Special Collections

A Recent Acquisition: Consider the Abacus

Special Collections’ newest acquisition is a six-volume treatise on computational instruments and techniques written in Chinese.

Related: Special Collections

Posner Center Open House Photo Gallery

During Spring Carnival, the Posner Center for Special Collections invited members of the CMU community to explore the recently renovated space and experience its inaugural exhibition. The open house highlighted Special Collections as a campus and community resource, both for scholarly research and more spontaneous exploration.

Distinctive Collections highlights a year of research, preservation, and engagement in 2025

The Carnegie Mellon University Libraries’ Distinctive Collections team experienced a year of growth and impact in 2025, expanding research services, strengthening digital preservation infrastructure, and deepening engagement across campus and beyond.

From Behind the Scenes to Center Stage

In a quiet lab inside the newly renovated Posner Center for Special Collections, a rare book rests in a custom cradle. Once positioned, it barely needs to be touched again. Two high-resolution cameras hover above, capturing each page simultaneously. The spine is supported. The lighting is calibrated. The image is preserved at the highest possible quality.

Spotlight: Ann Marie Mesco

At the University Libraries, faculty and staff bring diverse backgrounds and interests to their roles, elevating the Libraries’ culture of interdisciplinary collaboration and lifelong learning and curiosity. We asked Digitization Projects Manager and Data Deposit Coordinator Ann Marie Mesco a few questions about her work, to find out more about the inspiration behind her contributions to the campus community.

Spotlight: Joseph Mesco

At the University Libraries, faculty and staff bring diverse backgrounds and interests to their roles, elevating the Libraries’ culture of interdisciplinary collaboration and lifelong learning and curiosity. We asked Digitization Technician Joseph Mesco a few questions about his work, to find out more about the inspiration behind his contributions to the campus community.

From Text to Artifact: Teaching the Constitution in the Renovated Posner Center

Associate Professor of History Scott Sandage is no stranger to the Carnegie Mellon University Special Collections. For several years now, he’s used the resources in the collections — specifically a rare printing of the U.S. Bill of Rights, one of only five extant copies — as a tool to help students engage more deeply in his course “U.S. Constitution and the Presidency.” Sandage’s class examines specific powers granted to the president by the Constitution, and how presidents like Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin Roosevelt expanded the powers of the presidency. The Bill of Rights is central to the class. But with the reopening of the newly renovated Posner Center in fall 2025, the experience of teaching — and learning — with Special Collections has taken on new depth. The updated space enabled Sandage to build a layered, immersive experience — one that brought students back multiple times to learn from experts, examine rare materials up close, and actively debate the Constitution’s meaning.

Event Recording: Fine and Rare VI: Rare Books and Ancestral Machines

On January 22, the University Libraries hosted “Fine and Rare VI: Rare Books and Ancestral Machines.” At the virtual event, Curator of Special Collections Sam Lemley invited attendees inside the newly renovated Posner Center for Special Collections, a cabinet of rarities and technological marvels where paper-and-string cipher machines, centuries-old books, cogwheel computers, and nineteenth-century “digital” images sit side by side. A recording of the event is now available.

Renovated Posner Center Welcomes Students into Special Collections

After a major renovation, the Posner Center for Special Collections at the Carnegie Mellon University Libraries has opened its doors once more — this time as a vibrant hub for teaching, research, and public engagement. Within just days of reopening, students from across CMU and the University of Pittsburgh became the first to test the possibilities of the new space, engaging directly with rare books, archival materials, and historic technologies.

CMU Libraries Unveils the Newly Renovated Posner Center for Special Collections with Inaugural Exhibition “Rare Books & Ancestral Machines”

Carnegie Mellon University Libraries opened the doors of the newly-renovated Posner Center for Special Collections on December 2 with its inaugural exhibition “Rare Books & Ancestral Machines.”