Digital Collections

500 Festival

The 500 Festival archival collection is held by the organization in Indianapolis. This digitized collection was created to share the 500 Festival events and traditions with the community.

The online collection includes photos and documents from past and present 500 Festival events and programs.

Allison Transmission

Founded in 1915 by James A. Allison, Allison Transmission is headquartered in Indianapolis with additional manufacturing facilities in Hungary and India. The Allison Transmission archival collection is held by the company at its global headquarters in Indianapolis. This digitized collection was created to share Allison heritage with the community in celebration of the company’s centennial in 2015.

Archive of Muslim American History and Life

In collaboration with the IU School of Liberal Arts at IU Indianapolis, this digital archive collects and preserves documents related to Muslim American history from the colonial era to the present. It includes memoirs, newspapers, books, reports, speeches and other documents that reveal the place of Muslims in American social, political, religious, cultural, and economic life.

Athenaeum Damenverein & Women's Auxiliary Records, 1876-2007 (Digital)

In 1893 members of the Indianapolis German-American community living on the south side of Indianapolis broke away from the Indianapolis Socialer Turnverein to form the Indianapolis South Side Turners. This organization stressed physical fitness and the preservation of German culture and was a social and cultural center for German-Americans in the southern part of the city. In 1900 the South Side Turners built their hall, equipped with a gymnasium and meeting rooms, at 306 Prospect Street. The group sold the building in 1977 and today is based in German Park on South Meridian Street.

Athenaeum Turners Records, 1880-2002 (Digital)

The Athenaeum Turners is a German-American organization founded in 1851 as the Indianapolis Turngemeinde. Its original emphasis was on promoting physical fitness and intellectual development, advancing the political interests of German-Americans, and preserving German culture. The Athenaeum, the Turners' home since its opening in 1893, served as a gathering place for the Indianapolis German-American community, and members of the Athenaeum Turners were prominent leaders in the political, business, educational, and cultural life of the city.

Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site

The Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site is an independently-funded nonprofit museum dedicated to preserving and sharing Harrison’s presidential legacy and largely hidden collection of more than 10,000 historical items. The collection is composed of original Harrison family artifacts and accessioned artifacts of national significance. 

British Studies Intelligencer

The  newsletter of the North American Conference on British Studies, the British Studies Intelligencer was published twice annually at the University of Arizona at Tucson. It included information on forthcoming meetings, summaries of regional and national meetings, and additional announcements and news in British studies. This archive covers 1962-2001.

Civil War: Governor Morton Telegraph Books and Slips

During the American Civil War (1861-1865), Indiana Governor Oliver P.Morton's staff recorded thousands of the governor's incoming andoutgoing telegrams in small, bound books. The governor and his staffcommunicated by telegraph with the highest and most prominentgovernment and military leaders in the North, including PresidentAbraham Lincoln and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton. Researchers willfind many uses of these messages. Historians studying politics andmilitary planning at the highest levels of federal and state governmentduring the Civil War will find many important communications. Personsstudying the organization and actions of Indiana volunteer regimentsand batteries will gain useful insights. Biographers, local historians,and genealogists will all learn much from consulting these records.

Climate Data: Indianapolis, IN 1940-present

In collaboration with the Indianapolis Public Library, University Library digitized a collection of Local Climate Data dating from 1940 to present. The data is recorded from the Indianapolis International Airport (NOAA) and is now available via the web. Also available are several weather related newspaper articles ranging from 1936-1971. Additionally, you can view a dynamic weather calendar to view precipitation and temperature dating back to the late 1800s.

Conner Prairie Historical Almanac Collection

Almanacs, with their calendars, weather forecasts and astronomical information, were often coveted possessions in early American households. Indeed, one 19th-century historian claimed that almanacs and bibles "were the two books most likely to be found in Christian" homes. Though now lost to history one of the very first books thought to be printed in North America was an almanac published in Boston 1639.

Conner Prairie Rural History Project

The Conner Prairie Rural History Project (2001-2003) was an effort to capture the fast disappearing rural landscape and heritage of Hamilton County, Indiana.  Funded by the Legacy Fund of Hamilton County, the project conducted over 125 oral histories with farmers, business leaders, and local citizens who shared their memories of the county’s rural past.  In addition, diaries, letters and photos documenting that heritage were collected and digitized for posterity.

