News

WSU Press has released a new book this fall on the stunning history of an early 20th-century endurance competition from Bellingham, Washington, to the 10,781-foot summit of Mount Baker—more than 55 miles away—and back. The races drew thousands of enthusiastic spectators before they ended in 1913. In The Mountain Runners: America’s First Adventure Race, 1911-1913, […]

By Caitlin McKeand, Processing Archivist, Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections A newly processed 31-box collection, the Roberta Ulrich Research Papers, is now ready for researchers and scholars to see in Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections (MASC) in the Terrell Library ground-floor office. The collection follows the research materials collected by Roberta “Bobbie” Ulrich, a former […]

By Trevor Bond, WSU Libraries Dean In the dim glow of an early 18th-century London workshop, a young John Senex bent over a copper plate, carving lines that would soon become rivers, roads, and the edges of the known world. After his lengthy apprenticeship, beneath a sign that read The Globe against St. Dunstan’s Church, […]

WSU Libraries will hold a reception and program at 3 p.m. Monday, August 17, in the Terrell Library atrium to celebrate two endowments established by Patti Hirahara of Anaheim, California, daughter and granddaughter of two men who documented daily life in the Heart Mountain incarceration camp in Wyoming for three years during World War II. […]

Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections (MASC) will kick off the fall semester with an exhibit on one of its newest collections, rare mountaineering books donated in June 2025 by WSU alums and renowned mountain climbers John Roskelley and Chris Kopczynski. Both men will discuss the collection and mountaineering, their WSU connection, and more at a […]

WSU Libraries are conducting a usability study of university students, faculty, and staff to help the libraries determine whether to incorporate two artificial intelligence (AI) tools—Primo Research Assistant (PRA) and Ask Anything—into the Search It discovery website. The usability study builds off research conducted by the WSU Libraries’ Blake Galbreath, Erica England, Corey Johnson, and […]

As the WSU Press acquisitions editor, Beth Blakesley has enjoyed the variety of proposed manuscripts submitted to the university academic publisher. One of those is the story of Sister Kathleen Ross, who served as the founding president of Heritage College, now Heritage University, on the Yakama Indian Reservation in Toppenish, Washington, in 1982. Ross’s book, […]

Washington State Magazine associate editor Adriana Janovich earned several honors in the 2025 Region X Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) Awards program for her April 2025 story on the Robert Shields’ diary, held in Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections. Titled “The Constant Diarist,” Janovich’s article won first place in the magazine feature category, as well […]

Three new videos about student technology fees (STF), a new checkout program of Fluke equipment, and the impact of WSU Libraries on history students and faculty highlight the major initiatives that have happened recently and the ways the libraries influence our university community. Arpita Sinha, a graduating doctoral student in the WSU Department of Anthropology, […]

A longtime railroad enthusiast and professional tells of his experiences along the country’s rail lines in a new book from WSU Press’s trade imprint Basalt Books, Life along the Tracks: Candid Stories from a Career Railroader, coauthored and illustrated by friends and fellow railroad enthusiasts Jim Providenza and Dave Clemens. As a boy in the […]