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Digital rendering of a woman looking out over rows of blue digital file folders.

Archivists Aren’t Ready for the ‘Very Online’ Era

The challenge: how to catalog and derive meaning from so much digital clutter.
by Michael Waters via The Atlantic on June 4, 2025
Harrison Williams holding a Camera.

Seeking Clues in Cabinet Cards

The poignant images, at once banal and intimate, in the Lynch Family Photographs Collection contain mysteries perhaps only the public can solve.
by April White via JSTOR Daily on February 17, 2025
Looney Tunes "That's all Folks" on a TV screen.

HBO Max’s Great Looney Tunes Purge

Hundreds of classic cartoons vanished without warning. How can you raise your kids on favorites you can’t access anymore?
by Sam Thielman via Slate on January 11, 2023
Black-and-white grainy photograph of Eugene Debs speaking and gesturing with his hands

In The Debs Archive

The papers of American labor activist and socialist Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) offer a snapshot of early twentieth-century politics.
by Matthew Wills via JSTOR Daily on August 15, 2022
Woman preparing to digitize a manuscript document.
Exhibit

Archives in the Digital Age

How digital archives shape historical research and collective memory.
"Slave Market of America," a broadside published by the American Anti-Slavery Society.

Deep Zoom: 1836 Broadside “Slave Market of America”

Published by the American Anti-Slavery Society, this single 77 by 55 centimeter sheet tells multiple stories in both text and illustration.
by William G. Thomas III, Teresa A. Goddu, Dorothy Berry via JSTOR Daily on April 29, 2022

In the Dead Archives

The comment section of a Grateful Dead concert archive offers a sometimes-dark glimpse into a dedicated fan community.
by Max Abelson via n+1 on August 20, 2021
A graphic featuring art and archival storage.

NFTs and AI Are Unsettling the Very Concept of History

Non-fungible tokens and artificial intelligence make tracing the origins of a digital object more fragile. What are the world’s archivists to do?
by Rick Prelinger via Wired on April 20, 2021
This Project Blue Book chart shows the frequency of unidentified flying object (UFO) reports during the months of June through September 1952.

You Can Now Explore the CIA's 'Entire' Collection of UFO Documents Online

Thousands of pages of declassified records are available for anyone to peruse.
by Isis Davis-Marks via Smithsonian on January 15, 2021
A shackle hanging from a post.

A Massive New Effort to Name Millions Sold Into Bondage During The Transatlantic Slave Trade

Enslaved.org will allow anyone to search for individual enslaved people around the globe in one central online location.
by Sydney Trent via Retropolis on December 1, 2020

A New Database Will Connect Billions of Historic Records to Tell the Full Story of American Slavery

The online resource will offer vital details about the toll wrought on the enslaved.
by Amy Crawford via Smithsonian on January 1, 2020
Photograph of Julian Bond holding one of his children.

Julian Bond Papers Project

A new digital archive from UVA Carter G. Woodson Institute and Center for Digital Editing explores the late Civil Rights leader’s life, legacy, and writings.
by Deborah McDowell, Laura Baker, James Perla via Carter G. Woodson Institute on September 25, 2019
Internet Archive servers.

Data Overload

How will the historians of the future manage the massive archival data our society has begun to compile on the internet?
by Seth Denbo via Perspectives on History on May 7, 2019

The Archivists of Extinction

Architectural history in an era of capitalist ruin.
by Kate Wagner via The Baffler on October 19, 2018

Data-Mined Photos Document 100 Years of (Forced) Smiling

A high-school yearbook database dating to the 1900s shows how hairstyles, clothing and smiles have changed.
by Steve Dent via Engadget on November 27, 2015
Civil War soldiers on the cover of James Marten's book "The Sixth Wisconsin"

Ancestry.com and the Long Civil War

The sad remnants of a soldier’s life revealed through probate and Ancestry offer a moving glimpse into the afterlife of Civil War service.
by James Marten via UNC Press Blog on June 16, 2025
Cover of The Moving Image by Peter Kaufman.

