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

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

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

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Let’s Learn About Archives Together

Explore archivist-guided experiences for you or your class, club, or organization.

A researcher looking through folders of historical photos at the Bentley Historical Library. Only the researcher's hands and arms are visible, wearing a bright pink jacket, a watch, and two rings, reaching out to flip through folders in an open box.
Professor Greg Dooley teaching the History of Athletics class at the University of Michigan. Professor Dooley is out of focus in the foreground, inviting you to focus on the audience full of U-M students, wearing t-shirts and U-M sweatshirts. Some students are looking at Professor Dooley, and some are taking notes.

Teaching

Classes & Sessions

Collaborate with archivists to design a hands-on experience that builds research skills and supports your course goals.

Let’s Work Together
A historical page from the archives being worked on in the Conservation Lab at the Bentley Historical Library, including conservation tools like thread, scissors, and a metal scraper with a wooden handle, and a typed page of writing backed by a larger yellowing piece of paper with two punched holes on one side.

Learning

Public Workshops, Exhibits, & Events

Archives are for everybody! Learn about exhibits and events, or collaborate with us to plan one for your group or organization.

Join Us Plan an Event
Visitors in the reading room of the Bentley Historical Library looking through historical documents at tables, featuring two researchers in the foreground, one wearing a striped shirt and glasses with her brown hair up in a ponytail, and one wearing a white sweater with bleached-blond hair, looking at documents together at one table. In the background, out of focus, an archivist in a black dress can be seen visiting another table with two researchers who have an open box of historical papers on the table in front of them.

Explore Michigan history

Making Michigan Lecture Series

Join us for our series of talks with guest experts who explore the history of the University of Michigan.

Learn More
A visiting fellow to the Bentley Historical Library looking through historical papers at a table in the reading room, wearing a blue and white checkered shirt and glasses, with a laptop open in front of him. Several tables holding boxes from the archives are shown in the background behind him, ready for other researchers to arrive. The front desk, the red carpet of the reading room, and the library's brick walls are also visible.

Bentley research fellow Frank Cirillo in the reading room, studying the papers of Angela Morgan. Photo by Madeleine Bradford.

Research

Fellowships

The Bentley offers fellowships to support all kinds of use of our collections, including artistic inspiration, K-12 lesson planning, and publication research.

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Engaging the Archives

Learn about the many ways people experience history through the Bentley.

Students research the papers of Gerald L.K. Smith in the “History of Hate in the Great Lakes Region” class. Photo by Madeleine Bradford.

Student docents at the Frankel Detroit Observatory designed and produced the Watcher in the Sky exhibit.

A black and white image of sunlight filtering through trees and a woman walking along a wide sidewalk.

A woman on the U-M Diag in the early 1930s. Photo from the Ivory Photo collection.

A visiting fellow to the Bentley Historical Library looking through historical papers at a table in the reading room, wearing a blue and white checkered shirt and glasses, with a laptop open in front of him. Several tables holding boxes from the archives are shown in the background behind him, ready for other researchers to arrive. The front desk, the red carpet of the reading room, and the library's brick walls are also visible.

Bentley research fellow Frank Cirillo in the reading room, studying the papers of Angela Morgan. Photo by Madeleine Bradford.

A woman wearing a blue jacket holds an oversized book. Three people on the left side of the image listen to her, one of them is pointing at the book. They are surrounded by boxes on shelves in an archive.

Behind-the-scenes tours at the Bentley Historical Library give visitors exclusive access to the stacks and more.

Collections Magazine Story

October 22, 2025

Reckoning with the History of Hate

by Madeleine Bradford

A paid internship program gave students hands-on experience with archives that included studying the history of intolerance in Michigan and parallels between the past and today.

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Exhibit

June 11, 2026

Watcher of the Sky Exhibit

Built in 1854, the Detroit Observatory is now a museum, part of the Bentley Historical Library. Its latest exhibit, Watcher of the Sky: Making and Remaking the Detroit Observatory, explores explore the life of this historic observatory, 170 years in the making.

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News

May 21, 2026

Michigan’s Lost Campus

by James Tobin

Can you remember a beloved U-M space that no longer exists? In this Making Michigan talk, Professor Jim Tobin traces the University of Michigan’s “lost campus” and how changing spaces reflect broader patterns in University history.

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News

April 27, 2026

Bentley Fellowship Recipients Announced

The Bentley Historical Library is proud to announce the awardees for its annual fellowship program. The fellowships support the use of Bentley collections by K-12 educators, artists, and researchers.

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News

June 01, 2026

New Behind-the-Scenes Tours of the Library

by Lara Zielin

Get exclusive access to the Bentley Library as you’ve never seen it! Our free behind-the-scenes tours are offered every month, giving visitors a special look at the thousands of square feet of materials archived at the Bentley.

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