Located in the historic Douglas Library, W.D. Jordan Rare Books and Special Collections operates as a research and teaching resource for students, faculty, and the larger community. We preserve and provide access to a variety of materials including rare books, maps, posters, including the Edith and Lorne Pierce Canadiana collection. Our collections cover a broad range of subjects, with strengths in astronomy, classics, history, literature, modern languages, natural history, and politics.
Special collections are physical collections of books and manuscripts that are preserved for future readers. They are often old, rare, or unique works that have historical or cultural value, but can also include new or limited print material. Materials in special collections are not available to sign-out but are accessible in our reading room, Monday to Friday by appointment.
Our collections are open to everyone! We encourage you to explore our collections and incorporate primary resources into your research.
Our collections can be explored through the Queen's University Library catalogue, Omni, a single integrated search tool, in house finding aids, and our digital collections. If you would like help finding materials related to a certain subject or topic, do not hesitate to contact us and we will be happy to assist you.
When searching for special collections items in Omni, it is helpful to sort your results by location. Scroll down and select "Queen's Library" or "Queen's Location" on the left side of the screen and choose the appropriate section. You can sort your results by "Relevance" which includes date (oldest, newest), author and title.
If you would like to do a more specific search we recommend using the "Advanced Search" located at the bottom left of the search box.
For further information, please refer to the Omni Search Tips guide.
A finding aid is an organized list of materials in a collection. We have number of finding aids online, but some paper copies are only available at W.D. Jordan Rare Books and Special Collections. The finding aids are especially useful for exploring our posters, broadsides, and maps collections.
We are in the process of digitizing our collections. The Schulich-Woolf Rare Book Collection and Robertson Davies Collection are hosted through Omeka and continue to grow. Images of 18th Century British Political Pamphlets, Canadian Pamphlets, stereoscopic view cards, The Young Ladies’ Journal, and World War I Victory Bonds posters are available online through QSpace.
Some titles in our collections have been digitized by the Internet Archive; please visit the Queen's University Library Collection on the Internet Archive website.
After you have searched the catalogue and found what item you would like to read, come to our reading room on the second floor of Douglas Library and a staff member will help you retrieve your book. Expect the following:
You can request a book online or fill out a retrieval slip when you arrive at Special Collections. To fill out the slip, you will need to know the author, title, and most importantly, the call number.
The retrieval slip is your ticket to receiving an item. We use them to keep track of our circulation and where the book came off the shelf.
Before you enter the reading room (or our classroom), you will be asked to store any bags or coats in one of our lockers. You may bring pencil, paper, laptop, phones, cameras, or reference books into the reading room.
In order to ensure the preservation of our materials pens, food, and drinks are not allowed in the reading room. You may keep beverages at your locker.
Because we want to preserve our books and guarantee future access to our materials, we handle books differently in Special Collections. We ask that you come in with clean hands. Clean bare hands are ideal for handling rare books. You will only wear gloves if handling photographs, metal objects, or any other shiny material.
Your retrieved item will be placed on a book cradle while you work with it. Please leave the item in the cradle. Should you want to leave the book open to one spot, book weights are provided. We encourage you to take photos, if you need assistance please do not hesitate to ask. We have an iPad you can use to scan full pages as well.
Researching and using special collections material is not always easy and can sometimes be intimidating. We're here to assist you with your research. Please ask us for help at any time! Send us an email or call us at 613-533-2839.
We are happy to help with:
We look forward to your visit and your future research projects!
Kim Bell, Services Coordinator
Debbie Jardine, Services Assistant
Jacques Talbot, Services Assistant
Brendan Edwards, Curator of Rare Books and Special Collections
