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About UTSA Special Collections
Images, left to right: Rare Books, Scrapbook photos from MS 409 Lucie Petri papers, unidentified manuscript, and SNAP Magazine. UTSA Libraries Special Collections.
The University of Texas at San Antonio Libraries Special Collections preserves and makes accessible the legacies of San Antonio and South Texas through Special Collections, featuring a rich array of primary resources.
The collections are open to academic and casual researchers alike. Collections include papers, photographs, audiovisual recordings, digital records, and archived websites documenting the history of women and gender in Texas, Mexican-American activism, African-American and LGBTQ regional communities, the Tex-Mex food industry, and San Antonio history and urban development. Special Collections also maintains University Archives, which document the history of UTSA, and Rare Books, which include our Mexican Cookbook Collection.
What We Collect
UTSA Libraries Special Collections maintains:
- Manuscript CollectionsManuscripts seeks to acquire, preserve, and provide access to collections emphasizing the history, development, people, art, life, and literature of San Antonio and South Texas.
- Photograph CollectionsUTSA Libraries Special Collection maintains several large photograph collections, which document life in San Antonio and South Texas.
- University ArchivesThe University Archives collects, preserves and provides access to collections that document the history of UTSA. For more information on University Archives, visit the link above as well as our University Archives LibGuide.
- Rare BooksRare Books collects published materials emphasizing the history and development of the Texas-Mexico border region in general and the people, history, art, life, and literature of San Antonio and South Texas in particular. For more information about Rare Books, please visit the link above as well as our Rare Books LibGuide.
- Archived WebsitesWeb Collections constitute Special Collects' efforts to selectively capture, preserve, and make accessible web sites culturally and administratively significant to UTSA and that align with our manuscript collecting priorities.
- Digitized CollectionsSpecial Collections works to digitize our collections and make them accessible online. While we can only provide online access to a small fraction of our total holdings, we are committed to selecting material for digitization that will increase the availablility of our most heavily used collections, promote those with high research value, or aid in reducing wear and tear to our most fragile collections. Special Collections also actively engages in digital preservation efforts for our digitized and born-digital records.