Donor Spotlight

Moti Lal Rustgi Papers and Endowment

The professional papers of Moti Lal Rustgi, full Professor of Physics, were donated to the University Archives in 2003. Recently, Professor Rustgi's sons, Dr. Anil K. Rustgi, M.D., and Dr. Vinod K. Rustgi, M.D., generously established an endowment to support the processing, organization, and preservation of their father's papers and those of other physicists at the University at Buffalo. Professor Rustgi's area of research interest included nuclear and atomic physics, and medical physics. His expertise in photodisintegration theory focused on the nucleus of the element deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen that has twice the mass of ordinary hydrogen atoms. One of his grants, awarded by NASA in the mid 1980s, investigated ways radiation in space affects synthetic materials that could be used in space structures.

Mail Art

The UB Poetry Collection recently received a significant collection of mail art from "BARON," a mail artist who resides in Cleveland, Ohio. Like many mail artists, BARON prefers to be known simply by his moniker, and he donated his vast collection to the Poetry Collection because of its growing reputation for collecting, preserving, and curating mail art and other ephemera representative of popular and underground culture. Mail art, also termed "Network Art" or "Correspondence Art," circumvents established art conventions and embraces the U.S. Postal Service as its communication medium. Mail artists utilize such techniques and conventions as rubber stamps, collage, visual and concrete poetry, "artistamps," handmade papers and copy art. The UB Poetry Collection and the Educational Technology Center are presently developing a digital collection of mail art representative of our holdings, which will be offered via the UB digit platform.

Kerry Grant donates his collection of Pan-American Exposition print memorabilia

Dr. Kerry S. Grant, Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Affairs, recently donated his unique collection of Pan-American memorabilia to the University Archives. Following the publication of his book, The Rainbow City: Celebrating Light, Color, and Architecture at the Pan-American Exposition, Buffalo, 1901 , and the city-wide centennial celebrations throughout 2001, Dr. Grant wanted to keep the collection at the University where it can become an "expression of the University's association and engagement with the City of Buffalo." The collection documents the importance of "color" at the Exposition and includes many guidebooks, view books, books of photographs, maps and postcards, as well as magazines and newspapers. The Libraries look forward to using digital technologies to make selected unique or fragile items in the collection widely available.

Joseph Nitecki establishes gift annuity for the Polish Collection

Joseph Z. Nitecki, professor emeritus at the University at Albany and former director of the libraries there, has created a gift annuity in memory of his wife, Zofia, to support the Polish Collection in the UB Libraries. Mr. Nitecki recognizes the unique value of the Polish Collection to Slavic and ethnic studies, and its quality as a resource for scholars and others interested in Polish émigré culture. This generous annuity will help guarantee that the Polish Collection continues to be a major resource for Polish and Polish-American history and culture. Located in Lockwood Memorial Library, the Polish Collection features Polish-language books and journals, genealogical resources, and twenty-one original manuscripts of Polish kings dating from the 16th to 18th centuries.