Universal Access
Special Collections and University Archives is currently open Monday-Friday from 8am to 5pm.
Appointments are not required, but strongly encouraged (**see below)
Appointments can be made by visiting the SCUA Seat Reservation page (instructions are included on this page)
Virtual reference help remains available at specref@vt.edu or by phone at 540-231-6308
**By making an appointment, you will help us limit the number of researchers using our Reading Room at any one time for health and safety; guarantee you a seat at the requested time; and help us plan for your visit, for example, making sure the materials needed are on site and available.
Email: specref@vt.edu
Phone: 540-231-6308
Twitter: @VT_SCUA
Information for Visitors
Our website
Our digital collections
Our blog
Our LibGuides
Virginia Tech acknowledges that we live and work on the Tutelo / Monacan People’s homeland, and we recognize their continued relationships with their lands and waterways. We further acknowledge that the Morrill Land-Grant College Act (1862) enabled the commonwealth of Virginia to finance and found Virginia Tech through the forced removal of Native Nations from their lands in western territories. We understand that honoring Native Peoples without explicit material commitments falls short of our institutional responsibilities. Through sustained, transparent, and meaningful engagement with the Tutelo / Monacan Peoples, and other Native Nations, we commit to changing the trajectory of Virginia Tech's history by increasing Indigenous student, staff, and faculty recruitment and retention, diversifying course offerings, and meeting the growing needs of all Virginia tribes and supporting their sovereignty.
Virginia Tech acknowledges that its Blacksburg campus sits partly on land that was previously the site of the Smithfield and Solitude Plantations, owned by members of the Preston family. Between the 1770s and the 1860s, the Prestons and other local White families that owned parcels of what became Virginia Tech also owned hundreds of enslaved people. We acknowledge that enslaved Black people generated wealth that financed the predecessor institution to Virginia Tech, the Preston and Olin Institute, and they also worked on construction of its building. Not until 1953, however, was the first Black student permitted to enroll. Through InclusiveVT, the institutional and individual commitment to Ut Prosim (that I may serve) in the spirit of community, diversity, and excellence, we commit to advancing a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive community.
Full and short versions of the acknowledgements can be found on InclusiveVT's website.
This site includes Special Collections and University Archives resources related to the following topics:
You'll also find links to other academic and research organizations with significant collections about these topics.
If you have questions about the collections, locating resources, need help with a project, or just want to see some interesting or unique items, feel free to contact us.
We actively collect new material about these topics:
In addition, we have inactive collecting areas including:
You might notice that the topics covered by this guide are mostly not in this list of collecting areas. The only one that appears explicitly is Women's History appearing in the form "History of Women and the Built Environment." This is because we don't have a subject focus on the history of historically marginalized communities. There are other archives that have that focus and do an excellent job. In order for us to collect material about one of these communities, it needs to fit within one of the topics listed above.
Here are examples of materials we collect and why they are in our collections.
We have around 500 manuscript collections related to one or more of the historically marginalized communities covered in this guide. You can view the finding aids for these collections through Archival Resources of the Virginias, a search tool covering collections in Virginia and West Virginia. To limit your search to Virginia Tech materials, select "Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University" from the Repository drop-down. Then, enter your keywords and click search.
All of our books relating to these communities can be found using the library's catalog. Some of these books are in Special Collections and University Archives, but many are also in the circulating collection. If you are looking generally for materials about these populations, you can use a variety of search terms such as "African American", "LGBTQ", or "Latin American" in the search field. Suggested search terms for each group are included on the appropriate page of this guide.
Special Collections and University Archives has some material in our online collections related to these communities. You can find these items on Special Collections and University Archives Online. The site includes a search box in the upper right corner where you can search using keywords to locate materials related to a specific community or communities.
