Special Research Collections’ rare book collections include early imprints, published prior to the dates listed: United States (east of the Mississippi, 1851; west of the Mississippi, 1876); Europe, 1801 (selectively to 1851); Canada, 1901 (except Ontario, Quebec and other eastern provinces, 1851); Latin America, 1851; Asia, 1801; Africa and the Pacific, 1901. As well as first and signed editions of major American and British authors, with emphasis on 19th and 20th century literature (strengths include Charles Bukowski, Concrete Poetry, T. S. Eliot, Robert Frost, Aldous Huxley, Henry James, Robinson Jeffers, D. H. Lawrence, Henry Miller [Philip Peatman Collection], Christopher Morley, Ezra Pound, John Steinbeck, and Henry D. Thoreau); and Californiana and Western Americana (California authors, California history, California imprints to 1876 and selectively thereafter, local authors, local history, Western writers; strengths include Robinson Jeffers, Jack Kerouac, Donald Culross Peattie, Charles Snow).
The Rare Books Collection also includes bibles with early copies, many with extensive illuminations, from the mid-13c, including the ‘Santa Barbara Bible’ (ca. 1250), Biblia Latina (ca. 1297), Biblia sacra latina (1350); A Noble Fragment, being a Leaf of the Gutenberg Bible, 1450-1455…; Coverdale Bible, 1535 (first complete bible in English; gift of C. Pardee Erdman); several other 15th-18th century bibles, and the Greek New Testaments Collection (primarily 16th-17th century).
Other manuscript holdings include the Isaac Foot Collection (with bible leaves, ca. 1530-1611), Medieval Manuscript Fragments (with leaves from bibles, devotional books, scholars’ texts, liturgical musical texts, and texts of religious readings, 9th-15th centuries), Original Leaves from Famous Bibles: Nine Centuries 1121-1935… collected and annotated by Otto F. Ege, and "Biblical Library of Stanley S. Slotkin," with 30 original leaves and accompanying printed text for 16th-18th century bibles and other religious works.
Active Collecting Areas
We are currently actively seeking:
- Early imprints that exemplify the history of printing, the book trade, and bookmaking
- 19th-20th century California early editions
- Limited editions of significance
- Works associated through inscription, annotation, or previous ownership with important individuals, institutions or historical events
- Works of importance due to illustration, including artists’ books
- Manuscripts related to the SRC’s collection of first and signed editions of literary works
Exclusions
- At this time we are not accepting personal libraries or collections of books.
- Large objects and artifacts owned by writers and poets, including awards
Curator
David Gartrell
