Location: The Posner Center for Special Collections at Carnegie Mellon University

Featured guests: Sam Lemley, director of the Posner Center for Special Collections, and Katie Blauvelt, special collections coordinator

3 things that surprised me:

1. Walking around CMU, I used to have the feeling that all the buildings were off limits for nonstudents, but there are actually so many spaces that are open to the public. The Posner Center for Special Collections is one of those spots. Sam guided me through their most recent exhibition, which highlights just a few of their 8,000 rare books and unique objects. They plan to change the exhibition annually.

2. AI art might seem like a modern development, but Katie pointed out a painting created in the 1980s that was a collaboration between artist/programmer Harold Cohen and AARON, a piece of software he developed. Cohen’s prompts informed the black lines that AARON drew, and then Cohen added the vibrant color. This painting, along with others from Cohen, had been tucked away in the collections.

3. Sam brought me to one of the rarest pieces in the collection: a copy of the United States Bill of Rights. As far as Sam knows, this is one of only five copies in existence. It sits on a shelf alongside a first edition of Charles Darwin’s “Origin of the Species” and a 16th century text by Copernicus.

One thing that didn’t make the final cut: Sam also showed me a letter written by Charles Darwin to a British papermaker. At the time, Darwin was spending a lot of time plant collecting plants with his daughter, and he was requesting more paper to dry the plants on.

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