ARCHIVES*RECORDS 2018

1968 –"the year that changed America" according to CNN – was a tumultuous one filled with growing anger at America's involvement in Vietnam, the assassinations of MLK and RFK, as well as a contentious presidential election. As these events played out across the country reactions on college campuses gave birth to unprecedented student activism and protests, and, eventually, changes in policy, curriculum, and social mores.

Both Columbia and Harvard endeavored to capture the spirit of those times through unique projects documenting the experiences on their campuses in 1968. The Columbia University Archives commemorated the 50th anniversary of student protests and occupation of five campus buildings in April 1968 by creating an historical Twitter feed (@1968CU) detailing events "as they happened" on campus 50 years ago. Through the use of contemporary documents, images and information from its collections the CUA told the story of Columbia '68 in a 21st century fashion using a social media format. Although protesting like Columbia's did not catch on at Harvard until 1969, 1968 was an epic year for the University as changes on campus mirrored those across the country.  To commemorate the Class of 1968's 50th reunion, the Harvard University Archives hosted an exhibition and oral history program with StoryCorps; pairing up Class of 1968 alumni to discuss various aspects of their experiences as students and life after. This program documented both the significant shifts in campus life from 1964 to 1968, as well as MLK's visit to campus and Coretta Scott King giving his commencement address after his assassination.

Archivists Jocelyn Wilk (Columbia) and Virginia Hunt (Harvard) will discuss how college and university archives can showcase their collections by implementing large scale social media projects and/or reaching out to alumni through oral history programs to capture significant moments in institutional histories.