Conner Prairie Traditional Crafts: Preservation and Reproduction

The preservation and continuation of traditional crafts and their skills are important to American culture. The Conner Prairie craft collection is usually limited to museum guests, scholars, and other specialized researchers. By digitizing the collection and making it widely accessible o the internet these historic artifacts and the important story they tell will be available to a mass audience, including teachers and students. This collection consists of Conner Prairie traditional crafts featuring pottery, armsmaking, and blacksmithing.

Conner Prairie Transferware Collection

Transferware was an 18th-century English innovation in ceramic decoration in which copper-plate engravings were "transferred" to items via a "tissue." No longer was it necessary to laboriously hand-decorate ceramics like tableware, basins or tiles. This early form of mass production was an immediate success and demand grew over the early nineteenth century. Manufacturers like Spode and Wedgewood found eager markets for their deocorative, durable goods, particularly in the United States.

Crispus Attucks Museum

Crispus Attucks was Indianapolis' first segregated high school built for African-Americans in 1927. It was named after Crispus Attucks, a black man who was the first American to die in the Boston Massacre in 1770, a precursor to the American Revolutionary War. In 1986, the school converted from a high school to junior high school. This digital collection captures the history of the high school through its yearbooks (1928-1986), newspapers, and graduation programs. Special thanks to the Crispus Attucks Museum and its Board of Advisors for permission to digitize their valuable collection of historical documents. Special thanks to the Crispus Attucks Museum and its Board of Advisors for permission to digitize their valuable collection of historical documents.

WANTED: Missing Crispus Attucks High School Yearbooks
YEARS: 1930, 1980
Please help IU Indianapolis University Library complete the Digital Crispus Attucks Yearbooks collection.
Contact Information : digsvcs@iu.edu

Elmon Meyers Collection

Collection of photos and documents related to the life and times of Elmon Meyers. The collection includes documents published from 1954 to 2014.

Flanner House (Indianapolis, Ind.) Records, 1936-1992 (Digital)

The Indiana Historical Society (IHS) and Indiana University/Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI) collaborated to establish this digital project pertaining to Flanner House. The approximately 5,000 digitized objects consist of photographic, manuscript, artifact, and printed images from the IHS and IUPUI Flanner House collections and several items related to Flanner House from various collections at the two repositories.

Historic Indiana Maps

Maps are often beautiful illustrations of our history, the human-environmental interaction, and natural features of our state and its communities. Maps record settlement patterns, political boundaries, transportation routes, and land ownership. Maps contain invaluable information for historians, genealogists, and citizens. The resources in this collection are historical maps of Indiana, its counties and cities, from the collections at Indiana University. Efforts were made to represent various areas of our state, but selection was based on G. K. Hall and Co.'s Checklist of Printed Maps of the Middle West to 1900 Volume 3 covering the state of Indiana.

Historic Indiana Plat Books

The Plat Books of Indiana Counties are historic guides to the communities of Indiana, showing townships, roads and section numbers. These geographic resources were originally created by Sidwell Studio and W. W. Hixson & Co. between approximately 1925 and 1941. Only approximate dates are available as the publisher neglected to date the books. The original books are owned by and scanned in collaboration with the Indiana State Library through a grant from the Library Fund of Indianapolis Foundation, an affiliate of the Central Indiana Community Foundation.

Indiana Code

The Indiana Code contains the codified statutes of Indiana. This project aims to digitize all extant volumes of the Indiana Code for open access use

Indiana Farm Security Administration Photographs

The U.S. Farm Security Administration took 678 photographs with captions in Indiana from 1935 to 1943. These photos cover the Ohio River flood (1937), resettlement communities of Decatur Homesteads and Wabash and Deshee Farms (1938), and U. S. Army Chaplain School at Fort Ben Harrison (1943). Most of the photos are primarily concerned with rural and traditional agricultural life. There are very few industrial shots and no photos of major industries. The only major city in Indiana photographed was Indianapolis, including photos around Monument Circle, the Greyhound Bus Station, and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Indiana Historic Sites and Structures Inventory

Every year since 1978 Indiana Landmarks has surveyed from two to four counties, looking for architecturally and historically significant structures and districts. Field surveyors drive every road in the county, identifying, documenting, and photographing historic sites and structures. IU Indianapolis University Library has partnered with the Indiana Landmarks to make out-of-print reports available to the public via the web.

