MIT Libraries

From Samurai into Engineers marks the 150th anniversary of the graduation of MIT’s first Japanese student, Eiichirō Honma (SB 1874), and highlights the experiences of Honma and other Japanese students at MIT who followed in his footsteps.

MIT Distinctive Collections saved a set of striking windows of gypsum and stained-glass, dating to the late 18th- to 19th c. Ottoman Empire. This exhibition illuminates the life of these historic windows, tracing their refracted histories from Egypt to MIT.

The “Dead Cities” are a group of over 820 settlements in northwestern Syria. Masterfully carved out of gray limestone and built without cement, many stood in pristine condition until the early 20th century. This exhibit features detailed drawings, as well as maps, models, academic books, and photographs.

Under the Lens examines the work of women scientists in biology and chemistry at MIT beginning with Ellen Swallow Richards, MIT’s first woman student, through the present day, when many women scientists hold leadership positions at the Institute.

Sisters in Making works to explore and reveal the multi-level efforts of women surrounding the invention and implementation of Core Rope Memory and Magnetic Core Memory in the Apollo Guidance Computer that put man on the moon in 1969.

Inspired by the social and spatial nuances inherent in balconies, HONMI have studied eight different types of balconies around the world and is bringing these distinct qualities back in the MIT campus.

Researched by current MIT faculty, students, alumni, and staff, this historical exhibit tells the remarkable story of South Asia at MIT and MIT in South Asia to honor the determination and grit of multiple generations of South Asians at the Institute.