A recently released 18-month Sesquicentennial Desk Calendar containing numerous unique images of UB's past is only the first of a number of Sesquicentennial projects Finnegan will be working on despite her retirement. She culled the pictures, including a recently acquired 1895 image of Dr. Roswell Park performing surgery, turn-of-the-century science labs and the first two women graduates of the Law School in 1899, from the more than 250,000 images in the archives collection for the calendar, explaining that some have never before been published.

Finnegan is also preparing a major Sesquicentennial collection exhibition, tentatively titled "UB Remembers," slated to open in the archives in March, 1996. And, she explains, "since it is the thing to do to have a home page these days," Finnegan is fashioning a new Sesquicentennial exhibit to be available online through the archives website.

"I sort of fell into this line of work," explains Finnegan, who served as university archivist for 28 years before taking early retirement last summer. She taught English Literature at a small women's college near Boston, had three daughters, then arrived in Buffalo 30 years ago intent on earning her long-postponed doctorate. Instead, some research work in the library led to a part-time job in the archives office. A short time later, the archivist retired and Finnegan took over the fledgling operation.

Under Finnegan's direction, University Archives grew from a single, cluttered room in the old Lockwood Library to occupying half of the fourth floor of Capen Hall, with some spillover in a nearby warehouse. Packaged delicately in acid-neutral boxes are 7,000 linear feet of documents, photographs, memorabilia and microfiche, more than seven million items in all. Sunlight, temperature and humidity are all enemies of document preservation, so much attention is paid to the climate-controlled conditions in the archives, explains Finnegan.

University Archives has grown to be much more than just a storehouse for official university matters. "Some people become very attached to their records," said Finnegan, who had to earn many people's trust before large donations of records began arriving. "Older records are probably the most valuable, just because few records were created in the 19th century and fewer still survived," she explained, describing a bill of lading in the collection that describes a shipment of "subjects" to the medical school in the mid 1800s via the predecessor of the Wells Fargo Express. The "subjects," of course, were not living when delivered.

Finnegan feels that, through archival records, "I really got to know people whom I never laid eyes on. I'd recognize their handwriting instantly." It is that intense interest in understanding more than just "the facts" that makes an archivist, believes Finnegan. "History is more than just official papers of the presidents of the university. It involves the capturing of the institutional culture," she explained. Finnegan says her fascination with archival history grows from her academic background in rhetorical analysis in English Literature. "They are rather similar," she says, "analyzing written materials in a specific context."

Preservation is another high priority to an archivist. "During the period of campus unrest people probably thought I was crazy," recalls Finnegan. "In the midst of all that, I was running around picking up leaflets and other things off the floor to save."

The archives is full of a "tremendous amount of rich material," according to Finnegan. It houses the official papers of several local political leaders, including former Buffalo-area Congressman and Presidential Candidate Jack Kemp. Valuable personal correspondence between Darwin Martin, a turn-of-the-century Buffalo businessman, and his longtime friend, famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who designed Martin's home which the university now owns, are also stored there. Martin, Finnegan explains, was a compulsive letter writer and was so meticulous that he even indexed his personal diaries, which are also in the collection.

Likewise, Samuel Capen's contributions to the collection extend beyond the official correspondence of his 28-year term as Chancellor (the pre-SUNY equivalent of President.) Once an advisor to President Woodrow Wilson and a national leader in higher education, Capen was also prolific letter writer. The private letters he wrote almost daily to his wife while he was traveling were donated to the collection by his daughter. Finegan explains that the university "can't go out and buy this stuff" and depends extensively on charitable contributions of materials, usually inherited by heirs of alumni or employees.

Finnegan also draws from the archives collection to put together "slide/talks" on unique aspects of the university's history. Recently, she delivered an address to university development officers on the wildly successful capital campaign of the early 1920s which attracted Samuel Capen to UB and precipitated much construction on the Main Street campus. Her next presentation will be to the local medical history association on the history of the medical school.

Tomorrow's archivist will probably have more media to keep track of in culling history, but the basics will likely remain the same, according to Finnegan. "One form of technology usually supplants another, rather than replacing it," she explains. "Various types of electronic media will come and become technologically obsolescent over time. But, paper documents will probably remain the major source of information. If preserved properly, they remain readable and accessible much longer."