Alumni Affairs records, 1851 - 2015

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Summary

Creator:
Duke University. Office of Alumni Affairs
Abstract:
The Office of Alumni Affairs at Duke University administers the Duke Alumni Association (DAA), a nonprofit organization serving over 120,000 alumni and former students of Duke University, in addition to thousands of parents and friends of the university. Records contain class files, administrative materials, fundraising materials, alumni publications records, subject files, photographs, video and sound recordings, and an index to Duke students who served in World War II. Materials include reunion information, correspondence, reports, programs, clippings, and printed matter.
Extent:
33 Linear Feet
Language:
English.
Collection ID:
UA.14.01.0001
University Archives Record Group:
14 -- Alumni Affairs and University Development
14 -- Alumni Affairs and University Development > 01 -- Office of Alumni Affairs

Background

Scope and content:

Records contain class files, administrative materials, fundraising materials, alumni publications records, subject files, photographs, video and sound recordings, and an index to Duke students who served in World War II. Materials include reunion information, correspondence, reports, programs, clippings, and printed matter.

Biographical / historical:

Since 1838, Duke University has had two locations and five name changes, but one of its oldest components has been an active alumni association. The Trinity College Alumni Association was founded in 1858 by President Braxton Craven, with forty-one alumni on record. In the 1890s, when the proposal to relocate Trinity College to Durham was announced, opposition to the plan was widespread among alumni. The Alumni Association, however, listened to the arguments for relocation with an open mind and decided to put the interests of "a greater Trinity" above personal considerations. In 1891, a year before the move, the College's charter was amended to require that one-third of its trustees be alumni of the College. This tenet remains a requirement of the University's bylaws today, twenty-seven of Duke's thirty-seven trustees are alumni, and five are past presidents of the Alumni Association.

Within a decade of the move to Durham, both men and women enrolled in dramatically increasing numbers from the North, the South, the Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) and abroad (especially Japan). Today's Duke Alumni Association represents more than 110,000 members from every state in the USA and more than seventy countries.

Just as the pool of alumni has dramatically grown and changed over the last 150 years, so has the role of the Alumni Association. From an association intended to foster friendships and maintain an ongoing affiliation between alumni and the university, the Alumni Association now also provides educational and travel opportunities, along with many university and community services. It disseminates information about university activities and issues to alumni and friends of the university, and produces its own sources of revenue to help support its programs.

These changing roles are expressions of an ongoing review by Alumni Association leadership and members of the alumni community. They illustrate the Alumni Association's ability to recognize the university's continually changing needs and its own opportunities to contribute to the Duke community.

Alumni Affairs and the Office of University Development merged to become Alumni Engagement and Development in October 2020.

[Historical note from http://dukealumni.com]

Acquisition information:
The Alumni Affairs Records were received by the University Archives as a series of transfers in 1948-2023 and as a gift from Elaine R. Schaffer in 2019.
Processing information:

This collection is partially unprocessed: materials may not have been ordered and described beyond their original condition.

Encoded by Jill Katte, February 2005

Multiple accessions were combined in this finding aid.

Accesion UA2015-0016 added by Tracy M. Jackson, September 2016.

Accession UA2019-0004 added by April Blevins, November 2022.

Accession UA2023-0030 added by April Blevins, June 2023.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Subjects

Click on terms below to find related finding aids on this site. For other related materials in the Duke University Libraries, search for these terms in the Catalog.

Subjects:
World War, 1939-1945 -- Education and the war.
Format:
Video recordings
Photographs
Sound recordings
Names:
Duke University. Office of Alumni Affairs
Duke University. Alumni Association
Duke University -- Alumni and alumnae

Contents

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Restrictions:

Access restricted. Collection requires additional arrangement, description, and/or screening. Contact Research Services for more information.

Access restricted. Some materials in this collection are Duke University administrative materials. For a period of twenty-five years from the origin of the material, permission in writing from the office of origin and the University Archivist is required for use of administrative records. After twenty-five years, records that have been processed may be consulted with the permission of the University Archivist. Contact Research Services for more information.

Access restricted. Some materials are closed by donor request.

Access note. Some materials in this collection are fragile audiovisual/photographic formats that may need to be reformatted before use. Contact Research Services for access.

Access restricted. Collection includes materials from the Duke University Board of Trustees. Records of the University's Board of Trustees which have been in existence for at least fifty years are available for scholarly research with the permission of the University Archivist. Access to records which have been in existence for less than fifty years shall be granted only by special permission, in writing, from the Board of Trustees. Contact Research Services for more information.

Access restricted. Some materials in this collection are university development records. Materials related to individual fundraising prospects are restricted for 70 years. Contact Research Services for more information.

Terms of access:

Copyright for Official University records is held by Duke University; all other copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

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Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Alumni Affairs Records, Duke University Archives, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.