The Point: Learn from Activists of the Past Through the UMass Boston Archives
10/24/2024
This week’s Point was written by FSU (librarian) members Jessica Holden, Associate Archivist for Research Services, and Andrew Elder, University Archivist and Curator of Special Collections.
Learn from Activists of the Past through the UMass Boston Archives
The history of activism has been at the core of the UMass Boston Archives for our 40+ years of existence. Founded in 1981, the University Archives and Special Collections department in the Healey Library early on included materials documenting the Vietnam War, and as a relatively young archival repository in a region filled with some of the nation’s oldest libraries and archives, we soon focused our collecting efforts on documenting twentieth-century social movements. The UMass Boston Archives now holds nearly one hundred collections of primary source materials about many different types of activism–from organizational records and personal papers to poster collections, photographs, and oral histories. Topics range from activism at the local level to national and international issues.
Student activism at UMass Boston is well documented in our Mass Media collection. While we hold a full run of the newspaper through the present, issues from 1966-2011 are digitized and searchable/browsable online. Student journalists at UMB have always done an incredible job of reporting on campus demonstrations and student-related concerns, just as they are doing in our present moment. Here are a few examples of notable points in Mass Media history:
- April 25, 1966: The first issue of the Mass Media mentions a student petition to establish a B.S. degree at UMass Boston.
- May 20, 1970: UMass Boston students go on strike in solidarity with hundreds of other college campuses across the U.S. after the Kent State shootings.
- April 9, 1980: Students stage a sit-in outside of the Chancellor’s office. Their demands include “the reversal of negative tenure decisions which students have labeled as racist.”
- April 23, 1991: Students, faculty, and staff protest a proposed 24% tuition increase at UMass Boston.
- October 11, 2011: “Stand Up, Fight Back.” Students and faculty participate in the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations in Boston.
“Iraq War: Wrong Way” poster, 2006. Stephen Lewis poster collection.
However, our collections are not limited to student activism. We hold historical materials on many social issues. Some highlights include:
Antiwar activism
- Central America Solidarity Association records
- Indochina Peace Campaign, Boston Office records
- Lexington Oral History Projects, Inc., Democracy and Dissent collection
Environmentalism
- Boston Urban Gardeners records and photographs (includes digitized content)
- Dorchester Recycling Volunteers records
- South End Lower Roxbury Open Space Land Trust records
Housing and tenants’ rights
- Boston Public Housing Tenants Policy Council records
- Columbia-Savin Hill Civic Association records
- Tent City Corporation records
Immigration and refugees
- Cuban Activists Archive (multiple collections)
- Massachusetts Catholic Order of Foresters records
- Southeast Asian Oral History Project records
Labor unions
- Boston School Bus Drivers Union collection (includes digitized content)
- Boston Teachers Union collection (includes digitized content)
- Faculty Staff Union records (includes digitized content)
LGBTQIA+ community
- Elizabeth Bouvier collection of radical and leftist posters
- NAMES Project: AIDS Memorial Quilt Boston Chapter records
Prison activism
Racial justice
- Haymarket People’s Fund records
- Massachusetts Rock Against Racism records (includes digitized content)
- Mel King papers
Transportation
- Ann Hershfang papers
- Southwest Corridor Project records
- Washington Street Corridor Coalition records
Women’s liberation
- Carol McEldowney papers (includes digitized content)
- Christina Bobel: Our Bodies, Ourselves research collection
- Judith Smith collection of socialist feminist publications
Boston Maid Company workers on strike, 1940s. Mass. Memories Road Show collection.
This list of activist collections is nowhere near comprehensive, so if you are looking for something not included here, please contact us at library.archives@umb.edu so that we can connect you with relevant resources. We can also schedule research appointments for you in the Archives Research Room (fifth floor of Healey Library) and recommend ways of incorporating primary sources into your teaching. Finally, if you have your own set of activist materials that need an archival home, we are always happy to discuss that with you! We collect primary source materials on social activism both on and off campus, dating from the twentieth century through the present, including current issues such as Black Lives Matter, Israel and Palestine, police violence, and abortion rights.
Please reach out to us anytime.
Jessica Holden
Associate Archivist for Research Services
Andrew Elder
University Archivist and Curator of Special Collections
