Who Built Bryn Mawr Phase 2
1960s students confronting race.
Fall 2021 Exhibitions
Exhibitions at Bryn Mawr are more than just opportunities to show interesting artworks and historical documents; they are also original research projects that provide students with opportunities to explore new topics and learn to think through the challenges of presenting their findings in a visually compelling way. —Eric Pumroy, Seymour Adelman Director of Special Collections
In 2021, the Office of the President partnered with Library and Information Technology Services to launch a College history project based on recommendations from the Telling Bryn Mawr Histories Group and the History Advisory Group. Who Built Bryn Mawr?: Beginnings is the first exhibit in the project and aims to change the way the College tells its history. It spotlights four individuals who were instrumental in creating the Bryn Mawr we know today: Sally Brown, a maid who worked in Merion; Umeko Tsuda, the first East Asian student to matriculate to Bryn Mawr and founder of the first women’s college in Japan; Hilda Worthington Smith, the first director of the Summer School for Women Workers in Industry; and Enid Cook, a pioneering virologist who was the first Black student to matriculate from Bryn Mawr. Phase one of the exhibition is located on the first floor of Canaday Library.
The second phase of the project, Who Built Bryn Mawr?: 1960s Students Confronting Race, will join Beginnings this fall. The exhibition will be campus-wide, continuing the ongoing project of changing the way the College understands and talks about its history. This exhibition presents instances of Bryn Mawr students engaging with the nationwide confrontation over race through interaction with external organizations, especially those involved with the civil rights movement. With the introduction to the exhibition located in Campus Center, the exhibit will include multiple site-specific installations across campus. The exhibition focuses on the 1960s and presents an array of potential paths for engaging with the topics explored. Those who can’t make it to campus to explore the exhibition in person and those interested in researching further are welcome to explore both Beginnings and 1960s Students Confronting Race online.
Individual installations within the exhibit explore the exchange program between Bryn Mawr and Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the South, the relationship between student activism at Bryn Mawr and student activism happening in the South, student campaigns against the maids and porters system, a nationwide conference on civil rights issues hosted at the College, the beginnings of Bryn Mawr’s Black Studies Program, and the two Black arts festivals held on campus in the ’60s. The exhibition aims to establish meaningful links between these student-led movements in the past and the present day, inviting community members to question who built the Bryn Mawr we experience today. The second phase of WBBM? was organized by Emma Burns ’21, Keyla Benitez ’24, Bankston Creech ’22, Elliot Fleming ’22, Carolina Molina ’23, and Katy Rosenthal (M.A. candidate), in partnership with Special Collections staff members Allison Mills and Carrie Robbins, as well as faculty advisors Ignacio Gallup-Diaz and Monique Scott. It launches this fall across campus.