The title of this article may have caused you to raise an eyebrow. As it may suggest, I’m not talking about researching actual whales, but rather those arcane subjects one has a fate-given obligation to see all the way through. One of these subjects, for me, was Whitman’s planetarium. If looked at from the outside it seems like a straightforward enough matter:
I want to find out why the planetarium is called the Clise Planetarium
I search around in the College for what should be a relatively short explanation explaining why the planetarium is named the way it is
However. H O W E V E R. This was very much not the case. The first place one would think to look is the planetarium itself, but looking at the small plaque right outside of it all one finds is the planetarium's name: the “Charles F. Clise Planetarium”. I searched what I could on the internet, but didn’t find much beyond the College’s Astronomy page and the page for Clise Properties, of which Charles F. Clise was a second generation owner. This meant I was only left with one resource left: the archives. Now, how does one use the archives? I, for one, didn’t have the faintest idea. So I strode on down to the depths of Penrose basement and walked through the conveniently labeled doors of the archives. There I talked a little about what I was trying to find, filled out a form (which, fret not, is only a one time thing), and started down the rabbit hole. This, in hindsight, wasn't the best way to go about things. Depending on the week the archives can be very busy, and just waltzing in isn't the most efficient way of researching something. So instead of somewhat aimlessly asking for things, you can get a head start by looking on two different places:
1. Arminda
2. Archives West
After having gone through both of those, you can just send an email to the archives (Archives@whitman.edu) asking if the materials you've picked out could be ready by some given date, and that's it! (Though there's other ways of accessing the archives. Here's their access policy if you're interested.) Additionally, it's okay if you don't 100% know where to start researching something, the archives would also be more than happy to help you figure that out too. And be curious! At least for me research has never been a straightforward thing. While developing my article on the Clise Planetarium I ended up with much, much more info than I needed, and a lot of which I had no real use for: yet that’s exactly why I love doing it. So here is my honest proposal to you: give it a shot. Seriously. Pick some random part of campus you’ve ever half-wondered about and try to learn about and or uncover its history. Whitman is an old place, and not as dry as you might think; I have found all kinds of amusing facts and anecdotes along the way of researching things like the planetarium. (Some of which I’ll be sharing in an article soon!)
Fun fact: All the Pioneer articles on Arminda (that I've interacted with, anyhow) have actual text superimposed on each scan. This means that search functions (aka command + F) can search for words within a scanned Pioneer article, which is pretty handy.
P.S.
I would also recommend a trifecta of books about the College’s history: The Triumph of Tradition (1859-1924), Tradition in a Turbulent Age (1925-1975), The Transformation of Whitman College (1975-2015) –they are invaluable resources in learning about the College.