Indiana Landmarks Historic Architecture Collection

A Library Services Technology Grant allowed IU Indianapolis to begin digitization of Indiana Landmarks' slide collection, now making it available to the public. The collection contains images from the early 1960s through present day and captures historic architecture throughout the state. Educators will find the collection useful in documenting architectural styles and Indiana history. Old house enthusiasts will find ideas for paint colors, restoration techniques, and inspiration.

Indiana Medical History Museum - Wishard Scrapbook

University Library collaborated with the Indiana Medical History Museum to make this scrapbook, which Dr. William Niles Wishard was heavily involved in the creation of, available in digital format. This treasure, like many of the artifacts on display at the Indiana Medical History Museum, is a window into the history of medicine in Indiana and an introduction to some of the past prominent figures in the Indianapolis Medical Society.

Indiana Muster, Pay and Receipt Rolls, War of 1812

This collection consists of Muster, pay and receipt rolls of Indiana territory volunteers or militia of the period of the War of 1812. They are in the form of four oversized bound volumes of photostats made by Leet Brothers Co. in 1926 from information in the U.S. Adjutant General's Office. The four physical volumes digitized here reside in the collection of the Genealogy Division, Indiana State Library. An index was created by Genealogy Division staff and bound into Volume 1.

Indiana Red Cross

As one of the nation’s premier humanitarian organizations, the American Red Cross is dedicated to helping people in need throughout the United States and, in association with other Red Cross networks, throughout the world. We depend on the many generous contributions of time, blood, and money from the American public to support our lifesaving services and programs.

Indiana State Fairgrounds and Event Center Collection

The Indiana State Fairgrounds & Event Center annually hosts more than 400 meetings, shows, sports and agricultural events, including its signature event, the Indiana State Fair. Laid out over 250 acres, the Indiana State Fairgrounds & Event Center is home to more than 1,000,000 square feet of event space and offers the most flexible event venues in the state of Indiana

Indiana Territory Court Orders

The digital collection of Indiana Territory Court Orders is a collaborative effort between the University Library, the Indiana State Archives, and the Historical Society for the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana. This collection contains digital images of three order books: 2 original volumes created between 1800 and 1816 and a late nineteenth-century transcription for the first 114 pages of Order Book 1.

Indianapolis City Directory Collection

City directories contain a wealth of information for genealogists, researchers, and everyday history enthusiasts. These books tell a great deal about our past by including the names and information about residents as well as businesses in Indianapolis through the years. Inside you'll find addresses and occupations of householders, complete business directories, and much more. This collection consists of 14 Indianapolis city directories ranging from 1858-1980.

Indianapolis History

This collection includes a variety of Indianapolis related primary (with limited secondary) resources (photographs and text) dating from late 19th to mid 20th centuries.Example resources include:Indianapolis Power & Light Co. Distribution System Photograph collection, monographs on the history of Indiana such as, The Hoosiers published in 1916, several issue of the Free Soil Banner, and various published and unpublished city of Indianapolis scrapbooks.

Indianapolis Maennerchor Records, 1866-1990 (Digital)

The Indianapolis Maennerchor (men's choir), established in 1854 by German immigrants, is one of the oldest continuously active singing societies in the United States. The Maennerchor was an important organization in the early cultural life of Indianapolis, sponsoring musical events of national importance and bringing prominent singers and musicians to the city.

Indianapolis South Side Turners Records, 1893-1956 (Digital)

In 1893 members of the Indianapolis German-American community living on the south side of Indianapolis broke away from the Indianapolis Socialer Turnverein to form the Indianapolis South Side Turners. This organization stressed physical fitness and the preservation of German culture and was a social and cultural center for German-Americans in the southern part of the city. In 1900 the South Side Turners built their hall, equipped with a gymnasium and meeting rooms, at 306 Prospect Street. The group sold the building in 1977 and today is based in German Park on South Meridian Street. These photographs are part of the Indianapolis South Side Turners Records held by the IUPUI University Library Ruth Lilly Special Collections and Archives.

