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Summer 2024

Humanities

in the archives
Winter 2021

Missions and disasters

Here’s a look at two collections at Washington State University Libraries. Housed at the Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections (MASC), they are just a couple of the many treasures at WSU Pullman.

On a mission

Elkanah and Mary Richardson Walker established a mission in 1839 at present-day Ford, Washington, closing it a decade later following the Whitman killings in Walla Walla. When she died in 1897, Mary was the last of the 13 original members of the Old Oregon Mission. One of the books in the collection still has a portion of her homemade deerskin book cover attached. Two books in the collection are … » More …

Young Chinese men in the late nineteenth century wearing western clothes
Fall 2021

China’s First Hundred

In 1872 thirty young Chinese boys landed in San Francisco to begin a ten-year period of education in the colleges and technical institutions of the United States. These students and the others who followed them returned to their homeland as the first Chinese to receive an extensive education in Western technology and ideas.

“China’s First Hundred,” as they were called, built China’s first railroads, developed China’s mines, constructed a nationwide system of telegraph lines, became naval officers in an attempt to modernize China’s navy, and took a prominent part in the events leading to the Revolution of 1911.

In his book, China’s First Hundred: Educational … » More …