About George Mason University: A History
George Mason University: A History and the Mason History Project
George Mason University: A History has evolved from a series of published articles, websites, and exhibitions created by George Mason University Libraries Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) during the period between 1996 and 2010. Preserving the history of the University has been one of SCRC's main missions ever since its inception in 1978. Documenting and revealing that very unique history has been one of its passions since the mid 1990s. This project originally began with research and writing done by a Mason graduate student of History in the spring of 2011. Later that year, two generous sponsors provided funding for the continuation of the project. They were the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute and Mason's Auxiliary Enterprise Management Council. With this funding students with backgrounds in history and information technology were hired to create this site. SCRC has partnered in this project with the University Libraries' Digital Strategies & Systems division (DSS), the unit charged with the building and maintenance of the Libraries IT infrastructure, data services, and digital publishing programs. Together, DSS and SCRC have created the content and customized the Omeka theme. This site is a collection of essays describing persons, places, organizations, and events in the history of George Mason University. Unlike a traditional comprehensive institutional history which would treat events in fine detail, the narratives in this site are brief and intended to be quickly digestible by the reader. This site is more of a primer. It seeks to recall the milestone events and basic concepts one might need or want to know in order to understand the larger history of the University. The essays are meant to stimulate interest and provide jump-off points from which more detailed historical research can be conducted. George Mason University: A History was built using the Omeka exhibit tool developed by George Mason University's Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media. The stories in this collection deal with noteworthy and newsworthy events, persons, and movements in George Mason's development. Though its official history begins in August 1957, when it opened as a branch college of the University of Virginia with a student body of seventeen, the institution had been in the planning since 1949. In that year the University of Virginia initially proposed to support higher education in the Northern Virginia area. During this very early period, the foundations of George Mason University's personality, image, and character were laid by men and women who became leaders and long-time friends of the University. As the University itself is a continual work in progress, so will this site be. Additional topics, no matter where in the story, will be added as time passes.George Mason University: A History features digital objects or "artifacts" from the collections of the University Libraries which help illustrate the narratives, much like photographs in a printed historical monograph. Many of these artifacts are indeed photographs of persons and places in the institution's history, but the site also features single- and multi-page documents, and audio and video recordings.
The Mason History Project team is a group of librarians, archivists, and George Mason University students from DSS and SCRC who created and continue to maintain this site. The team uses sources such as oral histories of persons who were involved in the development and growth of the University, such as local leaders, presidents of the University, students, faculty, and staff. Also consulted are previously-written histories of George Mason University (both published and unpublished), official university archives, personal papers of individuals who were involved in the University, George Mason's student and staff newspapers, and state government documents. This site was redesigned and enhanced beginning in 2021, preparing for the 50th anniversary of George Mason University.