About
Duke University is a private, non-profit, research university located in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakersin the present-day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James Buchanan Duke established The Duke Endowment, at which time the institution changed its name to honor his deceased father, Washington Duke.
The Duke University Archives identifies and preserves administrative, fiscal, historical and legal records that have enduring value for the Duke community and makes those records available in accordance with policies approved by the university's administration, board of trustees and faculty. Although the need for a university archives was recognized in the late 1940s, Duke University did not establish one until 1972. At that time Duke University President Terry Sanford established the Duke University Archives as the official repository for university records of enduring value. The Duke University Medical Center Archives was established in 1977 to manage the archival records of the Duke University Medical Center. In 2002, after 30 years of operating as a department of the general administration, the Duke University Archives became part of the university's library system. In 2006, the University Archives merged with the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library, now the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Duke University owns 254 buildings on 8,691 acres (35.17 km2) of land, which includes the 7,044 acres (28.51 km2) Duke Forest. The campus is divided into four main areas: West, East, and Central campuses and the Medical Center, which are all connected via a free bus service. On the Atlantic coast in Beaufort, Duke owns 15 acres (61,000 m2) as part of its marine lab. One of the major public attractions on the main campus is the 55-acre (220,000 m2) Sarah P. Duke Gardens, established in the 1930s.