Academic Heritage collections

The Atlantis Archive Portal make historical archives accessible and searchable. New and existing inventories are continuously added and made accessible for you. Documents can be requested for reference at the university or scans can be made.

Searching archives may not be something you do every day. We like to help you answer your information request. You can contact us please fill in this webform.

The paper archive of UT-Nieuws (now known as U-Today), which covers the period from 1963 to 1995, has been made fully digitally accessible to all those who are interested. Thousands of pages of university news were scanned and added to the Overijssel Collection. This digitisation project was led by the ADM Department, and funded by the Twente University Fund. For more information, see the article Digital dig through UT history at U-Today (7/9/2021).  

The volumes dating from 1963 to 1995 can be found in the Overijssel Collection website under inventory number 1761.  

U-Today has provided its own archive since 2012 

*Click on the picture to visit the website.

Interviews with former students

In 2023, the ADM Department began the Oral History project, in which approximately twenty former students from the very beginning (1964-1973) were initially interviewed about their time studying at the university. Marjan Beijering (History Lab) is supervising the project and conducting the interviews. The interviews can be found at University of Twente Oral History.

Podcast serie Campus Walks  

Five former staff members and members of the University of Twente pensioners’ association GEWIS are also interviewing a number of former students. Expert assistance from the LISA Video team is provided by Martin Bosker, who has also conducted several interviews.

The podcast series Campus Walks, created by Martin Bosker, is also very interesting. ing. M. Bosker (Martin) Senior ICT-, Telecom & Multimedia specialist +31534892333 m.bosker@utwente.nl Building: Spiegel 201

More information on the Project Oral History UT, see the news item Project Oral History UT (7/11/2023)

Study collection EEMCS 

The EEMCS Historical Study Collection is housed on floor 5 of the Carré building. The collection consists of electronic measuring instruments and computer equipment and shows their historical development. The collection started in 1979 and is managed by an enthusiastic group of former employees. Part of the collection is exhibited in more than 40 display cases in various buildings across the campus.

In 1999, the University Library received a donation from a Dr J.A.P.G. Boot (1905-2006): a valuable collection (approx. 16,000 volumes) on the history of the Twente textile industry and a collection of sixteenth-century and seventeenth-century city books, including a Blaeu atlas. Dr Boot obtained his doctorate in Rotterdam in 1935 with a dissertation on The cotton industry in Twente, 1830-1873. Dr Boot lived and worked for much of his life in Tasmania, where he built up this collection. In 1996, he was awarded with an honorary doctorate by the University of Twente for his contribution to the history of the Twente textile industry. Boudewijn Büch’s visit to Tasmania in 1990, during which he visited Dr Boot and examined his book collection extensively, is particularly noteworthy. That episode (15/1990) of De wereld van Boudewijn Büch (the World of Boudewijn Büch) is still available on YouTube. 

YouTube video 

More on physical book collections 

The University of Twente offers various physical collections of literature for study and research purposes, as well as some special collections. Collections can be found mainly in the Vrijhof, as well as in Langezijds and the so-called Educafés. 

Online information can be found here. 

Images of student life on campus throughout the years, portraits of noteworthy professors and staff members, photos and videos of exceptional moments in the history of the University of Twente. All that and more can be found in the University of Twente Image Bank. 

The canon of the University of Twente was begun in 1948 with the establishment of the Twente University Fund, which will celebrate its 75th anniversary in 2023. The canon provides a colourful but incomplete overview of the rich history of the university. Did you know that the inventor of WiFi studied at the University of Twente? And why does Abe Lenstra feature in the canon? 

Click on the picture to visit the website.

The EEMCS Historical Study Collection is housed on floor 5 of the Carré building. The collection consists of electronic measuring instruments and computer equipment and shows their historical development. The collection started in 1979 and is managed by an enthusiastic group of former employees. Part of the collection is exhibited in more than 40 display cases in various buildings across the campus.

Information about the University of Twente can be found on the website of the foundation, as well as a blog about academic heritage in Twente. The SAE website can be found at: https://www.academischerfgoed.nl/.