The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly changed the lives of the AU community. We are all altering and adjusting to these sudden transformations of our lives. The Ashland University Library’s Special Collections and Archives wants to document the experience and story of Ashland University students, staff, faculty and other members of the campus community during the coronavirus pandemic. The Archives are looking to gather individual experiences that would provide insight and detail that the more official documentation cannot.

How to Participate

Share your experience with us. These experiences could include: staying on campus, learning remotely, working from home, stay-at-home life, essential worker experiences, self-quarantine, illness, or many other ways that our lives have been affected. We want to capture a reflection of what your experiences were to better reference and understand this event as a moment of Ashland’s history.

Please consider submitting items that you think document your life during this time. For example:

• Artwork
• Audio recordings
• Digital writings
• Photographs
• Screenshots of social media posts
• Stories or oral histories

The Ashland University Archives and Ashland University Special Collections are all part of the Ashland University Library. The Archives contain records from the founding of Ashland College in 1878 to the present. The aim of Ashland University Archives is to collect, organize, preserve, index, and provide access to historical information related to Ashland University. The AU Special Collections holds multiple different permanent collections around campus including  the Special Book Collection, ATS Flora Archaeological Collection, ATS Biblical Manuscript Collection, and other smaller collections. 

The Journal of the Plague Year is a curatorial collaboration that was started and is run by Arizona State University. This repository was created to document, share, and preserve what is happening as we experience a global pandemic. Their collection contains submissions from across the globe. 

The name is a reference to The Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe (NOT to be confused with Willem Dafoe). Defoe wrote this fictional account of one man's experience in 1665 London when the Bubonic plague struck the city. If you are interested in reading more you can check out this book (2009 edition) from the AU Library's ebook collection or check it out from the AU Library collection. Check below to connect to this topical book.