Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Use Restrictions

See the University of Virginia Library’s use policy.

Preferred Citation

Papers of the Dean of Women, University of Virginia, Accession #RG-34/1/1.701, Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.

Acquisition Information

These papers were transferred from the Office of the Dean of Women, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, to Special Collections on May 29, 1970.

Scope and Content

This collection consists of administrative records from the Dean of Women's Office at the University of Virginia, ca. 1,500 items (4 Hollinger boxes, ca. 2 linear feet), 1914-1969, during the period before co-education at the University, and notes and note cards used for the typescript "Women and the University " by Mary E. Whitney, written in collaboration with Rebecca S. Wilburn in 1969.

Topics in the papers include the details about the construction and furnishing of the Mary Munford Dormitory for women; papers concerning the women's alumni association; two applications from black females for housing at the University (see folders 4 & 5 in Box 1); the lawsuit against the University to force the admission of women as undergraduates; details about the bequest from the Emily Clark Balch estate; material about the conversion of Mary Washington to a liberal arts college, 1944-1945; and women applicants to the University of Virginia as special students, just prior to full acceptance in 1970. There is a separate folder for specifications for Randall Hall by Stanislaw Makielski, which was used as a dormitory for nurses at one point in its long career.

In a folder of correspondence between President Colgate W. Darden, Jr. and the dean of women, Roberta Hollingsworth Gwathmey, Dean of Women, 1935-1967, they discuss the need for and the construction of a new dormitory to house women at the University of Virginia, the Mary Munford dormitory, which opened in 1952 (see 1947-1951), a controversy about The Virginia Reel publishing vulgar material (1950 March 24), and Anna J. Franklin, a black student in medicine (1955 March 7, April 7).

Also present is the research notes and note cards for the typescript, "Women and the University " by Mary E. Whitney, appointed to succeed Dean Gwathmey as the Dean of Women in 1967. A bound copy of the typescript is available in the public reference area in the reading room of Special Collections.

Arrangement

This collection is arranged alphabetically by topic on the folder heading.