The Wesleyan University Slide Library began in 1973 as part of the Davison Art Center. It started as a resource to collect visual material for use in the classroom in service of the Art & Art History Department. In 1973, there were around 15,000 slides of various formats in the library.

At its peak, the slide collection contained around 227,000 cataloged 35mm slides. Much of this collection still exists in the Visual Resource Center. These slides were checked out by faculty members for use in Art & Art History courses. Professors would carry 35mm projectors to the classroom, dim the lights, and project images of artworks onto a screen to illustrate their lectures.

Slides were collected from private collections of artworks, purchased from commercial vendors, or photographed from illustrated art books. These same processes still happen digitally in the Visual Resource Center today.

The Slide Library was a collaborative space where faculty and students could often be found combing through the collection. If faculty were preparing images for a course or research, the slide librarian was ever-present to lend assistance. In between tracking down sources for slides, the slide librarian managed the space and cataloged incoming images into the collection. In its current form, the Visual Resource Center provides the same services albeit digitally.