The records of William and Catherine Wurster span the years 1914 to 1979, beginning with William Wurster’s student work and ending with post-mortem material regarding both husband and wife. The collection is organized into two series: Personal and Professional Papers.

The majority of the collection contains Personal Papers of the couple, particularly their photos and slides from various trips abroad, starting with William’s 1922 trip to Europe and ending with the couple’s world tours in 1957 and 1959. Although dates have been identified for many of the slides, some remain unclear. In this case, the trip most likely took place ca. 1957-1959, although the exact date is unknown. The photographs and slides from these travels are organized by place visited, generally by country.

Accompanying these photographs are written descriptions of the trips, including William’s travel journals and their joint notes and publications regarding their experiences. In addition to travel records, this series also contains William’s early student work and his personal diaries spanning the years 1922-1965, which chronicle the events of his daily life. Additionally, this series contains certain biographical information, including Catherine’s curriculum vitae from 1960 and post-mortem materials (obituaries, memorial speeches, etc).

The next series, Professional Papers, houses a variety of material that the couple accumulated regarding architecture or city planning over the course of their careers.

This series contains William’s correspondence with various individuals such as Alvar Aalto, Mercury Records executive Orson Welles, and others such as architects Henry Russell Hitchock and William A. Delano. Additionally, this series includes William’s letters to his business partners Theodore Bernardi and Donn Emmons that he wrote during his time abroad in the late 1950s.

It also includes several hundred lantern slides (and negatives), which were most likely collected by Catherine for use in a lecture or for her book, Modern Housing. Most slides are housing-related and include photos as well as reproduced cartoons, charts, and maps (including U.S.H.A. and F.S.A. images).

Along with these slides, this series contains three boxes of housing-related small photos and postcards, probably collected during trips abroad. The original order of these items has been maintained as closely as possible.

This series also contains the reprinted versions of several lectures delivered by both William and Catherine, various notes and pamphlets written by Catherine regarding urban planning, William’s retirement gift from the Class of 1963, which is a collection of Morley Baer photographs of The Ark, the architecture school building that preceded Wurster Hall, and finally, William’s architecture license from 1922.

Finally, the Professional Papers also contains material related to the development of Greenwood Common as well as an early portfolio of William’s projects, with pictures of each, which was possibly presented to new clients.

An Additional Donation consists of personal and professional material collected or written by Richard Peters as part of his research for a W.W. Wurster biography.