Inland Steel Company Image Collection

Inland Steel Company, founded in 1893 in Chicago, arrived first in northwest Indiana, establishing its Indiana Harbor Works in 1901 in East Chicago, Indiana. A very large and important source of historical information about the local steel industry is the Inland Steel Company Photograph Collection housed in the Calumet Regional Archives at Indiana University Northwest. Inland Steel created a visual materials collection comprising over one million images, including prints, negatives, slides and transparencies. Select images from this huge collection are presented here for use by students, scholars, and the general public.

IU Indianapolis Image Collection

This collection of digital images visually represents IUPUI's and IU Indianapolis' history and development as a teaching facility, an academic institution, a continually transforming campus, and a group of ever growing students, faculty, and staff.

Jessie Groves Collection, 1915-1977 (Digital)

In 1915 Jessie Groves arrived in Indianapolis at the age of 21 to take a position as the Night Supervisor at Long Hospital on the campus of the fledgling Indiana University School of Medicine. She spent the rest of her nursing career at the IU Medical Center, retiring in the 1950s as the Operating Room Supervisor for both Long and Riley Hospitals. The collection consists mainly of candid photographs taken by Jessie over the course of her four decades at the Medical Center and an oral history completed when she was 83 years old looking back on her career.

Jewish Post and Opinion

The Jewish Post & Opinion Newspaper (1933-present) is one of the first and only publications to offer insight into the lives of the national and local Jewish communities.

Keystone View Company Lantern Slides

The Keystone View Company was the largest stereographic company in the world, specializing in national and international geographic and social science images.  The 488 slides in this digital collection include images from the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. They depict scenes from agricultural, industrial, commercial, urban, rural, transportation, nature, historical and daily life situation. Images date from the 1890s through the early twentieth century.

Road to Indiana Statehood

The Indiana Supreme Court and the Indiana Historical Bureau are collaborating on a major project to gather in one place copies of original documents and research materials relating to Indiana's constitutional history. The IU Indianapolis University Library has digitized and organized the material to make it user-friendly and fully searchable, and serves as the host for this Web-based material.

Saoirse - Irish Freedom

Saoirse - Irish Freedom is the monthly newspaper of the Irish political party Republican Sinn Féin. The name is taken from "Irish Freedom - Saoirse", which was a Fenian paper of the early 1910s. IU Indianapolis University Library has collaborated with the School of Liberal Arts to digitize older issues of the newspaper which were previously unavailable online.

Service through Sponge Cake

The digital collection of cookbooks is a collaborative effort between the University Library and the Indianapolis Public Library and will focus on Indiana cookbooks dating from the turn-of-the-century, with a special emphasis on fundraising cookbooks published by churches, synagogues and other community organizations. The University Library has created the community cookbook collection using unique materials from the Indianapolis Public Library's collection of historic Indiana cookbooks.

Sovereign Nation

The Sovereign Nation is the on-line and hard copy newspaper of the 32 County Sovereignty Movement, which was founded on December 7, 1997. The founders considered themselves a "Committee" of Provisional Sinn Fein, but after being expelled from that organization they formally organized themselves as the 32 County Sovereignty Movement. Their primary focus in the late 1990s and early 2000s was "to achieve broad unity amongst the Republican family on the single issue of Irish Sovereignty." Today, the 32 County Sovereignty Movement has broadened its focus and seeks to promote "the revolutionary ideals of Republicanism" and to resist "all forms of colonialism and imperialism". See 32csm.org for more information.

Sports Car Club of America

Dating back to its inception in 1944, Sports Car Club of America has served as the United States’ most diverse motorsports organization. With competition in its DNA, SCCA is pleased to partner with the IU Indianapolis University Library to capture some of its proud photographic history for future members, motorsports enthusiasts and historians.

Tiananmen Square, 1989

On April 15, 1989, Hu Yaobang, the ousted General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, died in Beijing. Thousands of ordinary people went to Tiananmen Square to mourn for his death. The college students in universities in Beijing soon turned mourning into a grassroots movement that called for political reform. This event spread to many cities in China and abroad as well and lasted for more than a month. The event ended abruptly with government’s killing of hundreds of ordinary citizens on June 4. This collection photographically documents the events of this tumultuous time.

Womankind

Running from 1977 to 1983, WOMANKIND was a local feminist newspaper, conceived by, and published for women. Many of the writers have IU Indianapolis roots including founding, regular author and IU Indianapolis English professor, Rebecca Pitts. The newspaper includes editorials, research, poetry, stories, ads, and reviews of local exhibitions.