University Times

Pitt and Philadelphia University have entered into an agreement to advance the preservation of, and access to, the late U.S. Senator Arlen Specter’s archive.

The Arlen Specter Collection, which is part of the Arlen Specter Center for Public Policy at Philadelphia University, comprises more than 2,700 boxes of papers, photographs, audio/ video materials and memorabilia. It includes a wide range of historic documents on important events in modern U.S. history such as: 

• The Warren Commission’s investigation into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy (as an aide to the commission, Specter advanced the lone-gunman “single bullet” theory); and 

• Specter’s crossing party lines to become the only Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee to vote against the nomination of Judge Robert H. Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987.

Pitt’s University Library System will organize and manage the collection over the next four years and store it for a period of 30 years. Philadelphia University retains ownership of the archive; the two universities will collaborate on educational programming related to the archive and facilitate access to it. The center’s first exhibition, focusing on the Warren Commission’s report, will open in October and run through April 15, 2014, in observance of the 50th anniversary of the Nov. 22, 1963, Kennedy assassination.

Philadelphia University President Stephen Spinelli Jr. said: “I am particularly grateful to Elsie Hillman, a prominent political and philanthropic leader in Pennsylvania, for her efforts to initiate and promote this beneficial partnership and for her philanthropic support of the Arlen Specter Center.”

Specter died last October after representing the commonwealth for 30 years as Pennsylvania’s longest-serving U.S. senator. In December 2010, he donated his extensive archive, encompassing 50 years of public service, to Philadelphia University to establish the Arlen Specter Center for Public Policy. The center is a $5 million initiative that includes the restoration of Philadelphia University’s Roxboro House, where the center will be housed. Construction got under way in December 2012 on the $4 million renovation project, which is scheduled to be completed by February 2014. A ceremonial groundbreaking for the center will take place on May 23.

The Arlen Specter Collection will be archived and housed in Pitt’s Archives Service Center on Thomas Boulevard.