Exhibits

Archives & Special Collections

image from the cover of an Aetna Corporation marketing item with hands holding staircases and a woman in a skirt walking up themGallery under renovation

Richard Schimmelpfeng Gallery
Dodd Center for Human Rights
Monday - Friday, 9am to 4pm 

Coming soon:

"Aetna, I’m Glad I Met Ya!”: Preserving the Aetna Insurance Company Records 

Aetna’s roots in Connecticut run as far back as 1853, when Eliphalet Bulkeley became president of the Aetna Life Insurance Company. Quickly becoming a company that wrote policies for people across the country, it changed with the times, offering coverage for fires, life, health, home, accident, workman’s compensation, disability, and automobiles. It covered policies for notable disasters such as the 1871 Chicago Fire, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and the 1912 sinking of the Titanic. In the 1980s it responded to the AIDS Crisis, and in 2000, the now global company narrowed its focus to health and group benefits. 

In November 2018, the company was acquired by CVS Health and the next year it transferred many of its historical records to the UConn Library’s Archives & Special Collections and the Connecticut State Library.  

This exhibit highlights archival items in the company records that show Aetna’s global impact on the insurance industry while always remembering its roots in Connecticut. 

Homer Babbidge Library

collage of photos highlighting the UConn School of Pharmacy Centenial exhibit

UConn School of Pharmacy Centennial Exhibit 
Celebrating a Century of Excellence, Innovation, and Care

Gallery on the Plaza
Homer Babbidge Library 
On display through December 12, 2025

For 100 years, the UConn School of Pharmacy has been at the forefront of pharmacy education and innovative research in the profession and the State of Connecticut. The exhibit shows selections from the School's priceless historical collections as well as its significant contributions to advancing pharmacy practice and patient care. 

Join us as we reflect upon the School's legacy of excellence and honor its commitment to shaping future healthcare professionals in the next hundred years.

Online Exhibits

Image description: logo for exhibit titled 25 for 25, Celebrating Twenty-Five Years of Collecting

25 for 25: Celebrating Twenty-Five Years of Collecting

Online Exhibition, UConn Archives & Special Collections

Archives & Special Collections presents 25 for 25: Celebrating Twenty-Five Years of Collecting, a virtual, year-long exhibition celebrating collections and collecting. 2020 marks the 25th anniversary of the dedication of the Dodd Center for Human Rights, which brought together the collections and practices of the University’s Historical Manuscripts & Archives and Special Collections departments for the first time. Over the course of a year, Archives & Special Collections staff will explore 25 objects selected from the collections, engaging with and reflecting on the meaning of these objects and the activity of collecting over time. Through these objects, Archives & Special Collections celebrates the act of historical preservation and the recognition that collections constantly evolve, grow, and expand so that future educators, students, researchers, and learners may be inspired and informed by the objects within.

AMS Virtual Exhibit ImageThe American Approach to Montessori Teaching and Learning

Online Exhibition, UConn Archives & Special Collections

The Montessori method of education was first introduced to the United States in the early 1900s yet quickly fell out of favor with American educators. Widespread American interest in Montessori did not return until the 1950s, thanks in large part to teacher Nancy McCormick Rambusch. Rambusch founded the American Montessori Society in 1960, which sought to promote the Montessori method in the United States. AMS succeeded in reviving the Montessori method in the United States and gaining recognition for it as a valid educational system. This exhibit explores the origins of the Montessori movement in the United States and the Americanization of the Montessori method. It is comprised of materials from the American Montessori Society Records, which were donated to the UConn Archives in 2006 and digitized beginning in 2016.

Connecticut Businesses in WWIIHomefront: Connecticut Businesses in World War II

Online Exhibition, UConn Archives & Special Collections

The outbreak of World War II dramatically changed Connecticut businesses. Long a vibrant part of New England industry, local firms switched from making clocks and wool coats to mass producing artillery cartridges and Army pea-coats. Selections from the Connecticut business collections held by the University of Connecticut’s Archives & Special Collections paint a detailed portrait of this remarkable moment in history through the lives of the people who lived it.