From Brooklyn to Binghamton: The Vera Beaudin Saeedpour Kurdish Library & Museum Collection at Binghamton University

The Kurds number over 40 million and are a diasporic people scattered throughout the world, often far from their homeland. An American, Dr. Vera Beaudin Saeedpour started the Kurdish Heritage Foundation, Kurdish Library and Kurdish Museum all out of her home in Brooklyn, NY in the early 1980s. Her dedication to the documentation of Kurdish history and culture lasted until her death in 2010. Honoring her final wishes, Dr. Beaudin Saeedpour’s children generously donated the entire collection to the Binghamton University Libraries. This article describes the efforts of Binghamton University Libraries’ Special Collections to process and preserve this large collection and through collaboration, outreach, and the collection of oral histories with Iraqi Kurdish refugees who are currently living in the Binghamton area, continue the mission of Dr. Beaudin Saeedpour and honor the history, culture and struggle of the Kurds which has received little attention and remained relatively undocumented until now.