Navigating LGBTQ Archival Resources 

Researching LGBTQ history can be complex, interdisciplinary, and involves primary source materials that are categorized in many different ways. 

Using the search tool ArchiveGrid is a great way to start exploring related materials about a person or a topic in a broad sense – keeping in mind that entire collections may not be digitally accessible, and that the papers of one individual or entity are likely be found in multiple geographic locations. A search for the HIV/AIDS activist group ACT UP, for example, yields results from the organization’s individual chapters across the United States, as well as the ACT UP Oral History Project, and personal papers at various institutions.

In New York City alone, there are many institutions and community-based archives where LGBTQ-related materials are held. The LGBT Community Center has 163 collections of mostly personal papers relating to individuals, alongside a few relating to events or institutions – The Lesbian Switchboard of New York City, Inc. Records, Gay Games IV, etc. – as well as a browsable set of images. The Lesbian Herstory Archives hosts portions of its vast collections in online repositories, including a t-shirt collection, buttons, newsletters, and some photographic material. The majority of its collections, however, are held in off-site storage, with a wide selection of items at the Park Slope, Brooklyn, location.

The New York Public Library offers online access to organizational collections, including “The Mattachine Society of New York Records, 1951-1976; Gay Activists Alliance, 1970-1983; and ACT UP: The AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power,” and more. One of its three research libraries, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture’s Queer Studies Collection contains material related to Jewelle Gomez, Storḿé DeLarveríé, Assotto Saint, and other cultural luminaries active between the years 1921-2014. See their Exploring Black LGBTQ Studies research guide for more detailed information.

Additional LGBTQ Archives

The following is a selection of archives that were started by and for the LGBTQ community. The Digital Transgender Archive has no physical location, but offers a novel approach to synthesizing and connecting fragmentary or individual materials relating to gender non-conformity, in a single online portal.

Deaf Queer Resource Center – Founded by Dragonsani (“Drago”) Renteria and launched on the web in 1995. (Currently active on social media and through hosting Zoom events). 

The Digital Transgender Archive is an excellent search portal that helps bring together material form various online sources: you can search by topic (gender identity, drag queens, discos, etc.), genre (periodicals, photographs), and on a movable map. Their Global Terms section can be useful as a guide to different cultural terminology, though the content currently has more of a Western focus. The newspaper and periodical clippings can be especially illuminating, and includes pre-1900 material regarding gender non-conforming behavior and related culture.

Sexual Minorities Archive (SMA) – Founded by Ben Power and currently located in Holyoke, Massachusetts, this collection brings together a variety of LGBTQ-related histories and artifacts, including lesbian pulp novels, audio recordings and records, author Leslie Feinberg’s book collection (their personal papers are being donated to Syracuse University), 1980’s/90’s BDSM-related ephemera. Perhaps the most unique aspect is the localized and rare material about the emergence of queer community in Western Massachusetts, which has continued to happily ferment in the area since the 1970’s and into the present day. 

The ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives are housed at the University of California, and indexed by the Online Archive of California, with indicators of which items are available online. Originally based on the records of ONE magazine, the collection includes extensive material about the early 1950s-era homophile movement in the United States. Located in nearby West Hollywood are the June L. Mazer Lesbian Archives, though there is limited content currently available online (images of buttons and t-shirts). San Francisco’s GLBT Historical Society is another resource for digital material, with coverage of Bay Area newspapers, individuals, and culture.

The University of Victoria (Canada) is home to “the largest trans archives in the world,” ironically established only 10 years ago (!) with a few large donations around the early 2000’s, and lead by Prof. Aaron Devor. UVIC is a rapidly expanding archive and nexus of trans-related scholarship – it is also home to the Moving Trans History Forward conference (since 2014), and the Chair in Transgender Studies, a research center “committed to generating solid reliable information about the real world to drive social change and improve the well-being of trans, nonbinary, Two-Spirit, and other gender-diverse people.”

The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons seeks to cull all of the open access scholarship relating to LGBTQ topics in one searchable site.