The Power of the Moving Image

Video has become our dominant cultural medium, yet we lack reliable archives for the audiovisual record.
by Peter B. Kaufman via Los Angeles Review of Books on February 11, 2025
Painting of enslaved people running away from hands grabbing at them.

Remarkable Documents Lay Bare New York’s History of Slavery

A newly digitized set of records reveals the plight and bravery of enslaved people in the North.
by Carolyn Eastman via Smithsonian on September 3, 2024
Library card catalog.

To Preserve Their Work — and Drafts of History — Journalists Take Archiving Into Their Own Hands

From loading up the Wayback Machine to 72 hours of scraping, journalists are doing what they can to keep their clips when websites go dark.
by Hanaa' Tameez via Nieman Lab on July 31, 2024
A team photograph of the Homestead Grays.

The Negro Leagues Are Officially Part of MLB History — With the Records to Prove It

The MLB incorporated the statistics of 2,300 Black athletes who played in the segregated Negro Leagues, making the Josh Gibson its new all-time batting leader.
by Rachel Treisman via NPR on May 29, 2024
The Fulton Fish Market.

When Your Childhood Belongs to Everyone: Growing Up in a Manhattan That Changed Forever on 9/11

Loft life above the Fulton Fish Market and the day that everything changed.
by Emma Dries via Literary Hub on February 22, 2024
Illustration of an AI machine reading a book.

How AI Can Make History

Large language models can do a lot of things. But can they write like an 18th-century fur trader?
by Josh Dzieza via The Verge on February 15, 2024
Collage of Black woman and marriage certificate.

Why Is America Afraid of Black History?

No one should fear a history that asks a country to live up to its highest ideals.
by Lonnie G. Bunch III via The Atlantic on November 13, 2023
A Historic American Buildings Survey photograph of a house being demolished.

Before the Wrecking Ball Swung

The Historic American Building Survey's mission to photograph important architecture before its demolition.
by Martin Filler via New York Review of Books on November 9, 2023
A portion of the author’s music collection; bootleg cassette tapes and CDs. Photo by Maya Walker.

The Pirate Preservationists

When keeping cultural archives safe means stepping outside the law.
by Jesse Walker via Reason on September 10, 2023
A collage of a feminine hand using a computer mouse and an eye layered over it as if watching.

Many Revolutions

The internet has expanded how we understand the possibilities of the trans experience.
by Jamie Lauren Keiles, Avery Dame-Griff via The Baffler on July 10, 2023

Digital Queers: How Computers Transformed LGBTQ Life in the United States

Digital communications allowed transgender individuals and organizations the digital tools to organize and connect at a previously impossible scale and speed.
by Avery Dame-Griff via Process: A Blog for American History on June 29, 2023
Signage for Hachette Book Group is displayed at BookExpo America in New York.

When You Buy a Book, You Can Loan It to Anyone. This Judge Says Libraries Can’t. Why Not?

The lawsuit against Controlled Digital Lending is about giving corporations—rather than readers, buyers, borrowers, or authors—control over content.
by Michelle M. Wu via The Nation on April 20, 2023

Who Owns History? How Remarkable Historical Footage is Hidden and Monetised

From civil rights marches to moonwalks, historical imagery that belongs to everyone is locked away behind paywalls. Why?
by Richard Misek via Aeon on April 10, 2023
Anna Julia Cooper, portrait sitting in a chair, and Mary Church Terrell, side portrait.

‘Moving Unapologetically to the Forefront’: How an Archive Is Preserving the Black Feminist Movement

The Black Woman’s Organizing Archive highlights work in the 19th and 20th centuries that benefitted Black women and American society as a whole.
by Daja E. Henry, Sabrina Evans, Shirley Moody-Turner via The 19th on March 8, 2023
Marihuana revenue stamp $1 1937

1910s Cannabis Discourse and Prohibition

Does marijuana prohibition have racist origins? Where did ideas of “reefer madness” come from? This project looks to the historical record for answers.
by Isaac Campos via The Drug Page on March 7, 2023
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