Elizabeth Hatcher Conner Collection, 1933-1945
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Summary
- Creator:
- Conner, Elizabeth Hatcher, 1918-2016 and Conner, Robert W., 1914-2007
- Abstract:
- Elizabeth Hatcher, Duke University class of 1939, was a photographer and member of the Explorers' Club, along with her future husband Bob Conner. The collection includes many photographs, a scrapbook, letters, and other materials documenting campus life at Duke in the late 1930s.
- Extent:
- 2.0 Linear Feet
- Language:
- Materials in English
- Collection ID:
- UA.30.01.0071
- University Archives Record Group:
- 30 -- Student and Alumni Papers and Materials
30 -- Student and Alumni Papers and Materials > 01 -- Individuals
Background
- Scope and content:
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The collection includes photographs, letters, a scrapbook, and memorabilia from Elizabeth Hatcher and Bob Conner's time at Duke. Photographic negatives and prints depict Duke's campus, Explorers' Club activities, students in dorms and on campus, and other scenes; individuals in these images include Elizabeth Hatcher, Bob Conner, Dean Mary Alice Baldwin, Louis Orr, and a woman who may be Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans (then Mary Duke Biddle). Other materials include letters written by Bob Conner to his mother in the mid-1930s, Bob Conner's diary written during a trip to find and identify orchids in Florida and Georgia in 1936, Elizabeth Hatcher's scrapbook of her sophomore year (which includes clippings, football game programs, invitations, and other materials), newsclippings featuring Elizabeth Hatcher, Bob Conner's dink (freshmen beanie), and other materials.
Photographic negatives are primarily celluloid nitrate.
- Biographical / historical:
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Elizabeth "Lib" Hatcher was born August 2, 1918, in High Point, North Carolina, to Pearl Sink and Edgar A. Hatcher. She entered the Woman's College at Duke University in 1936, majoring in Zoology. She became a photographer for the Chanticleer and developed her own photographs in her room in Bassett dormitory. She also joined the Explorer's Club, a co-educational hiking group chaperoned by Dean Mary Alice Baldwin of the Woman's College. Lib Hatcher graduated in 1939 and married Bob Conner in 1940. She taught Biology at Smith College and later at High Point College.
Robert (Bob) Conner was born September 8, 1914, in Pennsylvania, to Floyd and Helen Conner. He enrolled in Duke University in 1933, studying Civil Engineering, and attended classes off and on due to the Depression. He served in the Seabees during World War 2 and later became an architect.
The couple had three children: Susan, Christine, and William (Bill). Bob Conner died in 2007. Elizabeth Hatcher Conner died January 27, 2016 in High Point, North Carolina.
- Acquisition information:
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The Elizabeth Hatcher Conner Collection was received by the University Archives, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book Manuscript Library as a gift in 2010 and 2016.
Accessions described in this finding aid: UA2010.0031, UA2016.008, and UA2016.0019.
- Processing information:
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Processed by: University Archives Staff
Finding aid derived from MARC record, November 2014
Accessions UA2016.0008 and UA2016.0019 processed by Tracy M. Jackson, May 2016.
Finding aid updated by Tracy M. Jackson, May 2016.
- 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.
Contents
Using These Materials
- Using These Materials Links:
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Using These Materials
- Restrictions:
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Collection is open for research.
Original nitrate negatives may not be viewed in the reading room. Some materials may have already been digitized. To arrange for the digitization of other materials, please contact University Archives staff.
- Terms of access:
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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.
- Before you visit:
- Please consult our up-to-date information for visitors page, as our services and guidelines periodically change.
- Preferred citation:
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[Identification of item], in the Elizabeth Hatcher Conner Collection, Duke University Archives, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.