The Heritage Collection is the Boston University School of Theology's oldest library collection, providing a direct physical connection to the School's founding institute through the books that its original faculty and students used.
The Boston University School of Theology was founded in 1839 as a project of the Boston Wesleyan Association. Beginning with the appointment of Rev. John Dempster in 1842, books were collected for the project, at first housed at the Newbury (VT) Biblical Institute under the directorship of Rev. Osman Baker, and later moved to Concord, N.H., with the incorporation of the Methodist General Biblical Institute in 1848. The Institute moved to Boston in 1868 to become the founding school of Boston University. Still preserved are several hundred books from the pre-Boston days in our Heritage Collection.
Check out our History of the School of Theology research guide to discover more information about the history of the School of Theology, from its founding in Vermont through the present day.
The collections listed here are located in our Archives and Special Collections. Access to archival holdings (e.g. paper church records, personal papers, baptism certificates, etc). are by appointment only; please send an email to our reference librarians at sthref@bu.edu. For access to books in our special collections, please find a full-time librarian on staff during daytime hours (see the right sidebar on the School of Theology Library homepage for regular hours during the current academic period) who will be happy to pull the material for you.