Schaffer Library

Digital Galleries : Postcard Collections

The postcard above, dated 1947, is of the sixteen-sided Nott Memorial, one of America's most dramatic Victorian buildings and the centerpiece of the Union College Campus. Initially conceived by campus plan architect Joseph Jacques Ramee as a round, windowless “chapel”, it was eventually named for longtime College President Eliphalet Nott, whose grandson Edward Tuckerman Potter (Class of 1853) produced its final designs in the 1850s. Construction took nearly 20 years and was completed in 1877. The library was the chief occupant of the building between 1903 and 1961. The Nott Memorial also housed a variety other activities including the College theatre. As the building aged over the years, numerous preservation plans were considered before a College bicentennial project in 1995 completely restored Potter’s design while also upgrading its infrastructure. The building currently houses student study space as well as Dyson Hall (an open meeting space on the first floor), the Mandeville Gallery, and the Wikoff Student Gallery.

Washburn Hall, built in 1883 and razed in 1963, was inspired in part by a building on Joseph Jacques Ramee’s plans for the Union College campus, although its appearance departed significantly from Ramee’s more austere architectural drawings. The building overall was designed by William Appleton Potter (Class of 1864). It served a wide variety of purposes over the years and at various times housed classrooms, academic departments, the College library, laboratories (including one assigned to General Electric), faculty offices, student organizations, administrative offices, Naval V-12 activities, and social events. The undated postcard above is from the era when Washburn Hall also housed the “College Bookstore, Theatre, and Student Activities Center” (postcard verso). Washburn Hall was razed after the new College library building was constructed immediately behind it.

Begun in the 1830s by Professor Isaac Jackson of the Mathematics Department, Jackson's Garden is eight acres of formal gardens and woodlands. Located on the side of the Union College campus where Joseph Jacques Ramee’s original plans called for a garden, it has been continuously cultivated since Jackson’s day. Its initial mix of vegetables, shrubs, and flowers, some of which were grown from seeds sent by botanists and botanical enthusiasts from around the world, drew the admiration of such early visitors as John James Audubon, who toured it in 1844. The postcard above, circa 1910, depicts a foot bridge over the Hans Groot's Kill (“the brook that bounds through Union's grounds” in the College song), which runs through the garden. Today Jackson’s Garden also contains the Robison Herb Garden, the Sidney and Geraldine Levine Wildflower Garden, the Van Voast Evergreen Garden, and the Professor H. Gilbert Harlow Thyme Clock. For many years graduating seniors held their Class Day exercises under an “old elm”, or Nott Elm, which grew in the garden until 1937. The garden is still the site of many special College events.

The Union College Postcard Collections provide a photographic record of selected individuals and activities associated with the College as well as views of the surrounding city, Schenectady, NY. The postcard above depicts State Street at a time when the Erie Canal ran directly through the downtown area. Opened in 1825, the Canal was designed to create a seamless transportation link between the Hudson River and Lake Erie. Union College faculty and students were enthusiastic supporters of its construction. Students fired their muskets in salute as Gov. DeWitt Clinton made his inaugural trip down the Canal in 1825; an 1830 graduate, Squire Whipple, designed many of the Canal's bridges while still a student; and after Union started its engineering program in 1845, at least 30 more alumni oversaw or worked on the Canal’s enlargement.

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Union College Postcard Collections

The Union College Postcard Collections are housed in the library’s Special Collections department. Most of the postcards in the collections depict campus and Schenectady city views from the early twentieth century through the present, but they also include a collection of postcards of French and other sites from the era of World War I. At the main collection site you may search all of the postcards simultaneously or browse individual collections, many of which have been given to the College by generous donors.