading room, exhibit gallery, oral history lab and preservation lab, along with a conference room for lectures and special events and a classroom for visiting school groups and students from Wright State\u2019s Public History Graduate Program. The facility will also provide the proper light, temperature and humidity control to preserve historic materials for generations to come.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving a bigger facility \u2014 and a stand-alone facility \u2014 provides more visibility,\u201d Rob said. \u201cIt will have the room for not just researchers and scholars to come in, but the space for the general public to come in as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rob hopes that everyone will come explore the treasures and stories within Special Collections and Archives \u2014 now and when the new Archives Center opens in the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t need to be part of the university to use it,\u201d said Rob. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to be alumni or faculty to be associated with the archives. The archives are something that is important to the entire community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Once people visit Special Collections and Archives, Rob feels confident they will want to make the dream of an Archives Center a reality.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you come and see it, you\u2019ll get excited about it and you\u2019ll want to get involved,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you get involved, you will find that it will touch you in a lot of ways. And you will see a lot of ways that the archives have a connection to your life. It\u2019s a way to bring history to life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Artist rendering of part of the reading room and help desk.<\/p><\/div>\n

For Ann, the success of the Discover Your Story campaign has personal significance. She freely admits that her novels would have never been written without the help of archivists and historical collections across the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll three of my books have been research based,\u201d she said. \u201cAlmost every chapter is the result of discovering something in an archive. I can write an entire scene around the tiniest thing I found in an archive. Something in a display will just hit me that just triggers a whole chapter in a book.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also understands the important role that archives play in guarding and preserving history for generations to come.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the archives expand, they\u2019ll be taking collections 50 years from now, 100 years from now, way past our lifetimes,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s what Wright State does. Wright State impacts generation after generation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wright State graduates Rob and Ann Weisgarber are among the first donors to support the campaign to build a new home for Special Collections and Archives. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":50356,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,733,4309,748,4906,2040,725,747,2114,715,2089,2118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-alumni","category-alumni-association","category-business","category-finance-accountancy-management-information-systems-and-economics","category-giving","category-home-news-sidebar","category-liberal-arts","category-libraries","category-news","category-social-work","category-special-collections-and-archives"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50347"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50359,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50347\/revisions\/50359"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}