A new portrait series that celebrates noteworthy Vanderbilt University community members is now on display in multiple locations across the Jean and Alexander Heard Libraries. V150: The Many Faces of Vanderbilt, which was funded by a Spring 2023 Sesquicentennial Grant, features prominent photographs and short bios of alumni, faculty and others, whose accomplishments and contributions have made a significant positive impact on the university and society as a whole.
“This series highlights just some of the many remarkable individuals who’ve called Vanderbilt home over the past 150 years, including pioneering figures who’ve fought to make campus a more welcoming and inclusive place, scholars who’ve pursued groundbreaking ideas and discoveries, and others who’ve exhibited radical collaboration in their support of the university,” said University Librarian Jon Shaw, one of the project’s team members. “These individuals, however, are not just representatives of Vanderbilt’s storied past. They also serve as inspiring examples for our university’s future, pointing the way forward for the next 150 years.”
Collaborating with Shaw on the V150 portrait project were four other team members, all from the Division of Communications and Marketing: Zack Eagles, assistant vice chancellor for content and creative; Jason Routhier, art director; John Russell, director of visual media; and Glenna Underhill, director of creative production and operations. The team plans to create a total of 150 portraits that will rotate across nine of the Vanderbilt libraries and eventually move to other locations on campus in 2024.
“Being included among this group of Vanderbilt luminaries is a true honor,” said Candice Storey Lee, vice chancellor for athletics and university affairs and athletic director. “It’s also a reminder that I wouldn’t be where I am today without these individuals who blazed trails for me and others—alums like Stella Vaughn, who formed the university’s first women’s basketball team in 1896, and Perry Wallace, who integrated SEC varsity basketball. They dared to grow despite great obstacles, and we’re a better university because of their courage and dedication.”
In addition to the V150 portraits, the Heard Libraries have organized and hosted a variety of exhibits related to the Sesquicentennial. Learn more at the libraries’ Sesquicentennial website and at the links below.
Alfred Leland Crabb: Pillar of Peabody (Peabody Library)
All That Glitters: Silver and Gold at Vanderbilt (Special Collections)
The Blair School of Music: From Peabody to Blakemore (Anne Potter Wilson Music Library)
Bricks and Beyond: Edifices of the Owen Graduate School (Walker Management Library)
Buchanan Library Fellowship Projects (Central Library)
- Taking Root: Vanderbilt University’s First Decade, 1875–1885
- Building a University: Vanderbilt’s Second Decade, 1885–1895
- Coming of Age: Vanderbilt’s Third Decade, 1895–1905
- Vanderbilt Self-Portrait
Cherokee and Chickasaw Students at Vanderbilt, 1885–1899 (permanent installation planned for Alyne Queener Massey Law Library)
Color & Conflict: Bishop Joseph A. Johnson and Vanderbilt University (Vanderbilt Divinity School)
Edward Emerson Barnard, Vanderbilt’s First Astronomer (E. Bronson Ingram College)
Reading Between the Lines: The Central Library from Cover to Cover (Central Library)
United in Purpose: 150 Years of Medicine and Nursing at Vanderbilt (Annette and Irwin Eskind Family Biomedical Library)