Discover Discover the Archive
Discover

The Archive

Search for historical materials, click through online resources, connect with archivists, and get your questions answered.
Start Your Search

Search Finding Aids

Search the Catalog

Materials Available Online

Athletics History

Image Bank

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit Plan Your Visit
Visit

The library

Make the most of your in-person visit with this overview of our hours, parking, and what to know in advance.
Visit The Bentley

Open Hours

Parking and Directions

Accessibility
Learn Learn With Us
Learn

With us

Attend an event, learn more about bringing your class to the library, and watch previous lectures from our Making Michigan series.
Learn at the Bentley

Classes and Sessions

Public Workshops, Exhibits, and Events

Making Michigan Series

Fellowships
Give GIve to Our Future
Give

To our future

You can help keep history alive by supporting the library in a variety of ways. Help us build a better Bentley.
Give to the Bentley

Financial Donations

Material Donations

Other Ways to Give
About About the Bentley
About

The bentley

The Bentley is home to the archives of the University of Michigan and one of the largest collections of materials on the history of the state of Michigan.
Learn More About Us

Director's Note

What We do

Full Staff List

University Archives and Records

Employment

For the Media

Bentley News

Collections Magazine

Detroit Observatory

My Account Faqs

You are searching the:

Like a traditional library catalog, this will help you find published materials such as books or maps. Learn More.

Finding Aids are like a table of contents for collections to help you find specific boxes and folders. Learn More

Go to Finding Aids

The website search allows you to search and find content on the website.

Ask an Archivist

Ask an Archivist

Making Michigan: A Lecture Series

Join us for the next free talk, and learn what U-M’s history means for its future!

A variety of paper materials from the Bentley archives layered on top of each other including a postcard of the University of Michigan campus, a page from a yearbook, and an old letter.

Making Michigan explores the history of the University of Michigan from its origins in 1817 to the present.

These talks are offered from September-May by the Bentley Historical Library and hosted by the Judy and Stanley Frankel Detroit Observatory.

Audiences can attend in-person or online. Advance registration is encouraged.

Watch Previous Lectures

The Lost Campus: The University of Michigan’s Vanished but not Forgotten Spaces

Staff from the Bentley Historical Library and a group of Chinese archivists in Nanking, China.

Archiving the World: The Bentley Library and U-M’s International Aspirations

The 1962 U-M Baseball Team leaving a plane after returning from Japan.

Go, Blue: A History of Michigan Athletics and International Travel

African American U-M students picketing in support of the Black Action Movement in front of Hill Auditorium.

A Place for Politics, Protest, & Performance: Exploring the Hidden Histories of Hill Auditorium

Angell Hall seen from the southwest.

The Children’s Psychiatric Hospital at the University of Michigan, 1955 – 1990

Angell Hall seen from the southwest.

The Edmund Fitzgerald Investigations

Professor David Gerdes performs a physics demonstration using a plastic ball on a string.

Saturday Morning Physics: Thirty Years of Engaging, Educating, and Entertaining the Public

A yellow typewriter superimposed over a map of the U-M campus.

Unboxing the Unexpected: The Notable and the Infamous in U-M’s archives

A map of Michigan showing its counties in 1842.

The 1817 Project: U-M’s Origins, Indigenous Lands, and Institutional (In)Action