Items owned by Tupac Shakur
have been donated to Temple University, including a bullet-dented
golden medallion the rapper was wearing in 1994 when he was shot five
times.
The rapper’s items will be on display at the school’s main
campus at the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection. The
collection consists of roughly 500,000 items detailing “the global black
experience.”
“For a hip-hop head, this is truly a dream come
true,” said Aaron Smith, a professor of Africology and African American
Studies who teaches a Shakur-focused class at Temple.
About a dozen items that belonged to Pac was donated to the
collection by Runnemede, New Jersey-based Goldin Auctions. Among the
pieces included are handwritten lyrics for tracks like “It Ain’t
Easy” and “I Ain’t Mad At Cha,” as well as handwritten track listings
for unreleased albums Shakur was working on before his death in
September 1996 from a still-unsolved drive-by shooting.
Also included in the donation is the diamond earing Shakur wore while pictured on the cover of his 1996 highly acclaimed album “All Eyez On Me.”
Jewelry plays a significant role in Shakur’s story, according to Smith. “There is a lot of mystery around 2pac & his jewelry,” he said. “To have some of it here means a whole lot.”
Diane
Turner, the collection’s curator, said Thursday that the Blockson
Collection will increase its focus on hip-hop culture with the addition
of Shakur’s items.
“This is just the beginning of a long journey to collect and preserve hip-hop culture,” Turner said.