Archives & Special Collections

Discover Exeter’s history.

The Center for Archives & Special Collections is the Academy’s official repository for non-current records, as well as for an outstanding collection of rare books and manuscript collections in a wide variety of subject areas.

> Submit a Research Request

Please note that the Center for Archives & Special Collections is open Monday-Friday 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m. to researchers by appointment only.

Special Collections

The Academy is fortunate to have received a number of rare books and manuscripts from donors to the Special Collections. Among the most notable of these is an early edition of Ptolemy’s Geographia (1545) containing 54 double maps. Another significant item is a 15th-century French illuminated manuscript in cursive Gothic script on vellum, De Vitiis et Virtutibus by Guillaume d’Auvergne, the Bishop of Paris. This volume was the gift of Imre de Vegh, father of Pierre Jay de Vegh ’54. Also among the treasures: the second and fourth folios of Shakespeare's works.

Alumni Collection

The Faculty and Alumni Collections reflect the achievements of Exeter’s scholars and artists and contain works by prominent historians, novelists, essayists, poets and playwrights.

The Alumni Collection contains more than 5,000 volumes and spans three centuries, beginning with a Fourth of July oration by George Sullivan 1783, delivered in Exeter in 1800.

Important figures in history include Daniel Webster 1796, represented by an extensive collection of speeches, writings, and biographies; and Civil War general and one-time presidential candidate Benjamin Butler 1829.

Many graduates have made their mark writing fiction and poetry, beginning with Henry A. Shute 1875, whose young adult books entertained generations of boys and girls. Booth Tarkington 1889 and Gore Vidal ’43 are among the most prolific of alumni/ae authors in the collection.

The Benchley family is represented by three writers: Robert 1908 (Of All Things), Nathaniel ’34 (Off-Islanders), and Peter ’57 (Jaws). Others of note include James Agee ’28, John Knowles ’45, Donald Hall ’47, John Irving ’61, Roland Merullo ’71, Joyce Maynard ’74, Dan Brown ’82, and Chang-Rae Lee ’83.

Archives provide new home for Exeter's treasures

Two centuries of history and some of the Academy's rarest gifts highlight the Center for Archives and Special Collections.