A Visit to the Prange Collection

On Friday, we divided the students into two groups after lunch for a visit to the Gordon W. Prange Collection, "the most comprehensive collection in the world of print publications issued in Japan during the immediate post-World War II years, 1945-1949." Professor Prange, a UM professor who served as General MacArthur's chief of historical staff, arranged for copies of newspapers, books, magazines, photographs, posters, and maps published in Japan during the occupation to be archived at UM. The collection is unique in the world, and Japanese scholars often come to College Park to conduct research there.

Eiko Sakaguchi, the curator of the collection, and Amy Wasserstrom, the manager of the collection, were kind enough to give us two hours of their time. The students saw a video and were conducted through the stacks, where they marveled over 50-year-old manga, children's books, movie magazines and other items. Dr. Sakaguchi also spoke to the students in small groups. Laura worked for the Collection up to the day before AGU in America began, so she met us there, and Ji Won and Tim also joined us later. Professor Uchida and Yukari F. rounded out our group. It was a very special experience!

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After a walk over to the Robert H. Smith School of Business (the B-School) looking for some more of the Fifty Nifty Turtles, I left the group with the mentors to take a short rest before they set out to take Georgetown by storm. They are great shoppers!