University of California (System). Office of the President. Records, 1914-1958, 1914-1958
Collection context
Summary
- Title:
- University of California, Office of the President records,
- Dates:
- 1914-1958
- Creators:
- University of California (System). Office of the President
- Extent:
- 612.5 linear ft.
- Language:
- English
- Preferred citation:
-
University of California, Office of the President records. CU-5, Series 2, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
Background
- Scope and content:
-
Series 2 of the Records of the Office of the President, University of California, covers the period 1914-1958. As in other series of these records, they reflect the activity of the entire office, not limited to the files of the president only. Individual campuses, and those research stations which came to be considered separate campuses during this period, had little autonomy for the most part; administrative decisions were highly centralized in the Office of the President.. Los Angeles did have a local administrator who had some local authority, but even so President Robert Gordon Sproul spent several weeks each year on that campus.
The content of the files changed greatly as the university administration decentralized and responsibility for various facets of the administration devolved to individual campus, beginning in 1952, with the appointment of a chancellor for the Berkeley and Los Angeles campuses. In 1952 the files in this collection became slim indeed but then grew as the systemwide administration was restructured. Accordingly, while there are indeed still files on, for example, particular departments on a campus, major high administrative level information on that department will be found in the individual campus's chancellor's records; only certain aspects of operation would rise to the level of the president's office.
Because of the history of the university and it's growth, the Berkeley campus and the systemwide administration were more or less synonymous; for this reason there are very few entries under Berkeley or UCB. On the other hand, an attempt has been made to gather materials relating to other campuses under an abbreviation for that campus, UCD, UCLA, UCR, etc. Another anomaly is that departments of instruction were generally not listed separately in the source documents for this index; they are all filed alphabetically under "Departments" (or "UCLA [or other campus] - Departments." (There is not necessarily a file for every department in every year.)
In the early years of this period there is much more indexing and coding into file numbers by specific heading. However, as time progressed and the coding system achieved more regularity folder headings became broader and were subdivided by campus or by subunit. For example. you might find for some years and entry under "UCLA - Library" while for later years the entry "Library" will be subdivided by campus, even if this is not necessarily indicated by the heading.
The index which follows covers the period 1931-1958. It was compiled from existing year-by-year lists of folder titles, which begin with the year 1936, and by actual examination of files from earlier years. This was followed by some weeding of the files, a complete inventory of the entire span years, and an extensive review of the folder titles to ensure as much uniformity as possible. Although this finding aid represents the records by means of a topical/organizational approach, extensive and much more detailed card indexes exist, which may be consulted through University Archives.
As of this writing it has not been possible to convert to machine readable form all the records for this period in order to prepare a finding aid for the entire series. The years 1914-1930 will require much additional work. Access to these years is through extensive card files, requiring consultation through University Archives. The files do not attain much regularity or realization of the advantage of filing based upon a topical/organizational approach until the 1930s. These earlier years have much more reliance a personal name approach; for example, files relating to the Department of English may be indexed under the name of the chair of the department only.
These files are arranged first by year, then by file number. Requests should specify the collection number, then year, then file, e.g., CU-5 Ser. 2 1944:35. It will be of great assistance to submit extensive requests in chronological and file number order.
- Acquisition information:
- Office of the President, University of California; transferred between 1959 and 1967.
- Physical location:
- For current information on the location of these materials, please consult the Library's online catalog.
About this collection guide
- Date Prepared:
- © 2003
- Date Encoded:
- Machine-readable finding aid created by James Lake. Machine-readable finding aid derived from MS Access Database. Date of source: September 2003.
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
The collection is open for research, although certain kinds of confidential information may be withheld if found.
- Terms of access:
-
Copyright has not been assigned to The Bancroft Library. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Public Services. Permission for publication is given on behalf of The Bancroft Library as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the reader.
- Preferred citation:
-
University of California, Office of the President records. CU-5, Series 2, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
- Location of this collection:
-
University of California, Berkeley, University Archives, The Bancroft LibraryBerkeley, CA 94720-6000, US
- Contact:
- (510) 642-6481