Formats - Archives & Manuscripts
The archival and manuscript collections available at the Center for American History's Research and Collections Division contain nearly 70,000 linear feet and comprise more than 7000 individual collections. These collections reflect the collecting scope of the Center, namely, the history of Texas, the Southwest, the South, and the Rocky Mountain West, the history of the University of Texas, congressional history, and specific national-in-scope topics, including media history and the history of the professional touring entertainment industry. Archival and Manuscript collections are stored in closed stacks and must be used in the James Stephen Hogg Reading Room.
The Center's collections offer research opportunities to a wide variety of users, including students, historians, genealogists, novelists, documentary film producers, and historic preservationists. The archival and manuscript collections contain the papers and records produced by individuals in many walks of life and of many ethnic identities and by families, businesses, and organizations. Among these unique materials, produced over a span of nearly 300 years, are a wealth of diverse documents, which include these types:
- Personal and business correspondence
- Diaries, journals, and appointment books
- Passports, birth certificates, and marriage records
- Ledgers and account books
- Scrapbook materials, including report cards, graduation certificates, programs, invitations, many kinds of documentary mementos, obituaries, and newspaper clippings
- Family histories and narratives, as well as family trees and other genealogical information
- Personal and business legal records, including wills, probate and estate records, deeds, court documents, and contracts
- Classified files on thousands of subjects
- Both personal and business financial records, such as receipts, invoices, and inventories
- Organizational records, such as charters, membership lists, minutes, correspondence, yearbooks, programs, press releases, newsletters, brochures
- Artistic materials, such as posters and drawings
- Literary productions, including essays and speeches, reminiscences and memoirs, and poetry and fiction