Roosevelt University

The Roosevelt University Archives contains several collections relating to the history of Chicago including contemporary accounts of the Chicago World’s Fair; Historic records of the Auditorium Building and Theatre designed by Adler and Sullivan; the most comprehensive national collection of records from the Chicago Musical College which operated from 1869 to 1954 when it merged with Roosevelt University; and the Christopher Reed Collection which includes research related to Bronzeville and other Chicago sites important to African-American history.

Left to right: Jerome Stone, Rolf Weil, and Mayor Richard J. Daley with a proclamation proclaiming Roosevelt University Day, April 1966. Photo by Chicago Photographers. The archives labor collections include records of the Chicago Newspaper Guild, Teamsters Local 743, the Retired Teachers Union, and the Labor Oral History Project of Betty Balanoff. The university archives recently became the new home of the Illinois Labor History Society’s historical records, making Roosevelt University the premier resource for labor history research in the Midwest.