1842-2011
For more digital collections, visit this guide!
Archives & Special Collections
704-894-2158
209 Ridge Road
PO Box 5000
Davidson, NC 28035
Monday - Friday, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm
By Appointment Only
Archives, Special Collections & Community welcomes you to Davidson! Explore the history behind campus traditions unique to Davidson by clicking through this slideshow.
The Cake Race, established in 1930, once helped identify hidden track and field talent in the first year class. First-years compete for a sweet reward at the end: a homemade cake of students' own choosing.
For many students, decorating their dorm rooms is a top priority when moving to campus. See how other Davidson students have decorated their rooms throughout the years.
Flickerball, a sport first played at Davidson in 1951, is an alternative to touch football. Today, first-year residence halls still compete in flickerball matches.
Spring Frolics is a chance to relax and socialize before spring exams. Outdoor concerts, water sliding, games, and friends are just a few highlights of this event.
For more college history from A-Z, explore our Online Encyclopedia. Here you will find entries ranging from all aspects of campus life, including the history of honor at Davidson and the history of the wildcat mascot.
Around the D is our official departmental blog. Here there are blog posts produced by archives staff, students, and faculty pertaining to college and local history.
On our website, we have a page of resources related to college history. Here you can find links to digitized 19th century student letters, databases for college facts and figures, and more!
Archives, Special Collections & Community welcomes you to Davidson! Our team helps preserve the institutional records of the college, manuscript collections from the local community, and rare books and special collections materials. We provide students, faculty, staff, and community members with opportunities for original research, inquiry-driven study, and object-inspired learning through instruction sessions and reference support. Through our work, our community engages critically with the past to understand our present and inform our future. For more information about our department and our collections, please email us at archives@davidson.edu.
For the Fall 2020 semester, reference services will be provided primarily via email (archives@davidson.edu) or Zoom. For research assistance, please email us at archives@davidson.edu with your research topic and/or questions and a staff member will follow up with you.
Many of our materials have been digitized and are available through our Digital Collections guide. To browse our archival and manuscript collections, please visit our online catalog and if there are materials you are interested in viewing, please email us at archives@davidson.edu and we will review your request.